Min/Max Boards

In my defense, I feel like I've said absolutely nothing about Hillary's popularity.  So, beat me up on the stupid crap I say (of which there is no doubt plenty).  Not the stupid crap I don't say.

Did you not say that?  You talked about her being supposedly toxic and monstrous (in a this is obviously not true sort of way).  I was expanding on that.  I wasn't trying to put words in your mouth. I apologize if that's not what you meant there.

But to the rest of this.

In the Democratic primary.  Primaries are a narrow subset of the electorate.  It is hard to overstate how big a deal this is.  On top of that, the Democratic Primary involves lopping off the rightward-leaning side of the spectrum.  Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure all/most states with open primaries (i.e., you can vote regardless of party affiliation) still only allow you to vote once.  Right-leaning people mostly vote in the GOP election, it's (a) much closer and less decided, and (b) the one that matters to them. 

So, when you say "Independents" you mean "Independents on the left side of the spectrum."  Further, you mean "among primary voters."  That's a really big difference.

You are right.  It does mean it's the more liberal parts of those electorates.  But...it's more complicated than that.  I'll expand a little further on.  (also I would note that up until Tuesday the RNC primary was much much less contested than the DNC primary, with Trump ahead by more that double Hillary's lead over Sanders.  And he's had to deal with more people taking votes and delegates away from him although it's very much up for debate how many of those would have actually gone to him)

I feel like you can just do find/replace for Sanders for Obama here.  I'm not saying these facts are untrue (although I feel like turnout has been pretty good in recent presidential elections?).  But, I fail to have noticed a massive progressive groundswell in the past 8 years.  Kind of the opposite, actually.

This posits that there are literally millions of people who think "y'know, that Obama guy just isn't doing it for me, and so rather than hold my nose and vote for him, or my local progressive candidate, I'm going to let [insert extremely conservative candidate here] run the country and/or stonewall everything."  I've seen no evidence that there are millions of people this stubborn.  It also neglects that there are thousands of people who tirelessly work to reach them.

Again, you are right.  You can mostly swap Sanders for Obama here.  That's pretty much it.  That's what this whole thing makes no sense for me.  Sanders is the Obama of this cycle.  But turnout is lower in the closed primaries.  Sanders has been breaking records in the same places Obama has been.  Sanders has been winning states where Obama did.  Here's the thing.  Obama was the progressive candidate in that election! But there's been "voting irregularities" in certain primaries.  Chicago's got some people even going to jail for these things.  Turnout has been low in these places, like Arizona where they're under investigation for voting rights abuses, especially in Arpaio country.

However, I know here where I live, we haven't had a progressive candidate.  There hasn't been one.  It's been right wing or right wing nut job.  So people aren't voting for progressive candidates?  There haven't BEEN any progressive candidates.  The first time we had a progressive candidate available for superintendent we elected her in a landslide.  The reason we'll elect a conservative in November for senate?  There is no other option.

I feel like I addressed this in earlier posts, so I won't retread it.  All I'll reiterate is that there is no dead center in US politics.  It simply doesn't exist.  Clinton could be the most conservative Democrat currently around, and she'd still be substantially more liberal than the median of the Republican party, which the current GOP candidates are far to the right of anyway.  Except for Donald Trump b/c only god knows what his ideology is. 

As to the labels of "true progressive" or not, I can't speak to that.  I feel like once we start going there (a) I don't have really anything to add other than my own opinion, and (b) we're a short hop away from convening a holy synod.

And thus we get to the crux of the issue.  See, the difference in what I'm pulling out as left/right positioning and what you are, is that I'm taking a time average and you're taking a time snapshot.  You're looking at today.  I'm looking at the past 20+ years.  This country has elected more conservative politicians over time.  And there's a LOT of discussion as to why this is so.  Hillary today is center right 20 years ago.  On some issues.  On some she says she has, she's far left.  Whether or not you believe those positions is up to you.  Some issues she says she has today she's right of most conservatives.  Same disclaimer on the believing.  The point is, "left of conservatives in government now" doesn't say much.  The center has shifted right over the past 40 years, at least as far as people in power, with a significant acceleration of that over the past 15 years.  So yes she's left of them.  No she's not left of center.  Not historically.

