The Democratic Presidential Debates

Gern Blansten

Lerxst1992 said:

mrussel1 said:

Lex is always on about turnout, but he's dead right.  Here's something just posted on the Hill about the turnout.  VA and SC had explosive turnout and those were the two Biden route states.  NH had strong turnout, but NV and IA did not.  

Nearly twice as many voters cast their ballots in Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary on Tuesday as in 2016. 

With 99 percent of precincts reporting, some 1.3 million votes had been counted in the commonwealth. That’s nearly double the roughly 780,000 votes cast in the state’s 2016 Democratic primary race between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). 

The number of votes also surpassed the 986,000 cast in the 2008 primary.

Former Vice President Joe Biden won a decisive victory in Virginia on Tuesday. Current tallies show him with more than 700,000 votes in the state — a roughly 40 percent increase over the half-million votes Clinton received when she won the state four years ago. 

Sanders saw a more modest 10 percent increase over the 275,000 votes he won in Virginia in 2016. He currently has a little over 300,000 votes in the state. 

The sky-high turnout in Virginia comes amid mixed turnout in the four early nominating contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

Turnout in Iowa and Nevada fell short of expectations. In New Hampshire, it exceeded the record previously set in 2008. And in South Carolina, turnout nearly matched the record set in 2008 when former President Obama was on the ballot.

Turnout is seen as an important measure of voter enthusiasm. Democrats see voter turnout as an electoral game changer, arguing that the more people who show up to cast their ballot, the better the party’s chances are of defeating President Trump in November. 

:-)

When I saw the great state of VA get put in Bidens column right at 7, I had a strong feeling Bernie was on the ropes.

Then the hundreds of thousands of additional voters who did not show up in 2016... to stop Sanders? 

The campaign has been a battle between the base and the millenials as we know. One group wants some sort of Euro fantasy utopia.  The other wants to beat trump. Period.No socialist American fantasies. Like I've been saying to Chaos for months.  Is he off today?

SC was a huge hint that the base is energized. We can only hope Shelby v. Holder isnt strong  enough to stop the entire base from voting in PA MI & WI this November 

I believe we are seeing the absence of an anti-Hillary vote

Lerxst1992

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

Hes not done spending. He has promised to keep his offices open to organize the dump trump effort. Something that the challenger party is usually not able to do.

That's an enormous distinction from past elections fighting a wealthy incumbent 

And his message is a pro moderate message. Exactly what is needed to bake trump.

JimmyV

Gern Blansten said:

Lerxst1992 said:

mrussel1 said:

Lex is always on about turnout, but he's dead right.  Here's something just posted on the Hill about the turnout.  VA and SC had explosive turnout and those were the two Biden route states.  NH had strong turnout, but NV and IA did not.  

Nearly twice as many voters cast their ballots in Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary on Tuesday as in 2016. 

With 99 percent of precincts reporting, some 1.3 million votes had been counted in the commonwealth. That’s nearly double the roughly 780,000 votes cast in the state’s 2016 Democratic primary race between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). 

The number of votes also surpassed the 986,000 cast in the 2008 primary.

Former Vice President Joe Biden won a decisive victory in Virginia on Tuesday. Current tallies show him with more than 700,000 votes in the state — a roughly 40 percent increase over the half-million votes Clinton received when she won the state four years ago. 

Sanders saw a more modest 10 percent increase over the 275,000 votes he won in Virginia in 2016. He currently has a little over 300,000 votes in the state. 

The sky-high turnout in Virginia comes amid mixed turnout in the four early nominating contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

Turnout in Iowa and Nevada fell short of expectations. In New Hampshire, it exceeded the record previously set in 2008. And in South Carolina, turnout nearly matched the record set in 2008 when former President Obama was on the ballot.

Turnout is seen as an important measure of voter enthusiasm. Democrats see voter turnout as an electoral game changer, arguing that the more people who show up to cast their ballot, the better the party’s chances are of defeating President Trump in November. 

