According to a poll released today by SurveyUSA, Donald Trump now narrowly leads all Democratic candidates for President.
* Trump 45%, Clinton 40%. (There is a 20-point Gender Gap; Trump leads by 18 points among seniors.)
* Trump 44%, Sanders 40%. (Trump leads by 10 among independents and by 6 among moderates.)
* Trump 44%, Biden 42%. (Trump leads by 10 among the best educated; Biden leads by 17 among the least educated.)
* Trump 44%, Gore 41%. (Trump leads by 12 among men and by 18 among voters age 50+.)Among a subset of registered voters who tell SurveyUSA that they pay “a lot” of attention to politics, the scale tilts to the right: Today it’s:
* Trump 54%, Clinton 36%.
* Trump 53%, Sanders 39%.
* Trump 53%, Biden 37%.
* Trump 54%, Gore 36%.
The margin of error was 3.3%.
Insofar as the accuracy of SurveyUSA polling is concerned, Nate Silver wrote an analysis of polling accuracy during the 2012 Presidential cycle.
In 2012 cycle SurveyUSA had an average error of 2.2 and a Republican bias (in the statistical sense) of 0.5. By comparison the numbers for the MassINC Polling Group in the same cycle were 3.1 and 3.1 (Republican), respectively.
To quote Silver:
Some automated polls that used innovative strategies got reasonably good results this year. SurveyUSA, for instance, supplements its automated calls to landlines with live calls to cellphone voters in many states.
That said, a look at the crosstabs gives Trump considerably more black and Latino support than I think is realistic; however that’s no reason for complacency.
Herewith the sampling:
SurveyUSA interviewed 1,000 USA adults 09/02/15 and 09/03/15. Of the adults, 900 were registered to vote. Of the registered voters, 58% (522) pay “a lot” of attention to politics. This survey was conducted using blended sample, mixed-mode. Respondents reachable on a home telephone (62% of registered voters) were interviewed on their home (landline) telephone in the recorded voice of a professional announcer. Respondents not reachable on a home telephone (38% of registered voters) were shown a question on their smartphone, tablet or other electronic device. Cell respondents, as is typically the case, vote more Democratic than do landline respondents. Among just the universe of cell-phone respondents, Clinton defeats Trump by 16 points; Sanders defeats Trump by 12 points; Biden defeats Trump by 17 points; and Gore defeats Trump by 17 points. The more cell-phone respondents a pollster includes in its “mix” of voters, the more Democratic the poll results will be.
… in this CNN/ORC Poll, released on August 19.
based on nationalist, xenophobic racism is a threat to our very progressive democratic way of life.
WAKE UP AND SPEAK OUT AMERICA BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE !
” In the end we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING
Fred Rich LaRiccia
…the media seem to like him as evidenced by constant coverage and lack of scrutiny. He is a showman manifesting nothing but swagger. It’s good to be confident, but if HRC just went around saying she would be the best and greatest President ever don’t you think the media would bash her relentlessly? First bubble that needs to be burst for Trump is “authenticity”. He is NOT authentic, but rather a panderer of the highest order. A cursory check of statements he has made over the years when not running for President would show that he is playing the base like a fiddle. Whoever does attack him though will need thick skin since he makes it personal quickly – just ask Megyn Kelly.
David Cay Johnston, a solid journalist, has written a great piece dealing with Donald Trump’s connections to the Mafia, his use of connections to get unfair tax breaks, and more.
Let people find out who Trump really is.
Trump is tied into the hate that folks have for government. Republicans promised trickle down, it failed. Democrats promised women’s reproductive rights and gay marriage……both won but Democratic voters still can’t pay the bills or save for a secure retirement. Trump is advertising high wages for workers (with NO specifics). And corporate media continues to ignore Bernie Sanders. Trump wins, nothing changes….Hillary wins, nothing changes….and by “nothing changes” I mean to those working stiffs who are just trying to get by.
Bernie Bernie Bernie
Nothing else matters.
I’ve seen plenty of Sanders coverage and things will change with HRC as President.
Morning Joe mentions Sanders on a few side comments. The New York Times hardly says much at all….and could you please tell me how or what things will change with HRC as president?
She talks about almost nothing else (except of course when she is forced to talk about her email habits) and has always been in my view (and I believe the views of others) more liberal than given credit for (including compared to her husband and the incumbent). PCCC has sent several emails rejoicing that she has “come around” to their view, though again I don’t think that requires as much movement on her part as some seem to insinuate. I’ve cited her “On The Issues” profile in the past. My Sanders coverage comes from MSNBC primetime.
it would make a lot more sense to compare her campaign talk to Obama’s campaign talk than to his actual record. Not that any of it is worth much. I have no confidence that she would be any more progressive than he has been.
He was pegged liberal because of his early opposition to Iraq, but the rhetoric was unity rather than storming the barricades. I think HRC understands that the party and nation have moved left and that she can get away with speaking and doing where I have always sensed is closer to her heart anyway.
He claimed to want single payer health-care, said he’d have the most transparent administration ever, would close the Guantanamo detention center, and a raft of other progressive issues he did not deliver on. Haven’t you been paying attention?