Mostly venting, but yes a prediction involved.  However, let me address a couple of your points.  On the Hillary being unpopular: that is not up for debate.  She is.  Her net favorability rating is something like -25.  Trumps is the only one worse at around -40.  The only one with a positive is Sanders at something like +10.  And people have been voting for the "socialist".  Independents and progressive Democrats have been.  In contests where anyone can vote, Bernie has been winning by a lot.  In contests where only (D)s can vote, he's been losing...by not a lot.  Almost all of Clinton's lead has been through early voting.  Sanders almost beat her election day in NC, and DID beat her on election day in AZ, MO, and IL.  So even though she "has more votes"* it's much more complicated than that.  So...in the elections where a larger portion of the demographics of the country can vote, he's been winning, and in the ones where there's a biased portion of the electorate voting he's been losing.

And the country is right leaning....kind of.  Until you look at actual preferences of policies.  Most progressive policies are well received by a majority of Americans, and most conservative ones aren't.  We have one of the worst turnouts in the developed world.  And Sanders has been getting first time voters out where he can (re: open state primaries).  In states where turnout is large, he wins.  I repeat for effect:  in states where turnout is large, he wins.  This is decidedly not just young people.  It's also people who haven't voted because they've had no candidate.  So yes.  There is a rather significant portion of progressives out there that is untapped.

As for the labels?  Obama is left of center.  Hillary is at best dead center.  And that's for American spectrum of politics.  She's way too hawkish to be considered a liberal.  She's espoused support for a LOT of conservative view points over the years, so I am very skeptical of this new, more progressive Hillary**.  Going simply by her campaign statements, over the past two months at least (but not the months before that!  She's changed positions on a large number of topics as Sanders has been catching up!), she's fairly progressive, almost halfway to where Sanders is.  I don't trust for an instant though that she's going to keep these views in the General, much less her presidency.  And my point in the previous post was that this is a humongous problem.  In an election defined by lack of trust in the establishment, pivoting to the center might well be a death knell.  Also my point, is that do not make the mistake of assuming this anti-establishment uprising is confined to the clown car that was the RNC primaries, it exists in the left as well.

As many have noted, Obama has not been a true progressive.  He's been fairly progressive, but he did walk back some of his more progressive agenda topics.  Some for legitimate reasons (like the conservative and hostile House and Senate he's had to deal with) and some not so legitimate reasons (simply not doing it).

*She doesn't have more votes.  It's impossible to tell.  Even though she's beating him in voting primary votes, she's lost nearly every caucus (or every one? I forget which ones were caucuses).  And caucus votes are not tallied directly.  So we don't know how many people voted one way or another in the various caucus states, directly.  We do know that they've tended to have record turnout, and Sanders has won those.

**Do I think Hillary will be a bad president?  No.  I do not.  I think she is dangerous to elect, not because of what she will do to the country, but what lesson it will teach the DNC and the electorate about the process, and progressive ideals.  I believe we are in a dangerous time, and at a turning point.  We are not about to fall backwards, no, but we are in danger of doing some things that we as a country will regret later down the line.  I do not think Hillary will be the cause of these things.  I simply think her election might precipitate some of these things later on.  This election's problem isn't the next four years.  It's the fours years after that.  And I believe that nominating Sanders would prevent the problems of those four years.

In summary, I really really really hope Hillary is now a progressive.  Because if she's not, the DNC just lost a lot of elections.  And that is bad for our country because the people that will be winning those elections are the Todd Youngs of the world.  Who's Todd Young those of you outside of Indiana?  He's Cruz, but worse.  He's probably going to be the next Senator from Indiana.  Sanders was the best thing to happen to the DNC in a long time, and they had better not waste it.

EDIT: On Clinton pivoting to the "center"?  Well, there's already evidence that she's going to do it.  Another reason I don't trust her not to do it.  Up until the Michigan primary, the Flint crisis was her number 1 top priority.  Then....nothing.  Nothing more about it.  Sanders keeps bringing up drinking water issues, but she hasn't.  She also spoke at AIPAC.  Also known as the conservative war hawk's wet dream convention.  And got a standing ovation.  After spouting peace talk. Then she's abandoned it.  I don't know her stance on a number of things because it's changed so much so recently.