:-)

When I saw the great state of VA get put in Bidens column right at 7, I had a strong feeling Bernie was on the ropes.

Then the hundreds of thousands of additional voters who did not show up in 2016... to stop Sanders? 

The campaign has been a battle between the base and the millenials as we know. One group wants some sort of Euro fantasy utopia.  The other wants to beat trump. Period.No socialist American fantasies. Like I've been saying to Chaos for months.  Is he off today?

SC was a huge hint that the base is energized. We can only hope Shelby v. Holder isnt strong  enough to stop the entire base from voting in PA MI & WI this November 

I believe we are seeing the absence of an anti-Hillary vote

From your lips to God's ears. 

F Me In The Brain

Lerxst1992 said:

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

Hes not done spending. He has promised to keep his offices open to organize the dump trump effort. Something that the challenger party is usually not able to do.

That's an enormous distinction from past elections fighting a wealthy incumbent 

And his message is a pro moderate message. Exactly what is needed to bake trump.

Did he promise that today, or previous to his ducking out on the campaign?

Only ask this because he also promised he would not quit even if he had a bad day on Tuesday.

(I am glad he quit and I hope he spends money fighting Trump...just think it is worth asking to understand if he really will do  it.)

Lerxst1992

dignin said:

Not to mention she was a lot of voters second choice according to polls.

Its all moot now 

Those second choice polls looked like Politics 101.

The media never learns.

4 words that put Biden in the drivers seat:

Turn out the base.

Lerxst1992

A short video I'd like to dedicate to Team Bernie, in support of party unity 

http://youtu.be/_Xlkla4Jrbk

Lerxst1992

F Me In The Brain said:

Lerxst1992 said:

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

Hes not done spending. He has promised to keep his offices open to organize the dump trump effort. Something that the challenger party is usually not able to do.

That's an enormous distinction from past elections fighting a wealthy incumbent 

And his message is a pro moderate message. Exactly what is needed to bake trump.

Did he promise that today, or previous to his ducking out on the campaign?

Only ask this because he also promised he would not quit even if he had a bad day on Tuesday.

(I am glad he quit and I hope he spends money fighting Trump...just think it is worth asking to understand if he really will do  it.)

Nobody saw this coming as recent as friday.

On Saturday night I saw the signs but Biden still had 3 moderates to fight off.

Then on sunday, obama moved oceans for the party.


Back to Bloomberg 

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/bloomberg-fund-sizable-campaign-effort-through-november-even-if-he-n1113421

F Me In The Brain

Lerxst1992 said:

F Me In The Brain said:

Lerxst1992 said:

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

Hes not done spending. He has promised to keep his offices open to organize the dump trump effort. Something that the challenger party is usually not able to do.

That's an enormous distinction from past elections fighting a wealthy incumbent 

And his message is a pro moderate message. Exactly what is needed to bake trump.

Did he promise that today, or previous to his ducking out on the campaign?

Only ask this because he also promised he would not quit even if he had a bad day on Tuesday.

(I am glad he quit and I hope he spends money fighting Trump...just think it is worth asking to understand if he really will do  it.)

Nobody saw this coming as recent as friday.

On Saturday night I saw the signs but Biden still had 3 moderates to fight off.

Then on sunday, obama moved oceans for the party.


Back to Bloomberg 

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/bloomberg-fund-sizable-campaign-effort-through-november-even-if-he-n1113421

Thanks - so he made that commitment in January.

Hope he keeps it, takes some nastiness to fight nastiness.  (And, to fight Russia)

Ledbetterman10

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

I'm not saying his throwing money behind the cause of getting rid of Trump is a waste. His actual campaign for president was. In fact, I think he'd have been better off bankrolling Biden from the get-go, keeping a low public profile, and then emerging as Biden's running-mate. 

ikiT

Lerxst1992 said:

A short video I'd like to dedicate to Team Bernie, in support of party unity 

http://youtu.be/_Xlkla4Jrbk

word the efff up

ikiT

Stop yelling at me and coalesce into a fighting unit already.   