He never said that he would propose a single-payer system if elected POTUS. Congress has blocked closing Guantanamo.
It may have been the case that she was in the closet more towards the left all these years rather than a centrist. It could be that she was actually for same-sex marriage when she argued against it on the Senate floor. It could be that she was secretly against giving Bush the authority to invade Iraq when she voted for it. It could be that she was all along clandestinely against the War on Drugs and the giant mass incarceration state that she and her husband created in the 1990s. She may even right now be privately in her most intimate heart of hearts against Wall Street having control of the economy, against Super PACs and this legalized form of bribery that we see by lobbyists through campaign financing and lobbying, against exploitative trade agreements, against the fossil fuel industry, and for strengthening workers protections through heavy support of re-building of labor unions.
So, I guess we can all rest assured knowing that when the positions of the majority of the country moves far enough ahead on these issues towards progress, Hillary Clinton will delight us all by saying “Ta da, I actually support these positions too, guys!”
Fine. But, what good does that do for people who are struggling now?
Not exactly what you’d expect from a leader, is it?
Leader? Who needs leaders? It Takes a Village (TM) and various people working together to make the community a better place, then just the finishing touches of one triangulating Clinton to show up at the very end for the awards ceremony to announce
“Congratulations, villagers, you did it! Well, I just wanted to let you know that I was always supporting you in spirit, and I’m sure that that’s what got you to the point where you are now. Give yourself a pat on the back, and don’t forget to vote for me at the next tribal election!”
…including the President that signed DOMA. Her Iraq vote is completely understandable in context and I really do have every reason to believe that the items in the second half of your larger paragraph are true. Indications are that she was to the left of her husband on some of the social issues, but a First Lady isn’t likely to publicly contradict the President. In short, I absolutely stand by my previous comment.
The “evolve” language seems to apply mostly to opportunistic politicians who waited until equal marriage was a more popular position.
Obama’s “evolution” was certainly opportunistic. When running in Illinois in 1996, he supported equal marriage, but then moved to a “civil union but no marriage” position as his profile increased (and likely as advisors told him supporting equal marriage was too risky), and then came to support equal marriage in 2010 when it was a much more popular position nationally.
I agree with the other commenters. I’ll take Hillary over any of the Republicans without a doubt, but thinking that she is a strong liberal who will lead on these various issues as if this is where her heart truly is means you have to disregard her entire political history.
I keep seeing defenses given for Clinton such as “Yeah, but I changed my position too” and “Yeah, but Obama ‘evolved’ too.”
The difference is that (and I may be wrong, and perhaps someone can help educate me), some feelings are personal beliefs while others were political positions people took in regards to legislation that could hurt or protect LGBT people. Obama answered questions of how he felt personally and also said he was “evolving” (implying that it should be expected for him to come out in support of same-sex marriage, but that he was still testing the waters). That hesitance on this issue was indeed cringe-worthy, but it was not a legal action taken.
On overturning “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (thank you for leaving that to be fixed too, Clintons), and on overturning The Defense of Marriage Act, the Obama Administration took political action on behalf of protecting LGBT people (no matter what he said to an interviewer).
In case any of us forgot, the DOJ would not enforce DOMA either, prior to the Supreme Court decisions.
There are so many excuses supporters of Clinton give to encourage one to roll his/her eyes to the back of the head: it was the political climate – they couldn’t have success, they couldn’t tell the truth, they had to compromise, they had no idea what mass incarceration would turn into, they had no idea what NAFTA would result in, they had no idea what ending Glass-Steagel would do, etc.
And people seem not to get – and sadly I’ve not seen this argument made enough my skeptics of these arguments – but the Obama Admin had to fix not only the situation George W. Bush left us in, but also that the Clintons did. So, what’s ultimately the argument, Clinton boosters? Finally the political climate has changed enough in America so that the Clintons can be honest and after decades of political experience and serving in office won’t make the same kinds of colossal mistakes they made in the 90s?
Why should one family receive so many second chances?
Perhaps we’re living in a period where so many have grown disillusioned with Obama that we find it difficult to recall how disturbing it was when the Clintons failed again and again to deliver. And, it’s not only that the Clintons didn’t work hard enough to made America better, it’s that they also are responsible for implementing policies that made various social ills incredibly worse.
…and I see that most of them are financial institutions. What are these financial institutions buying with their money? How is one “liberal” and beholding to billionaires?
Where is she on a living wage? On universal health care? On changing the rules to allow workers easier access to collective bargaining?
…but my dinosaur of a computer was having trouble loading the pages. (Though I’m reminded how much people dismissed info from a campaign’s own website when I tried that for Boston 2024.) She has of course been on the universal health care bandwagon since 1993-1994. As a Senator from NY of course she is going to have big finance connections; they were her constituents too.
And in 2015, she’s still in their back pocket?
N/T
I am eager to hear more about what President Hillary Clinton will do in her first 100 days to improve life for working stiffs who are just trying to get by.
I’m looking to see her priorities, and I understand that it may take years or decades for the benefits of policy changes to accrue to working-class people. I understand about the “bully pulpit”, and I understand that resisting the Washington infrastructure is a Herculean political task.
