US Election: 2016

[Old Sweat]

I'll echo FJAG's comment in his last paragraph. We are in Casa Grande, AZ, a small city/town about halfway between Phoenix and Tucson. The state primary elections are scheduled for 22 March, but you would be hard pressed to find any sign of it. I have not been driving up and down streets looking, but in casual driving about I have only seen two signs, both for "Bernie" and both homemade. 

 

[cupper]

I'll echo FJAG's comment in his last paragraph. We are in Casa Grande, AZ, a small city/town about halfway between Phoenix and Tucson. The state primary elections are scheduled for 22 March, but you would be hard pressed to find any sign of it. I have not been driving up and down streets looking, but in casual driving about I have only seen two signs, both for "Bernie" and both homemade.

The lawn signs typically do not come out in the primaries. Here in Northern Virginia you would be hard pressed to find anything indicating there is a primary election on March 1st. Only 2 commercials running for congressional seats, one for a Dem in Virginia and one for a Dem in Maryland.

 

[cupper]

The Bush Dynasty won't materialize. One thing that you can take from this is that perhaps there is a slight vindication of the Citizen's United commentary that ultimately endless amounts of corporate money will have little effect on the outcomes. Bush outspent everyone, and ultimately nothing to show, and never really got past the staring gate.

Jeb Bush Ends Presidential Campaign

http://www.npr.org/2016/02/20/467505778/jeb-bush-ends-presidential-campaign

Jeb Bush is ending his campaign for president after a disappointing showing in the South Carolina primary.

"The people of Iowa and New Hampshire and South Carolina have spoken, and I really respect their decision," the former Florida governor told his supporters gathered in Columbia on Saturday night. "So tonight, I am suspending my campaign."

The son and brother of the past two Republican presidents entered the race with all the signs of the classic front-runner: endorsements from other top officeholders, a massive campaign war chest and name-brand campaign consultants.

Bush sought to campaign as an optimistic champion of pragmatic conservative values — but his positions in favor of overhauling immigration laws and educational standards put him out of step with an increasingly conservative Republican electorate that was hungry for an outsider, not the ultimate insider.

His perceived momentum quickly stalled as it became clear that voters in both parties are shunning experienced politicians. Onetime protege Marco Rubio passed him in the polls, and Bush moved farther and farther to the side of the stage in the candidates' presidential debates.

In New Hampshire last week, Bush was left defending his family to voters eager for a change. "I'm proud of my dad. I'm proud of my brother. I'm proud of being a Bush," he told a crowd in Derry. "The Bush thing, people are just going to have to get over it," he said at a later town hall in Portsmouth.

South Carolina this week felt like Bush's last stand. He brought in his brother, former President George W. Bush, and his mother, former first lady Barbara Bush. He hoped to do well in the military-friendly state, which both his father and his brother had carried. Instead, the Palmetto State marked the end of the road for the once-promising candidate.

Despite spending far more money than any other campaign on television advertising, Bush garnered less than 3 percent of the vote in Iowa and placed fourth in New Hampshire. He's on pace to finish a distant fourth or fifth in South Carolina.

 

[cupper]

Clinton wins in Nevada, but Sanders still makes it a close contest. This may not be Hillary's to take yet, but Sanders still has a long uphill battle going into the souther states. Next Saturday's South Carolina Democratic Primary will be a must win for him.

Hillary Clinton Wins Nevada Caucuses

http://www.npr.org/2016/02/20/467503655/hillary-clinton-projected-to-win-nevada-caucuses

Hillary Clinton will win the Nevada Democratic caucuses, the Associated Press is reporting.

With 84 percent of the precincts reporting, Clinton has 52.5 percent of the vote, compared to Sen. Bernie Sanders' 47.5 percent.

"Tens of thousands of men and women with kids to raise, bills to pay, and dreams that won't die — this is your campaign," she told a crowd at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. "And it is a campaign to break down every barrier that holds you back."

This makes a second win for the former Secretary of State, along with her razor-thin win in the Iowa caucuses. Sanders, meanwhile, has one win under his belt, handing a stinging 22-point defeat to Clinton in the New Hampshire primary.

Older and nonwhite voters appear to have buoyed Clinton past Sanders, according to entrance poll data. (To be clear, entrance polls are just an estimate — these polls as reported by CNN have a total sample size of 1,024.)