I know, just noting that we already have it so it wouldn't be a HUGE leap.  Although, I have to admit there's a lot of people I wouldn't trust appointing judges.  However, those people are elected by people I wouldn't trust to elect judges.

Yes.  One of the biggest reasons it's problematic is that in election years, sentences are harsher.  Judges run on being tough on crime, not fair and impartial.  Hiring based on merit won't have that.  Well, as much.  We need to reform the system, and not have elections for judges.  Judges should be hired as impartial arbiters of the law, not elected to act in accordance with the electorate.  The legislature is what changes the law as to the accordance with the electorate, the executive makes sure things run smoothly and prioritizes funds, the judicial makes sure things run according to the law and rules.

Bernie is definitely not hawkish.  So...yeah one candidate isn't hawkish.  He's been against interventionist wars since time immemorial.  He's consistently been on the "no war" platform his entire political career, and famously had his speech against the Iraq war to the empty house back in 2004.

And you're right, Clinton isn't like the current Republican nominees. She's way left of them.  But she's about as far right as past conservative presidents.  I think that's what most of our complaints and explanations of why she's a Republican are.  That's the problem with the comparative scale though, saying "I'm not far left but I'm left of this person" is how we got to the point of the Democrats representing the middle of the spectrum and the Republicans representing the extreme right.  A "moderate Republican today is a nut job 15 years ago.  Notably there are exceptions of course.

But again, the problem with comparisons is that you need an anchor value to make them meaningful.  A choice between two candidates who want to...I'll use something realish....two candidates on the subject of drug legislation.  One is to the right, more conservative than the other.  Say you're a liberal, so you're on board with the one to the left right?  Well, not so fast, the only difference between the two is one wants the death penalty for offenders and the other just wants life in prison.  You wouldn't call the life in prison a liberal, even if they were running on the liberal ticket.  A slightly less extreme version of that is what's happened here.

Earlier I've seen a number of Clinton supporters and surrogates say things to the effect "We don't want Is voting, if you're anI wait until the GE" or "if you're an I you aren't a D and therefore are the enemy".  And then in the same breath accuse Sanders supporters of being "like the Tea Party" and intentionally splitting the Ds.

I don't think the executive action is as powerful as you think it is, although it is more powerful than people realize.  And less powerful.  It's weird.  People think Obama's using it to literally trample on their rights.  Like, manifest them as physical objects to trample on them.  And then they simultaneously think he can't do anything of note with them.  But mostly, it's a directorial thing.  Choose to spend the money that Congress has allocated for these things that Congress has enacted.  And choose how to spend that money.  There's a deceptive amount of stuff you can do with it, because it's all bureaucracy.

And all of that federal policy making?  I don't think there will be a functional difference between the two.  I hope Kasich is the R nominee because of what it would do for foreign relations (namely, what it would not do: piss every one off with bigots like Trump and Cruz as a potential choice).  Between her and Kasich, I hope she wins because her views are somewhat closer to mine and what I view as ethical.  Not terribly close, but closer.  She's slightly right of center, he's right of center, with a far right twinge at times as Bhu said.

Chyna

Also, since it hasn't been mentioned, Ed Snider.  And as an added bonus to that, here's Philly being Philly.

Yeah, but I don't think she'll make the air brown 

NJ will still be relevant to the DNC race.  It's probably going to come down to California, the very last one.  And ifNJ does well enough, that will help him.

As for the voter loss?  Well, here's the thing.  She won't be losing all that many votes in the GE because he's been bringing in new voters mostly.  The people who won't vote for her, or will vote for Stein or write in Sanders in the GE are mostly people who won't be voting anyways.  HOWEVER.  And this is a huge issue, the down ticket will suffer BIG TIME for the Ds.  So that down ticket "issue" they've been saying Sanders is going to cause by not fundraising for down ticket even though he has been?  It's actually only a problem with Hillary.  They won't get the votes out needed to retake seats in the House and Senate.  Unless Kasich is the R nominee, Hillary will almost certainly be president if she wins this nom.  But the obstruction will be even worse than it is now.  Basically the only way things get done over the next 4 years is if Sanders or an R is president.  And if it's one of the Rs other than kasich, they won't be good things.  I see very little functional difference in a Kasich or Clinton presidency.