Still, I want to know what specific changes she will make in tax policy, regulatory policy, spending programs, and so on. We are finishing eight years of inspiring speechifying and eloquent articulations of true-Blue Democratic principles from President Obama.
I want to hear what President Hillary Clinton will actually DO differently — differently from both Donald Trump and Barack Obama.
…whether President Trump (shutter) and President Clinton would do things differently? We really can do without the “not a dime’s worth of difference” nonsense!
Since nobody has said there’s “not a dime’s worth of difference” between Trump and Clinton, you can relax.
n/t
Here’s his final sentence:
Stating a desire to hear how two things differ is not an implication that there are no differences.
This response exemplifies the defensiveness that is so toxic.
What part of my last sentence was difficult to understand?
Your response leaves the impression that you don’t even want the question asked, never mind answered. Why would any supporter of Ms. Clinton be so defensive about such questions?
This ought to be a home-run pitch that supporters of Ms. Clinton should hit out of the park.
Asking about differences from Obama, Sanders, or her husband are legit, but Trump, the perfect embodiment of 1% wealth AND attitude?
Three is plenty of Trump-like attitude among the rest of us 99℅. Therein is the problem.
Let’s recap:
1. This is a diary about the standing of Donald Trump among Democratic voters.
2. This is a thread started by a comment observing recent history, suggesting (correctly or incorrectly) that neither Donald Trump nor Hillary Clinton will do anything for “working stiffs just trying to get by”, and promoting Bernie Sanders as the candidate who will make a difference for those “working stiffs”.
3. You responded with an un-elaborated claim that “things will change” with Hillary Clinton as president.
4. Two participants, johntmay and myself, asked you to elaborate what specifically Ms. Clinton will do differently.
Your response to me was to attack me for asking the question!
I offered the question again, and your second response was non-responsive. Why is asking what Hillary Clinton would do different from Donald Trump not “legit” on a diary discussing Donald Trump’s popularity among Democrats?
Another front-paged diary about Donald Trump, notes several areas where Mr. Trump takes a posture very different from the GOP (paraphrasing):
– “raise taxes on corporations that he believes do not act in the best interests of the US”
– “impose tariffs on American companies that put their factories in other countries”
– “change laws that allow American companies to benefit from cheaper tax rates by using mergers to base their operations outside the United States.”
– “the entire two-party system as we know it is corrupt, and it’s time for something else”
– “favors ‘imposing Smoot-Hawley-style tariffs’
That thread suggests that Mr. Trump is offering “a peculiarly American fascism”. My question remains what comparable actions does Ms. Clinton support or propose?
Or even, failing that, what do YOU anticipate Ms. Clinton supporting or proposing?
I think this question is not only “legit”, I think it is crucial during a time when American public opinion seems to be shifting towards support for Mr. Trump.
I think it’s time to stop ducking questions like this and time to stop attacking fellow Democrats who ask them.
I guess I’m just a bit sensitive to what I see as implications regarding purity that I get from some Sanders supporters similar to some Berwick supporters in last year’s campaign. I don’t have all the answers at my fingertips and looking them up requires more patience with my computer than I often have. (It’s an older machine that takes several seconds to process website loads and link clicks.) Trump has deviated on some things from the GOP line, which may explain crossover appeal, but why he won’t likely be the nominee as well. I’m not trying to claim that HRC is to Sanders’ left, but she is hardly a DINO either.
I also think I’m looking for something different than maybe others are. For me the presidency is in the words of Michael Dukakis, about “competence, not ideology”. I look for the person best prepared to be President, hence HRC now and in 2008 and Kerry in 2004, but am more open to pushing left for Congress, hence O’Reilly over the same Kerry in 2008 and Eldridge in the 2007 CD5 special.
I’m one of those Sanders and Berwick supporters, and I understand the reasons for supporting Clinton (or Coakley) and many I think are very good. Those reasons, however, do not include arguments that that candidate will be a very strong progressive in office on many of the most important issues.
Speaking just for myself, I don’t criticize other candidates for failing on one or two issues (admittedly Sanders stinks on guns and on Mideast issues related to Israel, in my opinion), but when supporters of certain candidates say that candidate will be great on certain issues, with very little evidence to support those arguments, questions and criticism are deserved. I don’t think Clinton is a DINO. I think she is a mainstream Democrat. That’s certainly preferable to any Republican, but as a progressive, I think we can do better. In this primary, we have an option to do better, so I will advocate for that, and pushback when position-based arguments for Clinton are made and hold little water.
I’m looking for who will do the job well. Many people can do the job, but few do it well. I’m especially weary of candidates with long public careers as centrists expecting them to be something different in a higher office. For me, someone with a long and very successful career as a legislator who has continuously supported and won battles for progressive positions easily meets the competence threshold but also shows the potential for being a better president.
(And as an aside, if the same competence not ideology argument held for a governor’s race, Berwick’s background in management, especially public services management pushed down on the competence lever at least as much if not more than another candidate’s law enforcement experience.)
