Serious 2020 Democratic Primary Thread

[Celticpride]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...ble-with-sanders-at-top-of-ticket/ar-BB10qGy2

Pelosi supported single payer as far back as 1993 as well it seems. Interesting that her and chuck have both made positive comments (well not positive but standard no rocking the boat speaker stuff) towards Bernie recently.

 

[vonFiedler]

They have to come to terms with the inevitable or they're going to get four more years of Trump. Republican politicians hated Trump until it was obvious he would get the ticket, now they look the other way when criminal charges are brought against him. All of these kinds of people want power and their seats over anything else.

 

[UncleSam]

Ya for any Dem to openly say they dislike Sanders at this point would be political suicide. Once your party has a presumptive nominee you stand behind that nominee no matter what because otherwise you'll just lose along with everyone else in your party.

 

[Chou Toshio]

So Biden probably going to win in South Carolina. My understanding though is that he hasn’t campaigned in any Super Tuesday states for a month. Will the lack of ground game matter?

edit: TBH though I’m not sure. Most of these polls have very small samples of young people— this is because in 2016 only 7% under 25, and only 14% 25-40. Of the youth do come out, the final numbers could look totally different. Add in the likely softness of dryer voters— too many variables to account for.

 

[Machoke]

SC polls also undersample older black voters traditionally. Plus if Steyer's soft support goes down which it likely will, more of his voters are likely to go to Biden than to Bernie. I think Biden might win this one but def not by the astronomically huge margin he had months ago. Bernie still has a chance but I am not getting my hopes up. But if Bernie wins SC it's over, he will be the nominee.
Otherwise, it's gonna be Bernie vs Biden and possibly Bloomberg in that mix a little longer. I think at this point everyone else is pretty much irrelevant.
Idk how well a SC win would transfer into Super Tuesday. It'll def give a bump but Idk if it's enough of a bump to get Biden key wins.

 

[RaikouLover]

Ya for any Dem to openly say they dislike Sanders at this point would be political suicide. Once your party has a presumptive nominee you stand behind that nominee no matter what because otherwise you'll just lose along with everyone else in your party.

Unfortunately, Bernie is still no where near a presumptive nominee. It looks like most of the remaining candidates are digging in. Expect this to be a longer primary season than we hope for.

Some of my more moderate Democrat friends still take issue with Sanders’ platform being about “free” stuff. It’s hard to sell “free” college to someone who doesn’t want to go to college. There’s a disconnect. He has to address this.

Same point about these reparations debates. It’s a sideshow conversation.

 

[Machoke]

Unfortunately, Bernie is still no where near a presumptive nominee. It looks like most of the remaining candidates are digging in. Expect this to be a longer primary season than we hope for.

Some of my more moderate Democrat friends still take issue with Sanders’ platform being about “free” stuff. It’s hard to sell “free” college to someone who doesn’t want to go to college. There’s a disconnect. He has to address this.

Same point about these reparations debates. It’s a sideshow conversation.

Define "most"

 

[tcr]

Some of my more moderate Democrat friends still take issue with Sanders’ platform being about “free” stuff. It’s hard to sell “free” college to someone who doesn’t want to go to college. There’s a disconnect. He has to address this.

What is your alternative? 69.1% of people in the United States attend college (source: "
In October 2018, 69.1 percent of 2018 high school graduates age 16 to 24 were
enrolled in colleges or universities"). If the alternative is trade school, Sanders education plan extends to vocational schooling as well. If the issue is no higher education, Sander's supports union rights to fight for higher wages and to combat at will laws, such as ones that are in my home state of VA.

In addition, none of this will be things that the middle class pays out for, so those who would most likely benefit from these actions (the middle and working class) won't get boned by having higher taxes to offset it (like laurel up above was going on about). The funding for it comes from a very small tax rate on Wall Street betting, 50 cents to every 100$ in Wall Street stocks.