I still need a Balto GA ticket.

The Juggler

Ledbetterman10 said:

The Juggler said:

Ledbetterman10 said:

The Juggler said:

Ledbetterman10 said:

mcgruff10 said:

Ledbetterman10 said:

So Liz comes in third in her home state, has less delegates than Pete who already dropped out, and yet she’s still going forward. For fuck’s sake. 

Time for her to drop out.  

All her sticking around does is add to the perception that some Sanders supporters have that the Dems are all against him. There were three candidates with no hope in hell. Pete and Amy, who were in Biden’s “lane” got out of the way. And Liz, who’s in Bernie’s “lane” refuses to. She has every right to go forward with her pointless campaign. I don’t mind it. I think Biden would be a better nominee than Sanders. But come on...

Bloomberg needs to go too. What a failure his campaign was. He spent like over $700 million. Imagine that. Almost a billion dollars for nothing. 

Yeah well he’s prepared to triple that to help the nominee. That’s more than Bernie can say. We’ll see if it was all for nothing come November. 

Yeah all that money was for nothing. Future money put behind Biden would be for something. Frankly he should have just backed someone financially like Biden from the start. Instead all he got for his billion dollars was an undressing from Liz and a nickname from Trump. 

The money he spent was a drop in the bucket to him....
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/bloomberg-lost-but-he-may-still-get-what-he-wanted/

Bloomberg Lost, But He May Still Get What He Wanted

Former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg suspended his presidential campaign on Wednesday. 

JOE RAEDLE / GETTY IMAGES

Former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg spent more than $400 million on television commercials alone during his ultimately brief 2020 presidential campaign. He blanketed the airwaves across the nation, running ads in almost every single state. And in the end, which came on Wednesday when Bloomberg announced that he was exiting the race and endorsing former Vice President Joe Biden, all he had to show for it was a handful of delegates and a win in American Samoa.

So Bloomberg’s candidacy failed in getting him to the Oval Office — but he won in another way.

Bloomberg entered the race in late November. At that point, Sen. Elizabeth Warren was ascendant, and fears about Biden’s weaknesses were rampant. Bloomberg opposed many of Warren’s more liberal ideas, such as her wealth tax plan, and he viewed her as unlikely to defeat President Trump in a general election. He reportedly saw both her and Sen. Bernie Sanders as unacceptable general election nominees and doubted Biden or any of the other more establishment, moderate candidates in the race could beat them. So he got in.

But Bloomberg opted for an unorthodox strategy to win the Democratic nomination, skipping the first four contests — Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina — while hoping his huge spending advantage would put him in a position to rack up delegates on Super Tuesday.

His strategy looked like it could work a few weeks ago. Sanders had jumped to the front of the queue instead of Warren, but the same fears about nominating too liberal a candidate applied to him. Bloomberg began amassing endorsements from more center-left figures in the party who opposed a Sanders nomination. Black voters started to move from Biden to Bloomberg. In short, Bloomberg looked like he could replace Biden as the candidate for older and more moderate Democratic voters and the party’s center-left elites. National polls showed Bloomberg climbing into a tie with Biden for second:

Then, Bloomberg’s plan fell apart. In fact, it fell apart so fast that national polls really didn’t have enough time to capture it. First, his surge in the polls resulted in the news media and the other candidates, particularly Warren, hammering him in the debates and on the trail, particularly about accusations that he has made sexist comments in the past. His performance in his first debate, in Las Vegas, was almost universally panned. It’s not clear that Bloomberg could have recovered from any of that — we didn’t get a ton of polling between that Nevada debate and South Carolina. But the real end of the former mayor’s candidacy came when Biden won overwhelmingly in South Carolina, got a surge of endorsements and then did well on Super Tuesday. The center-left, establishment wing of the party no longer needed a Biden replacement — they had Biden.