I think that’s perhaps a good way of wording things. The way I saw it, a big reason that Dukakis got creamed in the presidential election (and I should say that over the years I spent a lot of time working for him) was that he ran on the slogan “we can do better”. That’s the slogan of a middle manager. Maybe even a very good middle manager.
But people don’t vote for middle managers for president. They want someone with vision, someone with values. And for far too long the Democratic party has largely come across as a party of middle managers, while the Republican party has been a party of vision and values. Terrible vision and values, to be sure — racist, misogynist, homophobic, xenophobic, anti-teacher, anti-union, economically and socially reactionary. But these *are* values, at any rate. And if one party is giving you values — no matter how rotten — and the other party is saying “we’re good managers”, well, in my experience, the values always win.
Well, maybe not absolutely always. The other thing Democrats tend to do is to say, “look how awful the Republicans are”. And that’s true. And it does sway some votes, and even some elections. But the problem is that over the long run, it drives the Democratic party, and the national political discourse itself, ever further to the right. Bad values have to be countered with good ones. We all know, by and large, what good values are; the kind of values that speak to what is best in all of us, that bring us together, that honor the dignity of labor and and the diversity of all of our fellow citizens. We need to support candidates who explicitly — not in code — express these values.
That was doubleman’s most salient point above, and I also agree with Christopher that it makes sense to vote for the candidate you like in the primary who is the most progressive. I try and back the most liberal candidate whom I like in every primary, it’s why I backed Berwick and why I back Sanders. Save the “but the Republicans are worse” argument for the general-it’s already the bulk of the Clinton pitch and it’s something I’ve long grown immune to. We can cross that bridge when we get to it, for now, in my view, Sanders is the best progressive in the race and he is making democratic socialism in America totally mainstream. For those reasons he has my vote.
Like Bernie, Carl Sciortino excited me more than Katherine Clark, like Katherine Clark, Clinton could end up surprising me with how awesome she is. Part of the primary process is about forcing these comparisons into the open and addressing the early-our party is the better for it when it does.
I have found that businessmen like Trump hate government specifically because it is “of the people”. They like the days of certainty when they could simply pay an official a bribe to get access to whatever they needed. They hate the idea of a room full of “common” people guiding their fate based on their own opinions.
These businessmen have portrayed government as corrupt, evil and expensive, but the truth is that it is simply not corrupt enough for them. They want to be able to do whatever they want, and they don’t want anyone to have the power to stop them.
Black and Latino voters are not necessarily social progressives. Some of the non-support by black men in the gay marriage debate and the large numbers of pro-life Catholics among Latinos are only two examples of this.
And that is all that Democrats stand for any more in the public eye – even in your post all you come up with is ‘women’s health care’ aka abortion.
The black/Latino tabs may be more accurate than you think.
…as I mentioned here and here, but even black conservatives are on the whole anti-Republican.
Due to the racialized rhetoric used by Trump when addressing immigration (and the tacit assent by other Republican candidates), the same is true within Latino electorates. The issue is not so much ideological as it is a response to a direct and personalized threat.
Hence I think that black/Latino support is overstated.
And, for what it’s worth, Latino Catholics are somewhat more liberal than you might think.
But note that I said “liberal” not “progressive”.
The facts, on the other hand, demonstrate that Latinos are at least as supportive of LGBT rights as whites, and that holds true for most social issues.
African American voters have been moving dramatically fast toward supporting marriage equality, with a firm majority now in support. They’re considerably more likely to support marriage equality than, say, Republicans.
voters are just ready to leap to the Party with the racist rhetoric and voter suppression strategies. Particularly in this election which will be all about marriage equality.
No, Blacks and Latinos are not monoliths. Many African Americans are religious–some conservatively so. Clinton is more than twice as popular as any Republican running for President.
The best part about the GOP candidates is, to know, know, know them is to like, like, like them less, less, less:
…does Trump lead Biden among the best educated? I was counting on the best educated to see through his nonsense.
They self-report themselves as best educated. Isn’t that expected? They are Trump supporters!
In NYRB, Michael Tomasky called him “conservative resentment made flesh.” I’m more worried about a possilbe Kasich-Rubio ticket. We don’t see a demagogue of Trump’s stature every election cycle. It’s amazing. There’s too much politics between now and the primaries and all kinds of party GOP machinations to play out between now and then. If there’s any reason to be afraid, it’s the fact that our country–and one of our two major parties–is crazy enough to show so much interest in The Donald or that the GOP bench that was supposed to be so deep that is filled with know-nothings. Or that the Republican Party is now captive to a news network, a billionaire, and a bunch of people who have more in common with the John Birch Society than the GOP of 50 years ago.
Polls this early, as Paul acknowledges, have no predictive value. But they do offer an existential WTF. Krugman’s the only voice in the MSM pointed out how crazy the GOP is nation-wide. (Partisan as I am, I can’t say the same for Charlie Baker who is governing as a refreshing throwback).
Biden’s not going to run. He’s spent the last couple of weeks talking to people who are asking him why he wants to bother getting into the election. He’s got no money and no organization, and Hillary has the endorsements sewn up. It’s going to be Hillary and a few also-ran’s.