By those numbers, Clinton won 74 percent of the support of voters 65 and older, as well as 61 percent among people 45 to 64. Fifty-six percent of nonwhite voters also supported her. Black voters in particular helped Clinton win: 76 percent backed her.

Those polls also suggest that Clinton did better among women, with 57 percent of their vote.

Sanders, meanwhile, continued his dominance among young voters, with entrance polls showing him winning 72 percent of 17-to-44-year-olds. That's similar to his performance in New Hampshire and Iowa, where he likewise won young voters by big margins.

And while those polls say Clinton overall got 56 percent of the nonwhite vote, those polls also suggest Sanders had a strong showing among Latinos, at 53 percent to Clinton's 45 percent, according to those polls. Latinos made up 19 percent of the electorate in Nevada.

In Clark County, with 806 of 1022 precincts reporting, Clinton led by nearly 10 points — 54.9 to 45.1 percent, according to the New York Times. That's where Las Vegas is, and is where two-thirds of the vote came from in 2008.

Sanders' five-point (at this point) loss still represents a massive improvement for him in Nevada. Just a few months ago, Sanders was behind Clinton by double digits in the Silver State.

Sanders referred to his massive gains in a statement.

"I just spoke to Secretary Clinton and congratulated her on her victory here in Nevada. I am very proud of the campaign we ran," he said. "Five weeks ago we were 25 points behind, and we ended up in a very close election."

The Democratic candidates now look to South Carolina, which will hold its Democratic primary on Feb. 27. Clinton maintains a strong lead there in recent polls, ahead by more than 20 points, according to RealClearPolitics. Just days later, they will compete in 11 states on Super Tuesday — March 1.

 

[Old Sweat]

The lawn signs typically do not come out in the primaries. Here in Northern Virginia you would be hard pressed to find anything indicating there is a primary election on March 1st. Only 2 commercials running for congressional seats, one for a Dem in Virginia and one for a Dem in Maryland.

In the Rio Grande valley in 2012 there were not a lot of signs, but those that we saw were overwhelmingly for Hillary. However I do agree with your observation on a lack of visual indications re the primaries.

 

[cupper]

And the GOP Reality TV experiment just keeps on rolling.

Trump Wins South Carolina; Cruz And Rubio Battle For Second

http://www.npr.org/2016/02/20/467507410/trump-cruz-and-rubio-battle-for-south-carolina-prize

Donald Trump has won the South Carolina primary, while Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio are locked in a tight battle for second place.

"Politics: It's tough, it's nasty, it's mean, it's vicious. It's beautiful," Trump declared to his supporters at his victory rally in Spartanburg, S.C.

"Let's put this thing away," the real estate mogul crowed, looking ahead to Super Tuesday fights and boasting again of his big win last week in New Hampshire.

The Palmetto State also claimed the first casualty of the night: after a disappointing finish, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush suspended his campaign.

The brash billionaire was expected to carry the conservative Palmetto State, despite controversies in the past week that have had little impact on his dominance — as usual this election cycle. In last Saturday's debate, Trump attacked former President George W. Bush over his handling of the Iraq War, and on Thursday he tussled with Pope Francis over immigration.

Cruz worked to turn out the state's sizable bloc of evangelical voters, but even among those voters Trump triumphed, according to exit polls. The share of self-described born again Christians increased from four years ago — up to 73 percent compared to 65 percent in 2012. Trump carried those voters with 31 percent of the vote, while Cruz won 27 percent and Rubio got a 22 percent share.

Late mudslinging between the candidates may have impacted the tight contest too. A superPAC supporting Cruz was pushing out robo-calls, hitting Trump for supporting last summer's removal of the Confederate flag from the State Capitol grounds and for backing "forward motion" of LGBT rights.

There were plenty of accusations flying between Cruz and Rubio, too. The Florida senator's campaign slammed Cruz after they photoshopped a photo of Rubio and Obama shaking hands. The two rivals jabbed back and forth all week over their immigration records, too.

South Carolina was the death knell for Bush. The former Florida governor has leaned heavily on his family connections to carry him in the state, bringing in his brother, former President George W. Bush, and his mother, former first lady Barbara Bush, this week to campaign for him.

Former neurosurgeon Ben Carson has been fighting for conservative evangelical voters too, but has had trouble breaking through and was lagging in single digits.

And Ohio Gov. John Kasich hoped for a boost in the state after his impressive second place New Hampshire finish last week, but he didn't need a big result as bad as Bush and Carson do. In fact, Kasich has already turned his attention to delegate-rich Super Tuesday states which will vote on March 1, and is in Massachusetts watching results tonight, not South Carolina.