What are the concerns of these moderate Democrats? Is it that an influx of higher ed degrees will devalue the market of said degrees? Just because people go to higher education doesn't mean that they necessarily will graduate, but more that they have the opportunity to actually attain a degree, thus it's not the same as public high school. And even then is it ok to really oppose more accessible education? i struggle to understand the concerns of your moderate Dem friends

 

[UncleSam]

I expect Steyer to drop out after South Carolina and Warren, Klobuchar, and possibly Bloomberg to drop out after Super Tuesday. Buttigieg and Biden I’m sure will stick around longer unless they severely underperform on Super Tuesday, but I don’t think it’ll be that long a primary season. There’s also the potential for a complete knockout in California if no one other than Bernie makes it to the 15% threshold - if Bernie sweeps California it’s over, regardless of what happens elsewhere.

 

[TheValkyries]

Some of my more moderate Democrat friends still take issue with Sanders’ platform being about “free” stuff. It’s hard to sell “free” college to someone who doesn’t want to go to college. There’s a disconnect. He has to address this.

Same point about these reparations debates. It’s a sideshow conversation.

tell your friends to get their heads out of their asses. Politics isn’t about what’s good for a single individual it’s about what’s good for our entire collective peope.

”what benefits me specifically? If it isn’t about me I just can’t care about it.” is such a phenomenally selfish and shitty take. The worst part is if you call them out for being shitheads about it they’re equally likely to dig in their selfishness out of spite as they are to actually fix their heart.

imagine one of the most famous presidential speech lines is the literal response to this attitude and they just never fucking thought about it for two seconds. Ask not what your country can do for you, and ask instead what you can do for your country.

 

[Divine Retribution]

Collectivism is dangerous and endorsements of it are inherently self-defeating and often egocentric. Kennedy's "most famous presidential speech" is also possibly the worst collection of words to come out of his mouth, and wouldn't have sounded out of place translated to German and played at a Hitler rally. That's about as far as I'm willing to venture into this sinkhole of a topic on a Pokemon forum but someone had to say it. Have a nice day.

 

[tcr]

comparing jfk to hitler

lol man

 

[RaikouLover]

What is your alternative? 69.1% of people in the United States attend college (source: "
In October 2018, 69.1 percent of 2018 high school graduates age 16 to 24 were
enrolled in colleges or universities"). If the alternative is trade school, Sanders education plan extends to vocational schooling as well. If the issue is no higher education, Sander's supports union rights to fight for higher wages and to combat at will laws, such as ones that are in my home state of VA.

View attachment 225075

In addition, none of this will be things that the middle class pays out for, so those who would most likely benefit from these actions (the middle and working class) won't get boned by having higher taxes to offset it (like laurel up above was going on about). The funding for it comes from a very small tax rate on Wall Street betting, 50 cents to every 100$ in Wall Street stocks.

View attachment 225076

What are the concerns of these moderate Democrats? Is it that an influx of higher ed degrees will devalue the market of said degrees? Just because people go to higher education doesn't mean that they necessarily will graduate, but more that they have the opportunity to actually attain a degree, thus it's not the same as public high school. And even then is it ok to really oppose more accessible education? i struggle to understand the concerns of your moderate Dem friends

They were referring to the trades, yes. The candidates don’t really talk about their trade / vocational programs as much as just college education. For all the talk of winning back “working class” whites, that’s an epic fail. How do you sell tuition free college to people who never considered going to college?

tell your friends to get their heads out of their asses. Politics isn’t about what’s good for a single individual it’s about what’s good for our entire collective peope.

”what benefits me specifically? If it isn’t about me I just can’t care about it.” is such a phenomenally selfish and shitty take. The worst part is if you call them out for being shitheads about it they’re equally likely to dig in their selfishness out of spite as they are to actually fix their heart.

imagine one of the most famous presidential speech lines is the literal response to this attitude and they just never fucking thought about it for two seconds. Ask not what your country can do for you, and ask instead what you can do for your country.