We have great candidates, but DWS and the DNC aren’t letting them get in front of the screen as a group and speak about their priorities for America, in contrast to the GOP.
The Republican Primary is getting massive coverage and so much of that is about the debates, and there’s absolute crickets coming from the Democratic Party on that front.
We could be going up there once every 3-4 weeks with Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley and others, talking about their record of helping millions of people, and talking about why Donald Trump, Jeb Bush and Scott Walker would be horrible for this country.
But we aren’t giving the American voting public that second choice, so Donald Trump and the Republican Party are getting the full stage.
It’s wrong and it’s hurting us, and if DWS won’t immediately change course, she needs to be sent packing.
The Republican field may not be a circular firing squad, but it’s doing the eventual Republican ticket some damage. The farther Trump brings the GOP field to the knuckle-dragging right, the better for our eventual candidate.
Standard rule of campaigns — if your opponent is killing himself, don’t get in the way. The Republican Party is in a determined race for incompetence (build a border wall with Canada) and racism (dark skin=racist). They are alienating an entire generation of voters, with enthusiasm. And you’re whining that nobody is trying to interrupt that clown show to push headlines of Hillary or Bernie having coffee with Iowa voters?
DWS and company are doing a great job holding their fire and letting their opponent dig a hole. You don’t waste your best stuff 14 months before the vote.
It’s 6 months before a vote, and we haven’t even had a debate yet. The issues of the campaign are being defined — and it’s not our issues. Our candidates are being defined — and, in Hillary’s case at least, not in a good way.
What’s happening now is bad, and not easy to recover from.
I think a few people need to go back and watch The American President again, because Bob Rumson is the only one doing the talking here.
You were describing the work the Democrats need to do in order to raise their prominence through the Republican noise — that’s general election stuff. From May to November it will be elephant v. donkey all you want. I’m happy letting the elephant bang its head into the wall for the time being.
States like NH and MA also allow unenrolleds to vote in primaries so in some ways we do need to compete with Republicans early. If people hear nothing but the GOP message it will be harder for us to break through.
He’s a megolomaniac, sure..but he reminds me on some level of the Richard Pryor character in the 80’s flick “Brewster’s Millions”, who runs for mayor as “None of the Above” then quits on election eve. His eyes seem to be laughing at us- and himself- more often than not.
My dad, a pretty conservative, somewhat old-school Boston white guy, thinks he’s ridiculous. I highly doubt he’ll ever be president.
Donald’s loving the crowds now, but I’m not sure he has the stamina for the four rallies in a day the run-up to Super Tuesday requires. I see him finding an excuse to quit in a snit like Ross Perot did.
He’ll be fired by primary and caucus voters.
Trump’s problme right now is that he’s gaining popularity from more moderate, more disillusioned voters. They don’t vote in the Iowa caucus, in the New Hampshire primary, or on Super Tuesday.
Not only does he have the RNC working against him, he’s got math working against him. He’ll get squeezed out despite his popularity*, which really primes him for a third-party candidacy. Even if he doesn’t run on his own brand, he’ll still manage to discourage his current-day fans from voting, which methinks helps HRC a heck of a lot more than Kasich et al.
* maybe he’ll still be popular in April 2016. TBD.
It’s one thing to lead a poll, it’s another to have primary voters vote for you.
And his only competition — the only person who’s even close in Iowa — is Bob Carson, who’s had zero scrutiny as of yet and is going no where fast.
And ole Bob Carson has had even less scrutiny than Ben (no relation). I wish him the best. 😉
Mea culpa.
I hope you don’t mind, but I screencapped it and shared it on Twitter.
Agreed, BTW, all though in a sense what he represents is no laughing matter, I’ve continued to be skeptical of how much this isn’t just all one giant gag by him (and possibly in tandem with the Clintons). Granted, I won’t pretend that the idea was mine.
Glad you liked it 🙂
And, that’s the biggest problem we have. We have deeply flawed candidates. We’ve got HRC. Sure, great qualifications. BUT, not a very good candidate as she proved in 2008, and seems bent on proving again; distrusted by many true progressives; hawkish on foreign/military policy; too cozy with Wall Street. On top of that she has very, very high negatives/unfavorables for a front runner. We’ve got Bernie. He’s not a Democrat and he’ll have a very hard time winning a national election against a credible Republican. Webb and O’Malley are largely unknown and neither one, from what’ve seen, are good enough at getting their message out or raising money. Oh, I almost forgot… Lincoln Chafee. If the Republicans get their heads out of their butts, and we stick with this field of Democrats, we may lose. I hope HRC comes around, but I see little evidence, in this go-round, that she’s managing a campaign operation well enough to win a national election.
I see a very solid field of candidates that we can be proud of, to wit:
A former activist state and national First Lady, Senator, and SoS
A current Senator, former Congressman, and former Mayor
A former Governor and Mayor
A former Governor and Senator
A former Senator and Secretary of the Navy
Potentially, the incumbent Veep and former Senator (who has chaired Foreign Relations and Judiciary
Of those, Clinton and Biden, even if they don’t win, I believe of earned their place among the ranks of what I call “the Great Almosts – those who tried a couple times and didn’t get the top prize, but held several other high-ranking offices and were very influential nonetheless (other examples might be Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, or more recently Bob Dole).
