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Brexit will be abandoned	0 votes - 0 %
Brexit will go ahead	5 votes - 100 %
-	0 votes - 0 %
Republican party will turn away from populism	1 vote - 20 %
Republican party will not turn away from populism	4 votes - 80 %
-	0 votes - 0 %
Jeremy Corbyn will lose leadership	0 votes - 0 %
Jeremy Corbyn will remain Labour leader	4 votes - 80 %

5 Total Votes

There's a room where the light won't find you | 13 comments (13 topical, 0 hidden)

A bit alarmist by ucblockhead (4.00 / 3) #1 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 02:14:03 AM EST

While Trump is does a better in online polls, he's still losing pretty badly according to them. Also, beware thinking in national percentages in US elections as they are entirely meaningless.

The Republican party leadership knows what most politically savvy know: That the Republican lead in the house is structural, primarily due to gerrymandering in the 2010 redistricting. Whether they will be able to control the populist elements of their party is another matter entirely. You are treating the Republican populist elements like savvy political wonks...they aren't. They are true believers who will use roughly the same line, win or lose. That's why the Republican party leadership is so screwed.

No one expects a Goldwater loss because the conditions for a Goldwater loss are simply not here. The nation was far less divided then and votes could swing much more dramatically then than they do now. Goldwater lost that badly because he lost the Republican liberal wing while Johnson mostly kept hold of the conservative Democrats. Those two things don't exist now.
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[ucblockhead is] useless and subhuman

And the economy favors Trump by lm (4.00 / 3) #2 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 08:04:04 AM EST

All things being held equal, the GOP should have a slight edge this election cycle. The economy is doing well but not well enough to favor the incumbent party. That in itself suggests that the race should be tighter than what it is.

And Clinton's large negative favorability ratings make her a weaker than usual candidate despite her formidable political skills on the organizational front.

That Trump is so far behind in the polls speaks volumes to his unsuitability as a candidate It's almost like out of a field of 20, the GOP picked the one candidate who is almost guaranteed to lose to Clinton.

Kindness is an act of rebellion.

[ Parent ]

Yes by ucblockhead (4.00 / 1) #3 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 11:23:46 AM EST

And of course the Republican establishment knows this, and never in a million years would have picked him.
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[ucblockhead is] useless and subhuman

[ Parent ]

They might as well have by lm (4.00 / 2) #4 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 02:28:35 PM EST

I don't know whose idea it was to not lean harder on the candidates to drop out before Iowa. Or, at the very least, to find some mechanism to wean the heard before people started voting.

Kindness is an act of rebellion.

[ Parent ]

What they need... by ana

(4.00 / 1) #5 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 03:19:41 PM EST

...is to spend more effort suppressing the vote of Republican would-be primary voters, and less on general election voters.

Or get rabies. Also don't do that. --scrymarch

[ Parent ]

: What I'd like to see ... by lm (4.00 / 1) #6 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 03:46:54 PM EST

... is someone work out a form of a jungle primary that works across multiple states so that we have a mechanism that produces just two candidates for the November election yet still respects individual states as entities in their own right.
Kindness is an act of rebellion.
[ Parent ]

Like everyone else... by ucblockhead (4.00 / 1) #7 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 04:25:12 PM EST

they didn't take him as a serious threat and were planning for things to happen like 2012, with the voters reluctantly settling on Jeb! or someone like him.
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[ucblockhead is] useless and subhuman

[ Parent ]

That's almost a fair point by lm (4.00 / 1) #8 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 06:04:09 PM EST

But even if Trump were absent from the race, I don't see how they thought that anything close to a consensus candidate could emerge from such a broad field.

Honestly, Cruz as the nominee wouldn't have been much better.

Kindness is an act of rebellion.

[ Parent ]

Well again by ucblockhead (4.00 / 1) #9 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 07:33:52 PM EST

That's what happened in 2012. They started out with 13-15 candidates, many of them frankly loony tunes, then the field thinned out as each of the crackpots flamed out until they were left with Romney, a candidate that was seen as just as lackluster as Jeb! was in February. I think the establishment expected that to happen again. I'm not saying it was smart, just what they expected.

Whether Cruz would have done better or worse without a Trump in the race is an interesting question.
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[ucblockhead is] useless and subhuman

[ Parent ]

: I don't think it's an interesting question by lm (4.00 / 1) #10 Sun Sep 04, 2016 at 11:43:03 PM EST

I highly doubt much of Trump's backing would have went to Bush or Graham or Rubio or Kasich or any of the other establishment figures in the race if Trump were not in it. They would have either stayed at home or been in the corner of Cruz or one of the other challengers of the establishment.
And, well, 2012 was cluster-fuck for the GOP just like this cycle only a hair bit smaller in magnitude. Despite the "autopsy" the message that the rank and file carried away from 2012 was that they lose if they don't elect a "real" conservative.
Kindness is an act of rebellion.
[ Parent ]

picked the one candidate ... guaranteed to lose by wiredog (4.00 / 1) #11 Tue Sep 06, 2016 at 06:45:41 AM EST

They did that in the Virginia governor's race. The Democrats settled on McAuliffe, who is a long-time Clinton operative and widely regarded (fairly or not) as being as honest as Hillary. So who did the Republicans nominate? Bolling, who could get the support of most independents and many Democrats? Of course not! They nominated Cuccinelli, who drove turnout up among Democrats, and who convinced many white women in the suburbs to vote against him.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}

[ Parent ]

I'm still dumbfounded that McAuliffe won that race by lm (4.00 / 1) #13 Tue Sep 06, 2016 at 06:33:08 PM EST

But that may just be me projecting. McAuliffe is one of the Clinton tribe that I dislike very much.

Kindness is an act of rebellion.

[ Parent ]

: He won because Cuccinell was a whack job by wiredog (4.00 / 1) #14 Wed Sep 07, 2016 at 08:17:51 AM EST

Cuccinelli makes Ted Cruz look all moderate and statesman-like. Cuccinelli was well to the right of many Republicans in Virginia.

Earth First!
_{(We can strip mine the rest later.)}
[ Parent ]

There's a room where the light won't find you | 13 comments (13 topical, 0 hidden)


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