The self-righteousness is what turns people off to the Democratic Party, and especially the liberal wing. The average American unfortunately doesn’t see beyond what can be done for them. How do you sell collectivist ideals to people who don’t care? We have to make it about them.

I agree with everything you said. However, when are progressives going to question why 75-80% of the population agrees with progressive ideas and policies, yet left / center left parties all over the world keep losing elections?

 

[vonFiedler]

1. People who don't want to college right now (when college loans and housing are a monumental scam) aren't necessarily people who wouldn't want to go to college if it was free. Or at least, they'd be stupid to be.
2. I'd rather live in a world where I have to deal with smarter people.

 

[Chou Toshio]

 

[tcr]

They were referring to the trades, yes. The candidates don’t really talk about their trade / vocational programs as much as just college education. For all the talk of winning back “working class” whites, that’s an epic fail. How do you sell tuition free college to people who never considered going to college?



The self-righteousness is what turns people off to the Democratic Party, and especially the liberal wing. The average American unfortunately doesn’t see beyond what can be done for them. How do you sell collectivist ideals to people who don’t care? We have to make it about them.

I agree with everything you said. However, when are progressives going to question why 75-80% of the population agrees with progressive ideas and policies, yet left / center left parties all over the world keep losing elections?

yes, it is a tragedy that more underlooked aspects of peoples campaigns do not make their way into mainstream consciousness but this is the nature of the news cycle and debates on policy. The big ticket items are what people learn the most of if uninformed (and by uninformed i mean not actually looking at the person’s platform). This is why I was pro-Williamson, because I read and agreed with her platform and policy stances.

Now that you are aware that Bernie indeed supports trade school grants rather than JUST college, I would expect you to make mention of that to your moderate Dem friends to quell their worries

 

[RaikouLover]

1. People who don't want to college right now (when college loans and housing are a monumental scam) aren't necessarily people who wouldn't want to go to college if it was free. Or at least, they'd be stupid to be.
2. I'd rather live in a world where I have to deal with smarter people.

Those are rational (in my opinion, correct!) arguments. But rational arguments don’t work! Devils advocate responses:

1. What about all the people who worked to put themselves and / or their children through college? How is that fair to them?

2. human fact a lot of folks won’t admit - financial, social, and educational equity disrupts moral hierarchy some ascribe to. There have to be “winners” and “losers.” If everyone has a degree, it’s no longer aspirational.

 

[billymills]

It'll be interesting to see how long some of these states take to count.

The winner in California will likely be called Tuesday night, but I doubt they'll know exactly who hit 15% before the next 7 contests on the 10th.

Most other states should be pretty quick though I think?

 

[JTD783]

My primary concern regarding free college is over-saturation of degrees.

The job market has no shortage of people with degrees looking for work; giving everyone a degree would increase the supply to the point that it would become meaningless. Over time it would be expected that people who want high-earning careers all get a Master’s degree or a PhD, and that makes the student loan problem even worse, especially because grad programs are much more expensive than undergrad ones and are less forgiving with regards to financial aid.

There are still an enormous amount of careers that don’t (and shouldn’t) require bachelors degrees in the United States, so it’s not as if a lack of college education will ruin someone’s financial standing. The ever-increasing ability of technology to replace/reduce the need for jobs is the most troubling trend, and free college won’t fix that. Ironically, many careers with little value places in degrees are harder to replace anyway.

One could argue that the state/federal government’s authority over education is high enough as it is, and shouldn’t be expanded through subsidizing higher education. I’ve heard arguments that governments shouldn’t be involved with higher education at all, that even state schools like University of Arizona or Ohio State shouldn’t exist/be state-sponsored. I don’t have strong opinions about those arguments but many voters do.

 

[tcr]

My primary concern regarding free college is over-saturation of degrees.