To be fair on paper the GOP has a solid field too. Even Rachel Maddow pointed this out. Numerous current and former Governors and Senators are seeking their nomination, but can’t seem to nudge aside the clown who calls everyone and everything he encounters a disaster.
You’re right, we must have different versions of “great candidates.” I don’t see a solid field at all. I see a field that’s quite weak because many people decided to sit-it-out because HRC was supposed to be “inevitable.” Maybe she’ll turn out to be “inevitable” and put it all together. I hope so but remain unconvinced at this time that she will run a great national campaign with a clearly articulated, compelling progressive message that can motivate the base, and sufficient numbers of independent voters necessary to win. If you put the names with the resumes you outlined, I see little reason, as a progressive Democrat, to be proud of the field—at all. At the moment, with HRC’s inability to move past the e-mail/server deal, I find the pool depressingly shallow.
….when I say great candidate it means it great that person is running because he or she would make a good President. Others seem to mean literally that said person is good at RUNNING for office. The curse of democracy is that running for office and holding office are very different skill sets. I tend to overlook weaknesses as a candidate if I think the person would do well in the office. OTOH I’m less impressed by running great campaigns if I’m not convinced the person would not be the best to hold office. Hence Dean in 2004 and Obama in 2008, two people that the base went gaga over how they campaigned, were not my choices.
BTW, as a progressive Dem what is your problem with Sanders? Methinks your standards might be impossibly high.
My problem with Sanders is that he loses a national election. Maybe I’m wrong about that… He hasn’t been a Democrat for very long (ever?). I probably agree with him on most issues except gun control but I’d have a hard time voting for someone who cannot win. I reserve my right to vote for him and think he’s running a good campaign so far. Better or worse, you have to be a good candidate to win. Your take sort of ignores the reality of the situation — you’ve got to run for it if you want to hold the office. For that reason, I tend to look for candidates who I think will run a very strong campaign and be a good candidate. Subjective? Yes, to a degree, but that’s one of my criteria.
Why does Sanders lose a national election? Because his platform isn’t what Americans are looking for? I’m not so sure of that. Look at his platform:
* Income and Wealth Inequality
* Getting Big Money Out of Politics
* Creating Decent Paying Jobs
* Racial Justice
* Fighting for Women’s Rights
* A Fair and Humane Immigration Policy
* A Living Wage
* Real Family Values
* Climate Change & Environment
* Reforming Wall Street
Those are reasonable issues that the country is concerned with.
The thing is, Bernie Sanders knows how to speak to each of those issues in a down-to-earth way that people connect with. Take Income and Wealth Inequality. “Socialism!”, they will say to him. And he’ll come back and say
Amen! And then he’ll outline his plan to change this:
And he has a bunch more – I just got tired of copying.
Hillary’s issues are more bread-and-butter Democratic issues which Republicans have been inoculating against (or even agreeing with) for decades:
Honestly, I see Hilary Clinton as a slightly more conservative Obama term #3. Obama hasn’t been horrible, but he has been Republican-lite in many ways, and both he and Hilary are pushing the same old singular Democratic prescription for our country: everyone simply needs more education to be able to join in the economy, and we’ll give you some child care in return. And we’ll “Stand up to Putin” and “defeat ISIS”, whatever that means (and it sounds like war to me).
I note that the proposals from Bernie Sanders are very similar to those offered by Donald Trump. In a matchup between the two of them, I hope that disaffected independent voters will choose Bernie Sanders over Donald Trump because of Mr. Trump’s fundamental insanity.
And I hear you. But, I think that age, socialism and lack of a regional base work against Sanders in a national election. I’m also a little concerned about whether African-Americans will turn out and support him to the same degree that they would likely turn out for HRC, Biden, or perhaps other Democrats. I would also like to hear Sanders express more of a positive view of what the future holds, rather than identify (correctly, I agree) the problems that we face as a nation. That’s something that Trump is going to struggle with too. Although I’m shocked by how well Trump is doing, I still don’t think he makes it through. I think that ultimately, the base of the Republican party that actually shows up and votes in the primary will sort it out between Rubio, Bush, Kasich, and Walker.
I’m pretty sure she is not campaigning on removing business regulations, tax cuts for businesses, and less regulation on banks. In fact she has spoken in very much the opposite terms. Also, except for the military stuff I don’t see the GOP agreeing or making their peace with what you have copied.
They were listed under her issues page. I paraphrased them since I couldn’t copy the text easily, but those words are used. Tax cuts, removal of regulation.
…but this page also refers to reining in Wall Street.
I tend to agree that Mr. Sanders loses a national election to a reasonable GOP candidate (such as Jeb Bush). I don’t like to admit that, but I have to reluctantly agree with it.
On the other hand, I think Mr. Sanders wins against Donald Trump. If he doesn’t, then I’m not sure how long I want to keep living here — I’m not sure I want to live in any nation that chooses Donald Trump over Bernie Sanders.