 

[cupper]

In the Rio Grande valley in 2012 there were not a lot of signs, but those that we saw were overwhelmingly for Hillary. However I do agree with your observation on a lack of visual indications re the primaries.

I think it depends on where you live. The bid must win states such as Iowa and New Hampshire do get campaign money dumped there, but as things tend to start to filter out, you see less campaign money and the accompanying accessories being spent unless the races are really close.

 

[CougarKing]

Will it be Rubio as Trump's main challenger?

Canadian Press

The Republican party's Trump-hating stars start aligning behind Marco Rubio
[The Canadian Press]
Alexander Panetta,
February 21, 2016

COLUMBIA, S.C., S.C. - Donald Trump haters within the Republican party hope the seeds of his eventual demise have just been planted in the soil of his latest triumph.

The South Carolina primary gave him a big win over the weekend but might also have sprouted an alternative candidacy capable of uniting the party's anti-Trump forces: the wealthy, the ideological conservatives, the college grads, and those voters who tell exit pollsters they're most desperate to beat Democrats.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[a_majoor]

Well Democrats are clear and united behind the issue of nominating a Supreme Court Justice:

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/227356

GAME OVER: JOE BIDEN SAYS IN 1992 THAT THE PRESIDENT SHOULDN’T NAME A SCOTUS NOMINEE “ONCE THE POLITICAL SEASON IS UNDERWAY.” “If you’re keeping score, this means that the current president, current vice president, current Senate minority leader, and incoming Senate minority leader have all gone on record in the past in favor of obstructing a Supreme Court nominee.”

 

[CougarKing]

I remember when John Kerry was running for president in 2004, he made the mistake of saying "unless you're Red Sox fan" during a presidential debate to describe someone in denial. Then when it seemed to the Red Sox might indeed win, he made a party rally the night of the big game saying "Dems for the sox." Regardless Kerry lost, even if the Boston Red Sox won that year, if I can recall correctly. 

I wonder if Trump will attempt to deflect a similar jinx?  :facepalm:

Yahoo Sports

Donald Trump vs. the Cubs has become baseball's newest rivalry
By Chris Cwik
3 hours ago
Big League Stew

For many reasons, the Chicago Cubs rivalry with the St. Louis Cardinals has become one of the best in the game. The Cubs victory over the Cardinals in the playoffs last season may have signaled a changing of the guard in the National League Central, and the banter between the two sides after Jason Heyward left ensures things should remain interesting in 2016.


But as camps open, a new, unlikely challenger threatens to unseat the Cardinals as the Cubs biggest rival. No, it's not the Pittsburgh Pirates or any other team in the division. In fact, it's not even someone involved with baseball.

(...SNIPPED)

 

[cupper]

Well Democrats are clear and united behind the issue of nominating a Supreme Court Justice:

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/227356

So what surprises you about this, that the Dems can be just as hypocritical as the GOP, or that the Dems came up with the idea first? ;D

 

[a_majoor]

An interesting take on how the insular world of political insiders were totally blindsided by the Trump (and to a lesser extent, Sanders) phenomena. Of course since they are insular and not receptive to input from the ordinary voters, the fact that "outsiders" gained so much traction by saying the things voters want to hear and addressing issues voters want addressed shouldn't be a surprise for the rest of us:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/02/23/my-very-peculiar-and-speculative-theory-of-why-the-gop-has-not-stopped-donald-trump/

My very peculiar and speculative theory of why the GOP has not stopped Donald Trump
What if political scientists are to blame for his rise?
By Daniel W. Drezner February 23 at 9:21 AM
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a regular contributor to PostEverything.

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump’s victory in South Carolina, his expected victory Tuesday in Nevada, his poll dominance in the upcoming states, and the increasing unlikelihood of an “anybody but Trump” bandwagon coalescing fast enough around another candidate is causing a lot of pre-nomination autopsies about what in the world happened.