The job market has no shortage of people with degrees looking for work; giving everyone a degree would increase the supply to the point that it would become meaningless. Over time it would be expected that people who want high-earning careers all get a Master’s degree or a PhD, and that makes the student loan problem even worse, especially because grad programs are much more expensive than undergrad ones and are less forgiving with regards to financial aid.

There are still an enormous amount of careers that don’t (and shouldn’t) require bachelors degrees in the United States, so it’s not as if a lack of college education will ruin someone’s financial standing. The ever-increasing ability of technology to replace/reduce the need for jobs is the most troubling trend, and free college won’t fix that. Ironically, many careers with little value places in degrees are harder to replace anyway.

One could argue that the state/federal government’s authority over education is high enough as it is, and shouldn’t be expanded through subsidizing higher education. I’ve heard arguments that governments shouldn’t be involved with higher education at all, that even state schools like University of Arizona or Ohio State shouldn’t exist/be state-sponsored. I don’t have strong opinions about those arguments but many voters do.

Some quick facts:

• The underemployment rate in the United States is around 11.1%, and is definitely less than 15% (source)
• You assume that free college = everyone gets a degree. This is a majorly false assumption as money isn't the reason that people don't get degrees. It is the reason a lot of people post-graduation end up working worse jobs (to make ends meet) and is a factor in being underemployed, but there is still a necessary gpa maintenance to be able to attend schooling. On top of this colleges still have a max amount of students that will be able to attend due to budgeting. This is why, for example, I cannot take a certain summer class despite being willing to pay for it, because there is simply not enough reason to warrant the class being kept (an actual situation that happened to me). Being subsidized by wall street taxes does not mean that colleges will then be able to admit any person who so applies, if anything it makes the pool of applicants more competitive.
• The point isn't to broadly give everyone a college education but to make it more accessible financially. Applicants from poorer areas, where traditionally they would not be able to afford to attend through a ton of hidden fees (like bullshit 50-75$ application fees) would be able to actually compete for a position and maintain it. Students who then graduate would not immediately be saddled with 20k+ in student loans.
• "technology" replacing jobs is a scare tactic. This has been the ploy forever, jobs will not simply cease to exist. Obsolete jobs will cease to exist and job fields are constantly expanding and getting traction. And again, trade schools are also being subsidized through Sanders arguments, so it's not just the coastal elite schools that get the benefits, worksman and crafting positions also get the benefits.

What arguments are there for privatization of education? Public education has been a huge boon for the overall education level of the populace. Private education is commonly criticized for being supremely narrow. One example of such is in VA, Liberty University, which is a private institution that gets a ton of flack. It is a supremely religious school, requiring Bible citations in every single paper no matter the field to support arguments. It's infamous for being overwhelmingly Orwellian. Students are subject to random drug testing, students are unable to listen to music with "lewd lyrics" on or off campus, you can't be in a relationship outside of a "biblically ordainned marriage between a natural-born man and a natural-born woman," and you are required to attend convocation.

Do you have any sources for your concerns about the general populace being against state-sanctioned education? I would imagine the vast vast majority of people don't actually care, and those that do are most likely the libertarian crowd that the progressive movement 100% should not cater to get votes for anyway, since that crowd of people will almost overwhelmingly support Trump

 

[fanyfan]

Ok so an update on my previous post going through the upcoming states

South Carolina: Since Nevada, Biden has seen an increase in his South Carolina polling, so it looks very likely he’s going to win. The question is, how much will he win by? If he only wins by a little, I don’t know if that can save his campaign. If he wins by a lot, he can definitely be competitive on Super Tuesday. If he does get a big win, it could potentially come down to a two person Bernie v Biden race. I guess we’ll see.

Super Tuesday
Alabama: Still no recent Alabama polls but this was one of Bernie’s worst states in 2016 so I think it’s gonna be either Biden or Bloomberg who picks this one up, honestly probably Biden.