I don’t think Mr. Sanders has ever affiliated with the Democratic Party (at least, while he’s been on the national stage). He was first a Socialist, then an independent who caucused with the Democrats.
In today’s toxic political environment, I think Mr. Sander’s posture may be an advantage over Donald Trump. I think his presence during the primary season will keep the “Warren agenda” (progressive populism) front and center in the news cycle, and I think that will help Hillary Clinton win the general election if she is the nominee (assuming a reasonable GOP nominee).
I agree that the other Democratic candidates are relatively weak.
My main anxiety at the moment is what happens in a matchup between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.
That would be fascinating. I don’t see it, but who the heck knows?
It sounds like you are saying that anyone who can win isn’t progressive enough for you and anyone progressive enough for you probably can’t win.
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EW is progressive enough for me, and I think that she could win. If we’ve got Clinton and Sanders, I think that they both would have a hard time winning.
A few decades ago, I launched a venture-funded startup with L. John Doerr as our lead investor. One of his favorite lines, that I heard often, was “your best deal is the one on the table”.
The deal on the table for the Democrats is the candidates now in the race. Regardless of how weak or strong Elizabeth Warren might be as a presidential candidate (my bias is that she is many times more effective right where she is than as either a candidate or as President), Ms. Warren is not a candidate.
I like Bernie Sanders more than any of the other candidates. If Ms. Clinton becomes our nominee, I like her more than any Republican.
I”m profoundly uncomfortable with “electability” arguments, especially at this stage in a campaign. Deval Patrick was unelectable until he was the Democratic front-runner. For some, even then, he was unelectable until he was elected.
I agree that it will be very hard for Bernie Sanders to win against any candidate other than Donald Trump. Interestingly, I think Hillary Clinton can readily beat any candidate other than Donald Trump. The recent and long-belated tax proposal from Jeb Bush exemplifies this — it is a stale rehash of failed GOP dogma enthusiastically promoted by stale GOP economists like the now-descredited (except by the GOP) Arthur Laffer. When Bernie Sanders attacks it, it will be easy to dismiss his criticisms as “radical left-wing socialist nonsense”. When Hillary Clinton attacks it, such dismissals will be far less damaging. Even though the individuals are different, the stellar performance of the economy under Bill Clinton will be compared to the abysmal performance under both Jeb Bush’s father and then brother. Ms. Clinton will benefit from those comparisons (rightly or wrongly).
The wild card in all this is Donald Trump. The skillset required to successfully counter Donald Trump in a hard-fought campaign is, I strongly suspect, very foreign to Hillary Clinton and very familiar to Bernie Sanders. Bernie Sanders has been winning elections for decades where his opponents derided his “radical left-wing socialism” (and worse). One key difference between the candidates is that, historically, Hillary Clinton has adjusted her political stances to at least appear more “centrist”. Bernie Sanders has stood his ground and demonstrated why his proposals work better.
In a contest between Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, my money is on Bernie Sanders. In a contest between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, I don’t have the foggiest idea — positive or negative — of what might happen. If she wins, it will be a Hillary Clinton we haven’t seen before.
The primary season is shaping up to be more interesting than I thought possible a few short weeks ago.
I was only pointing out to Christopher that there are Democrats out there who I think are electable who are progressive enough for me. I wasn’t saying anything about EW running or not. Only that she’s progressive enough for me and I think that she’s electable nationally. Electability arguments are tough, I agree, but I see no way around factoring that in (for me, at least).
This is an awful lot of hand-wringing for so early.
The guy is a nativist populist, which is not a new phenomenon in American politics, and isn’t some turn into Weimar Republic darkness. He gets a lot of traction because a big chunk of the Republican base– the “lunch bucket” working class– who were once Democrats, then Reagan Democrats, and are now just “Republicans”– regard illegal immigration as a big issue. They are not wrong to do so, in my view, because the presence of undocumented workers must exert downward pressure on wages.
They also know that Big Business Establishment Republicans want to make a lot of noise about this, but maintain the status quo, which is why, in my view, the various things that Trump has said that should have ended his candidacy have had no effect. The more he talks about his wall while insulting Rubio and Bush, the better.
But while nativist populism is, was, and likely always will be a significant strain in American politics, it has a ceiling. So while I don’t see Trump going anywhere anytime soon, I don’t see him as the nominee. And I do see him causing the eventual GOP nominee to take positions that can be neatly exploited by a competent Democratic nominee, which the Clinton camp certainly is.
I agree with most of this (hence my uprate).
I disagree that the presence of undocumented workers “must exert downward pressure on wages”. If there is downward pressure on wages, I suggest it is caused by:
1. Consumers who have so little wealth that they won’t or can’t pay high enough prices to allow employers to pay living wages
2. Small business employers who are so squeezed that they won’t or can’t living wages and maintain profit margins they can live with.
Neither of those is caused by undocumented workers. Both are the direct result of the accelerating wealth concentration that besets us.
“Illegal immigrants” are just another scapegoat, invented by the right-wing to distract attention from the real cause of the malaise that 99% of the country feels.