[Trump is on course to win the 1,237 delegates he needs]

There have been two strands of this anti-Trump cri de coeur. The first is genuine puzzlement over why most of the Republican Party hasn’t trained its fire on Trump. Sure, most GOP officials might prefer him to Ted Cruz, but that doesn’t explain why the other candidates have attacked one another more than Trump. The New York Times’s Michael Barbaro and Ashley Parker, for example, report an astonishing figure: “In a presidential campaign during which ‘super PACs’ spent $215 million, just $9.2 million, or around 4 percent, was dedicated to attacking Mr. Trump, even as he dominated the polls for months.” As Slate’s Jamelle Bouie observed Monday:


Now that Jeb Bush has left the contest, everyone in the race is more focused on someone other than Trump. It’s as if the GOP’s traditional candidates are in denial about the state of the party’s primary, as though they don’t believe that Trump could win the nomination outright. It’s the same mistake that Republicans made throughout 2015, when Trump gained steam and GOP elites refused to confront him.

Or, to put this in terms that “Star Trek: The Next Generation” fans would understand:

GOP, as Starfleet: "Hey, why engage the Borg at Wolf 359? Let's wait until they get to, like, the Moon."

The second strand is anger at the mainstream media for enabling rather than critiquing Trump. Most of the recent fire has been concentrated on the hosts of “Morning Joe,” but in many ways this echoes an argument from last summer that media coverage of Trump enables him. According to this narrative, the media never condemned Trump’s racist, bellicose rhetoric, instead giving him tons of free coverage and thereby boosting his electoral chances.

So what’s going on? I have a theory, but it’s very speculative and I will welcome pushback from actual experts in campaign politics.

Basically, I think the fault lies with political scientists.

To explain this, I need to start with pitch framing in baseball. Last month Fangraph’s Jeff Sullivan wrote something interesting about the waning ability of major league catchers to “frame” pitches — i.e., make a ball look like a strike to home plate umpires. In short, over the past year or so catchers who were historically skilled at pitch framing stopped having consistent success at it. What’s puzzling about this is that over the past decade, new data about the location of pitched balls made it easier for teams to use catchers who were excellent pitch framers.

So what happened? Sullivan’s hypothesis is that because of all the analysis of this phenomenon, umpires are now cognizant of pitch framing. They responded to the new data by becoming more suspicious of catchers who are really good at it:


Pitch-framing isn’t just some nerd interest. They talk about it on television broadcasts. They talk about it on the MLB Network, and they write about it on the MLB website. It’s still not household information, like saves or RBI, but it’s known in the industry, and along with that comes knowledge of who’s supposedly good at it. …

It’s a really extraordinary situation. Pitch-framing research uncovered an area where teams could gain or lose rather significant value. Some teams acted on that, and some teams have benefited, but the unusual thing about this is it’s related only somewhat to actual on-field talent. The rest is in the hands of the umpires, and at some point, umpires were going to catch wind of what was taking place. And then they could have a response, because umpires don’t want to be manipulated, not intentionally and not for a team’s direct gain.

So, in other words, analysts noticed a real thing in baseball, analyzed it, and quantified it — but because the umpires care about this stuff as well, they internalized this analysis and changed the way they called the game, thereby obviating the analysis to some degree.

What does this have to do with Trump? Let me suggest the following hypothesis. For the past few years, political scientists and pollsters have developed a number of explanations, indicators and theories for why some candidates do well and others don’t. The Party Decides, for example, has been the primary theory driving how political analysts have thought about presidential campaigns. It seemed to explain nomination fights of the recent past quite well.





Trump tackles election, pope, Iraq


Play Video1:14


Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump spoke about his election win, the pope's comments and his views on Iraq and the 9/11 attacks. (Reuters)

When Trump announced that he was running last summer, his lack of establishment support and high unfavorables made it extremely easy to very smart people to confidently assert that he had almost no chance at securing the GOP nomination. I certainly predicated my own horrible, no-good, very bad predictions on this kind of analysis.

So why has it been proved wrong? My hypothesis is that GOP decision-makers also read the same analyses and concluded that they did not need to do anything to stop Trump. Sure, his poll numbers stayed robust even after he kept saying racist and insulting things, but there were good auxiliary hypotheses to explain why that was the case. They kept reading analysis after analysis in 2015 about how Donald Trump had little chance of winning the GOP nomination. They read smart take after smart take telling them that Trump didn’t have a chance. Even as the media covered Trump, even as late as the South Carolina debate, pundits were also talking about how his latest transgressive comment would doom his chances.
 
So GOP party leaders didn’t take any action. Except that the reason smart analysts believed Trump had no chance was because they thought GOP leaders would eventually take action.


Even now, the circular firing squad of the non-Trump candidates is predicated on the theory that There Can Be Only One who challenges Trump, and so the last non-Trump standing will win the nomination. Even now, there are tweets like this one:

Had coffee with a very senior banker today who literally laughed off Trump as "entertaining" and not a threat to win. So. Clueless.