Arkansas: No new polls from Arkansas so we just have the one from the 11th. Bloomberg and Biden are quite competitive in that poll with Bernie actually not that far behind. This one seems to be a close three-way race, but as long as Biden doesn’t implode in South Carolina, I’d give him a good chance to win.

California: Pretty much every California poll backs up Bernie winning here. Honestly, unless something drastically changes in the next 5 days, I’d say California is a lock for Bernie. How other candidates do here will really affect things though. If you like Bernie, you want as many candidates to get below that 15% threshold as possible and vice versa if you don’t like him. It matters so much because California has so many delegates. There are actually a decent number of polls that have no one else getting that 15% and in that case, Bernie literally picks up almost every delegate in California, which is literally about 10% of the total pledged delegates. This is one state I think will help Bernie tremendously.

Colorado: Since my last post, there actually has been some Colorado polling and it’s definitely looking good for Bernie. These western states really love him. He’s up by double digits in both polls and considering how well he did in Nevada, which is a close state, I’m quite confident he’s gonna win this one. Also of note, Biden and Bloomberg, likely Bernie’s biggest competition, are doing awfully in both Colorado polls so they both could not get any delegates from here, which is definitely good for Bernie.

Maine: There’s still only the one poll, but I still think this is a likely Bernie victory from that poll and 2016 results. Maybe Biden can make things somewhat competitive here, but I definitely think Bernie wins this one.

Massachusetts: There’s been no new polls, it’s still extremely close between Bernie and Warren with a slight edge ti Bernie, but the fact that Warren did so poorly in Nevada and probably does poorly in South Carolina leads me to believe Bernie is the favorite here. I wouldn’t say it’s as strong as him winning Colorado for instance, but I’d say tossup leaning Bernie. Biden and Bloomberg haven’t done well in these polls either, so that’s a positive for Bernie.

Minnesota: Klobuchar is up six points in the two recent polls, but considering how she collapsed in Nevada and likely will do just as well in South Carolina, I don’t know if that will hold. The polls here were taken before Nevada so she was still riding her New Hampshire outperform. Based on current polling, I’d say tossup leaning Klobuchar, but based on what I think might happen, I’d say tossup leaning Bernie.

North Carolina: Looking like a very close three-way race here. The polling has honestly been all over the place, Bernie winning, Biden winning, Bloomberg Bernie tie, all three of them tying, you name it. This is going to be a very heavily contested state I feel, but if Biden wins big in South Carolina, I’d say he’s likely to win here, but if he doesn’t win by as much in South Carolina, honestly I could see Bernie, Biden or Bloomberg winning. Very close.

Oklahoma: Actually another close one. Kind of like Arkansas where Biden and Bloomberg are very competitive for #1 but Bernie’s not that far behind. I think how well Biden does in South Carolina might seal the deal for this one.

Tennessee: Still no recent polling out of here, Biden or Bloomberg will probably win.

Texas: Very competitive here. Polls make it look like a very close race between Bernie and Biden with Bloomberg not too far behind. I’d say definitely a tossup and I don’t even know who I lean towards here. Very heavily contested, tons of delegates.

Utah: Still only have one poll here from late January, but Bernie is leading pretty heavily in that poll, he is leading by a lot in nearby states, and he did quite well here in 2016. I think Bernie’s got this one on lock.

Vermont: No surprises here, Bernie pretty much guaranteed wins and I’d even say is likely to get every delegate. Not that Vermont has many delegates, but yeah.

Virginia: Two recent polls from here. One has Bernie and Bloomberg tied, which from 2016 you’d expect establishment candidates to do well here. However, the second poll Bernie is leading by 9, which actually surprised me quite a bit. I’d say this is tossup leaning Bernie right now as long as that poll isn’t a crazy outlier.