So with Biden now back as the most likely Democratic nominee, it did not make much sense for Bloomberg to keep running.

But I don’t think Bloomberg’s candidacy was a mistake or unwise. He’s worth more than $50 billion — so it’s not clear the $400 million he spent on television commercials or the other money he poured into his campaign matters much to him. He got to go on stage in the debates and attack Sanders and Warren. We don’t know if that boosted Biden, but it likely didn’t hurt him. With Biden now in a much stronger position than when Bloomberg entered the race, you could argue that Bloomberg provided what he and other more center-left figures wanted — to steer the race towards a more moderate nominee. The more extreme back-up plan — nominate Bloomberg — ended up not being needed. My guess is that Bloomberg would have preferred to be the candidate instead of Biden but knew that was a fairly unlike outcome, since he is a one-time Republican who entered the race in late November.

So Bloomberg, who has flirted with running for president since 2008, can now go back to his previous political role: pumping his billions into a variety of liberal causes. He hired people in numerous states for his presidential campaign, and his employees were reportedly told that they would have jobs through November. It’s not clear if Bloomberg will end up retaining these staffers for some kind of operation to boost Biden against Sanders and Warren in the primary, have his team start focusing now on the general election against Trump or simply wind down his apparatus. But I expect him to stay out of the primary and focus on Trump.

In short, Bloomberg may end up spending more than $1 billion in 2020 to get Trump out of the Oval Office — and from Bloomberg’s view, spending about half of that money to replace Trump with Michael Bloomberg was probably a failed investment that was well worth the risk.

So in summation, he wasted millions of dollars but he's so rich that it's no big deal that he did. And he might spend over a billion dollars between his pathetic campaign and backing Biden to TRY and get Trump out of the Oval Office. Got ya. 

no

The Juggler

Gern Blansten said:

Lerxst1992 said:

mrussel1 said:

Lex is always on about turnout, but he's dead right.  Here's something just posted on the Hill about the turnout.  VA and SC had explosive turnout and those were the two Biden route states.  NH had strong turnout, but NV and IA did not.  

Nearly twice as many voters cast their ballots in Virginia’s Democratic presidential primary on Tuesday as in 2016. 

With 99 percent of precincts reporting, some 1.3 million votes had been counted in the commonwealth. That’s nearly double the roughly 780,000 votes cast in the state’s 2016 Democratic primary race between former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.). 

The number of votes also surpassed the 986,000 cast in the 2008 primary.

Former Vice President Joe Biden won a decisive victory in Virginia on Tuesday. Current tallies show him with more than 700,000 votes in the state — a roughly 40 percent increase over the half-million votes Clinton received when she won the state four years ago. 

Sanders saw a more modest 10 percent increase over the 275,000 votes he won in Virginia in 2016. He currently has a little over 300,000 votes in the state. 

The sky-high turnout in Virginia comes amid mixed turnout in the four early nominating contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

Turnout in Iowa and Nevada fell short of expectations. In New Hampshire, it exceeded the record previously set in 2008. And in South Carolina, turnout nearly matched the record set in 2008 when former President Obama was on the ballot.

Turnout is seen as an important measure of voter enthusiasm. Democrats see voter turnout as an electoral game changer, arguing that the more people who show up to cast their ballot, the better the party’s chances are of defeating President Trump in November. 

:-)

When I saw the great state of VA get put in Bidens column right at 7, I had a strong feeling Bernie was on the ropes.

Then the hundreds of thousands of additional voters who did not show up in 2016... to stop Sanders? 

The campaign has been a battle between the base and the millenials as we know. One group wants some sort of Euro fantasy utopia.  The other wants to beat trump. Period.No socialist American fantasies. Like I've been saying to Chaos for months.  Is he off today?

SC was a huge hint that the base is energized. We can only hope Shelby v. Holder isnt strong  enough to stop the entire base from voting in PA MI & WI this November 

I believe we are seeing the absence of an anti-Hillary vote

YES
YES
YES

A million times yes. Joe Biden is NOT Hillary 2.0. 