I don’t think that lack of consumer wealth necessarily causes lowers wages. My company, like many others, has outsourced its janitorial services. 30 years ago they would have had these people on the payroll, but that is simply not the prevailing way of doing things now. They now send the work to the lowest bidder, and the lowest bidder gets the lowest bid by squeezing his employees. This means the janitors at my company get minimum wage and no benefits despite my company having good wages and good benefits.
We have no ability to change this. All the janitorial companies are in competition with each other over price, so they’re all bottom feeding the same way. We could try and pay our company more money for the service, but the owner would simply take this as profit. There really is no way to et these janitors more money except to hire them ourselves, but HR doesn’t want to deal with the realities of lower wage workers and the issues they bring (like transience).
The wage thing seems more structural than anything. Workers are interchangeable and have zero bargaining power. They can either take the minimum wage or be unemployed.
My former company was the same way. When I started even the cafeteria workers were full-time, had health care and pensions. Regional competition within the US began to show that “non-essential” workers ex janitors, could be paid less and new factories could be sited where costs were lower. Now that competition is global, factories can be sent overseas where even essential workers are worth less.
At one time my company made a product which required the operator to wear a hazmat suit, with extensive ventilation for the machine. That product is now made in China under an open air tin shed where the worker gets a surgery mask.
If you want to see the future go to the food court at Foxwoods. There are kiosks where you order your food. There are no lines (plenty of kiosks), you’re not feeling hurried by the clerk, and your order is correct. The kiosks don’t get $15 an hour.The human interaction is the person who hands you your tray of food, they may be looking into getting rid of them.
As consumers we can slow down the trend, I won’t use self check out at Home Depot so the clerks can keep their job, but the pattern of commerce in the future is going to accelerate wage inequality.
I happen to think that this is “the ice sheet is expanding!!” reality denial, and I think the view is prevalent among Democratic Party Stalwarts because those folks are in significant measure the sort of suburban, well-educated professionals who are immune to the problem– but who also definitely want the lawn around their Prius in the driveway to be tended for $1000 for the whole season; who want their hardwood floors done cheap, quickly, and tomorrow; and who like really cheap California produce, even the organic kind at Whole Foods. Who wants to pay $30 for a pint of strawberries, anyway?
You can get a manicure in NYC for $10. That makes “documented” manicurists unemployed, and anyone who employs them out of business.
It is probably good for the overall “economy” (in the Wall Street sense) that this be so–downward pressure on wages is a pillar, along with technology, of the huge and seemingly perpetual productivity gains upon which our economy depends.
But I don’t think one can honestly deny that it utterly screws the non-professional, non-educated working class. Nor that downward pressure at the bottom also affects wages up the scale. It is a difficult conflict of liberal values, which explains the la, la, la “that doesn’t exist” magical thinking about it on the left, and the inclination to pretend that basic economics somehow doesn’t apply. In that sense it is a little like the politicians of the 1980s railing against powerful and wealthy Columbian drug lords, without ever stopping to consider just who was buying the product that produced all that wealth.
Republicans make noise but do nothing, which is why though the people most affected are Republicans, they are disaffected Republicans. Hence the appeal of The Donald, and the limit of that appeal.
For me, this discussion will be more constructive if it is informed by some data.
Specifically, I’d like see how documented vs undocumented fits into the mechanisms you describe. I recall the persuasive (to me) clip a few years ago of the Arizona farm worker organizer gesturing to the buses waiting to take farm workers to the fields, and saying “these buses leave every morning. There’s plenty of union-scale work for anybody, including Anglos, who want it”.
I’d like to see evidence that the immigration status of workers at the bottom plays a significant role in the process you describe. To the extent that it does, I’d also like to see data that measures the role played by the totally broken government systems for becoming and staying properly documented.
I enthusiastically agree with you that downward pressure on wages is a pillar of our current economy. I remain unconvinced that illegal immigrants are more than (a) a symptom and (b) scapegoats.
Let’s get rid of them all and see if wages go up. 🙂
I think CMD is making a point that it is a real perception problem, and one the Democrats, with the exception of Bernie Sanders in my view, have done a poor job articulating that they are on the same side as workers. Immigration reform has become an essential goal of the progressive movement, with even unions joining in the fight, but the question of what the right kind of reform is barely scratches the service. I do not want a mere guest worker program that helps folks like the Koch brothers without doing anything to alleviate the exploitation undocumented workers face.
On the other hand, those undocumented workers and their contribution to the economy is merely a symptom of the kind of reckless, Wall Street oriented economy we have been conducting for the past 30-40 years. I completely agree with Tom about that. They are symptoms of a globalized economy unchecked by fair market regulations, and convenient scapegoats for folks like Donald Trump who have made and are eager to protect vast fortunes built on this status quo.
The old joke still applies, a Wall Street exec, a white working stiff, and a Mexican are sitting at the table with a dozen donuts. The Wall Street exec steals 11, turns to the white working stiff and says ‘that Mexican is gonna take your donut’ and leaves. That’s the argument. It even fits on a baseball hat. Undocumented workers are unfair competitors with blue collar workers in many industries, we can’t deny that, but the playing field they are playing on is designed to be unlevel and unfair and we can lift the fortunes and rights of both groups up by leveling it.