Just as sabermetrics led to a change in how umpires called the game, political science led to a change in how party elites intervened in the campaign. Because the smart people said he had no chance, they presumed that they did not have to do anything. And now it’s too late.

Let me be very clear at this point: This is just a theory and I have almost no data to support it. This is an untested hypothesis. Like most of my analysis of the 2016 election cycle, it’s probably, mostly wrong.

But I wonder: Just how much of Trump’s rise came about because the people who could have stopped him read analyses asserting that he had no chance of winning? How much did political scientists refute their own hypotheses?

 

[Kirkhill]

So what surprises you about this, that the Dems can be just as hypocritical as the GOP, or that the Dems came up with the idea first? ;D

No, neither.  What is surprising is that there are still people that believe that rational debate will change minds.  >

 

[Rocky Mountains]

Let's not forget though the US Constitution says that it is the President's duty to nominate Judges to the Supreme Court, whereas it is the Senate's duty to advise on and consent to the nomination.

It's one thing to reject the nomination, and the Senate is well within their right to do that. It's even their right to drag out the process to the point that either the President is forced to withdraw the nominee or the Congressional session ends (or goes into recess which would defeat the purpose for delaying).

But to state that the rules say that the President shouldn't make a nomination in an election year, or during the lame duck session, or to refuse to allow the process is not only hypocrisy but violates the Constitution in that the Senate fails to carry out it's role of advice and consent.

The outspoken members of the GOP who say the President should not be allowed to make a nomination need to back off the hypocrisy and go back and read the Constitution they are quite ready to accuse Obama of ignoring.

But withholding consent is entirely within the Constitution.  I don't think anyone can dispute a nomination but if Obama doesn't nominate someone acceptable to the Senate, they will be rejected, just like the Constitution intended.  Obama could easily have a nominee approved.  He just has to nominate someone known to not be a social engineer.  Too simple.

 

[cupper]

So, McConnell and the Judiciary Committee have drawn the line in the sand. But to refuse to even consider any nomination violates the advise and consent rule. They don't get to say "Talk to the hand."  This isn't withholding consent, this is refusing to consider. As I said upthread, take the nomination and slow walk it until January 2017 if you want. I don't have a problem with that. Or hold one day of hearings, and have the committee vote to not pass on the nomination to the full senate. Keep doing it. Your still being obstructionist, but you are following the rules as laid out in the Constitution.

And the whole argument of not making a nomination during an election year, or during the election season, or even during the presidential lame duck period is crap to begin with. At what point do you say it's OK. As the election period extends further and further out from the actual election you would need to extend the exclusionary period out as well. And it's not hard to argue that the 2016 election started the day after the 2012 election (on some respects it started before that).

As for the political gamesmanship who the hell are they playing to? Their base? The base is going to vote for them regardless. THe Dems? Dems weren't going to vote for them so that's not it. And the middle is too big a group to think that these games will work and gain you votes. In fact it is more likely to cost you votes. And this is why they are now trying to figure out how they let the whole Trump insurgency get out of control.

McConnell: No hearings or meetings with Supreme Court nominee
Senior Republicans said they are committed to cutting off any White House effort to fill out the bench.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/senate-gop-supreme-court-219661

Senate Republicans will deny hearings to a Supreme Court nominee from President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he's not inclined to even meet with whomever the president picks for the job.

The party quickly dug in behind McConnell's strategy in a series of decisive gatherings. The Senate Judiciary Committee membership met with McConnell privately on Tuesday, then penned a letter signed by all 11 committee Republicans vowing not to hold hearings for a nominee. Then the entire GOP Conference met and emerged in near unity behind McConnell who said his party will not budge on the matter.

"My view, and I can now confidently say the view shared by virtually everybody in my conference, is that the nomination should be made by the president that the people elect in the election that's now underway," McConnell told dozens of members of the Capitol Hill press corps.

Asked if he'd even meet with a nominee on a courtesy call, McConnell responded: "I don't know the purpose of such a visit. I would not be inclined to take one myself."

McConnell's hard-line stance presages a yearlong war in the Senate over the vacancy left by Justice Antonin Scalia's death.

Democrats said they will make sure the matter does not fade as the election nears, while conservatives that are often critical of McConnell began backing him, giving him little incentive to back down.