The Juggler

Ledbetterman10 said:

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

I'm not saying his throwing money behind the cause of getting rid of Trump is a waste. His actual campaign for president was. In fact, I think he'd have been better off bankrolling Biden from the get-go, keeping a low public profile, and then emerging as Biden's running-mate. 

Reread the article. He got in when Biden was faltering and a lot of us thought he might be done. I don't blame him for throwing his hat in the ring. His best case scenario didn't work out. Next best is still removing Trump. Don't think the hundreds of millions he has spent in advertising didn't have an effect on people realizing that beating Trump is the most important factor this year either. Look how much that moved the needle in a short time. Then extract that over the next 8 months. 

Bloomberg at this point is still one of the most important people in this race.

CM189191

JimmyV said:

It is partly due to my location and my circle, no doubt, but I know at least a dozen women who are devastated by Warren's showing yesterday.

https://twitter.com/EddyElfenbein/status/1235281679549378561?s=19

CM189191

https://twitter.com/AdamBlickstein/status/1235286089805463553?s=19

mrussel1

CM189191 said:

https://twitter.com/AdamBlickstein/status/1235286089805463553?s=19

Haha... yeah, so now Bernie loves Obama.  Isn't that convenient.  Oh wait, Sanders never waivers right?  

Here's something that will shock no one on the boards.. old people vote, young people don't. 

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/04/politics/youth-vote-sanders-biden-super-tuesday/index.html

Ledbetterman10

The Juggler said:

Ledbetterman10 said:

HughFreakingDillon said:

if it works, it wasn't a waste. 

I'm not saying his throwing money behind the cause of getting rid of Trump is a waste. His actual campaign for president was. In fact, I think he'd have been better off bankrolling Biden from the get-go, keeping a low public profile, and then emerging as Biden's running-mate. 

Reread the article. He got in when Biden was faltering and a lot of us thought he might be done. I don't blame him for throwing his hat in the ring. His best case scenario didn't work out. Next best is still removing Trump. Don't think the hundreds of millions he has spent in advertising didn't have an effect on people realizing that beating Trump is the most important factor this year either. Look how much that moved the needle in a short time. Then extract that over the next 8 months. 

Bloomberg at this point is still one of the most important people in this race.

I think you, Bloomberg, and every other devoted Democrat has made it loud and clear that beating Trump is the most important factor this year. And of course you don't blame him for throwing his hat in the ring. As you said, when Biden looked to be floundering, Bloomberg was your supposed savior. Basically it was a coordinated Democrat effort that 538 feels was a good idea. So OF COURSE you're going to be into it, Juggler. The only thing that would make it even more up your ally is if the Philly Phanatic was one of Bloomberg's advisors. 

I agree he's still important in all this. Certainly more important than Warren who's "still in the race." And likely more important than Sanders following the convention. I just think Biden wasn't faltering as much as people think. Yeah he struggled in early states, but as he himself said, wait until South Carolina. And he was right. So Bloomberg sweeping in as a plan B to save the day might not have even been necessary. Just start bankrolling Biden the moment you feel he's struggling (maybe after New Hampshire). All of Bloomberg's money and experience doesn't mean a whole lot when he lacks a base of support, a personality, and an ability to connect with people outside of NYC, which are three things that Biden has going for him. 

If the Dems (Warren and Pete in particular) had a lot of democratic voters convinced that Bloomberg was trying to buy the election, Trump will surly get that talking-point (that he's now trying to buy it for Biden) over with his crowd, and maybe with undecided voters as well. I dunno, I just think he'd have been better off behind the scenes of all this. 

mrussel1

My guess is Biden is having a pretty good day at the fundraising office, with or without Bloomberg. 

Ledbetterman10

mrussel1 said:

My guess is Biden is having a pretty good day at the fundraising office, with or without Bloomberg. 

Probably. And couple that WITH Bloomberg's contributions and Trump should just start packing his things now. It's over.