American Samoa: Apparently this territory has their caucuses on Super Tuesday too. It’s actually very hard to predict the results here, for a couple of reasons. The polling here is pretty much nonexistent from what I could find, they’re pretty isolated from the usual us population, and probably no one is spending much time or money here. You wanna know why probably no one spends time here? It has a total of 6 delegates. A whopping 6. Honestly, I have no clue who will win here, but I don’t think it matters anyway and won’t mention them when talking about how many states someone might win since it is not a state and it probably doesn’t matter.

Other thoughts:
- Bernie I think is going to win 5-10 states out of 14 on Super Tuesday. One thing to note is that Bernie is probably picking up some delegates in almost every state based on the polling which is very good for his delegate numbers. By contrast, Biden and Bloomberg both have states they probably don’t have any hope of getting any delegates from. That could really potentially help Bernie build on his delegate lead.

-Biden’s states he wins on ST I think really depends on how well he does in South Carolina. I’d say he’ll win 0-7 states as absolute maximum and minimum but he’s likely to do somewhere in the middle, and I think unlikely to win 0 orunless he absolutely dominates South Carolina. Then maybe he can get somewhere in the 5-7 range.

-Bloomberg honestly could win 0-7 as well I feel, the same seven as Biden I think he’s competitive in, but I think he probably doesn’t win 7.

- Warren and Klobuchar both have a shot at their home state, but probably aren’t really competitive elsewhere. I’d say Warren has a better chance to maybe pick up a couple delegates from other states, but Klobuchar has a better chance to win her home state. I do think Bernie could definitely win both their home states though, which would be absolutely devastating for their campaigns.

- You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned Pete. The reason for that is, based on current polling, he’ll be a non-factor from here on out. Now, he has outperformed polls before, but I don’t even know where he could win in the states coming up. I’d say a very small chance he makes a comeback, but I’d say likely he just falls to the wayside.

 

[Chou Toshio]

Holy shit— Chuck Rocha just announced on Twitter that 120+ THOUSAND new young voters have registered in South Carolina, where there were 300k voters total in 2016...

And the polls are weighted for historic data where only 7% were under 25, 14% under 35 in 2016.

Looking at the demos I knew the young vote turn out was the only unaccounted variable but this actually brings it into contention.

 

[Adamant Zoroark]

Current thoughts: Buttigieg, Warren, and Klobuchar most likely drop out after Super Tuesday. Buttigieg has not been able to improve his support among POC and the whitest states on the Super Tuesday calendar (the New England states) are heavily favored for Sanders, so there’s a good chance Buttigieg doesn’t crack 15% in any state. Warren and Klobuchar could both very easily lose their home states and they don’t look competitive in any other ST state, so I don’t see how they continue after Tuesday.

Bloomberg is a huge wildcard for Tuesday simply because he will be on the ballot for the first time. How many delegates he gets on Tuesday will likely be what decides how likely a brokered convention is to happen.

 

[Chou Toshio]

 

[Bughouse]

A resurgence like this and eventual SC result this dominant from Biden will likely blunt Bloomberg's effect on ST. I expect a substantial amount of voters who valued electability, etc., to see Biden as a possible option again and switch back from Bloomberg.

It seems likely to me that after a whole lot of unnecessary confusion was caused by a large field that could intensively focus in 2 small, cheap to campaign in, and unrepresentative states (not shocking, it's happened before), the primary field has now moved on from its "flavors of the month" and will quickly narrow down to where it fundamentally was always likely to end from day 1 of them entering the race, which is Bernie v Biden. This consolidation probably won't happen until after ST though and perhaps not even immediately after that if Bloomberg sticks around, which obviously benefits Bernie.

Even so, this isn't 2016, and I'm skeptical Biden would even beat Bernie heads up in a primary anyway.
Hillary did so only narrowly, the electorate has moved somewhat to the left, and even if Biden's favorables might be higher than hers were (not sure), he inspires less enthusiasm than Hillary did. Meanwhile Bernie is still the same force, just a bit older, which will hardly matter in an eventual race against Biden (or Bloomberg for that matter).