Still, the issue became heated on Tuesday as the GOP leader flashed rare emotion under intense questioning from the media about how his extraordinary blockade might play politically. Democrats believe they can win back the Senate based on the issue, though McConnell said Democrats would have done the same thing under similar circumstances. But the question of when election season actually starts provoked the notoriously guarded leader into a curt response.

"We are in the election year. It will occur this November. The vacancy occurred this election year. That's what we're talking about. Thanks everybody," McConnell said as he walked back to this office.

The Democratic response to McConnell's intensifying effort to defang Obama in the last year of his presidency ranged from a somber Minority Leader Harry Reid to an angry Whip Dick Durbin to a prognosticating Chuck Schumer, who maintains that McConnell will back down. Reid said Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley is on track to be the "most obstructionist" chairman in the history of the panel — but added Democrats will not retaliate by becoming the "obstruct caucus."

"It's wrong. And I believe the American people won't stand for this. The Senate needs to do its job," Reid said. "The world's greatest deliberative body? They're not going to deliberate at all in this most important responsibility they have. All we want them to do is do their job."

But senior Republicans said they are committed to cutting off any White House effort to fill out the bench. GOP members on the Judiciary Committee wrote a letter, addressed to McConnell, explaining their rationale for holding no hearings and no votes on an Obama nominee.

"[G]iven the particular circumstances under which this vacancy arises, we wish to inform you of our intention to exercise our constitutional authority to withhold consent on any nominee to the Supreme Court submitted by this President to fill Justice Scalia’s vacancy," read the letter, which was released shortly after the meeting. "Because our decision is based on constitutional principle and born of a necessity to protect the will of the American people, this Committee will not hold hearings on any Supreme Court nominee until after our next President is sworn in on January 20, 2017."

Both McConnell and Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn then used the letter to defend the party's firm decision, bragging about the consensus among a committee filled with diverse opinions on deference to presidential nominations. Cornyn, a senior Judiciary member, also said he would not meet with a nominee Obama chooses.

"That may be their consensus view. Or the consensus between the far right and the far far right. But that is certainly not the consensus view of the American people who want the Senate to act," Schumer said of polls beginning to show the public leans toward having the Senate take up a nominee.

On the Senate floor on Tuesday morning, McConnell quoted past remarks from Democrats, including Vice President Joe Biden, Reid and Schumer, in defending his decision to prohibit confirmation of a new justice.

"Whatever [Obama] decides, his own vice president and others remind us of an essential point: Presidents have a right to nominate just as the Senate has its constitutional right to provide or withhold consent. In this case, the Senate will withhold it," McConnell said.

Democrats dismissed all those past remarks because the vacancies were hypothetical. Still, both parties appear poised to throw old quotes at each other for much of the rest of the year in explaining their positions.

"The public doesn't care about that," Schumer said of old quotes. "Don't make a darned bit of difference to the public."

The Judiciary Committee contains no vulnerable GOP incumbents, but even so they are beginning to line up behind McConnell anyway. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), chairman of the Senate GOP's campaign arm, said Republicans are "comfortable" going into the election behind their obstructive posture.

In an interview, Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio said he agreed that Republicans should move to block even cursory hearings.

"In this highly partisan, charged environment I think we should wait until we have the people weigh in," said Portman, who's up for a tough reelection campaign this fall in a purple state.

Over the past week, Grassley had left the door open slightly for a hearing, but the majority of his panel — from newer Sens. Mike Lee and Ted Cruz, to powerful senior Republicans like Sens. Orrin Hatch and Cornyn — urged him to block the process entirely. And once people like Sen. Lindsey Graham, who has shown deference in the past to presidential nominations, began to back barring a nominee from hearings, it seemed the deal was sealed.

"No. No. I'm following the Biden rule. If it's good enough for Joe, it's good enough for me," Graham said. "It's not going to hurt me. I think it's a good idea. I never thought I'd live to hear myself say this but I agree with Biden."

For his part, Grassley appeared to be going to great pains in avoiding the media, even shielding his face from cameras as he entered lunch.

Two moderate Republican senators, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Susan Collins of Maine, have said hearings should be held, but neither serves on the Judiciary Committee. Senior GOP aides expect several other Republicans to also call for the hearing process to begin, but predicted it will not be enough to influence Grassley or McConnell’s decision-making.

The argument made internally against a hearing is that giving a nominee a platform could backfire for Republicans and build public support for the president and his Supreme Court pick. Republicans are hoping to avoid proceedings that could drag on close to the election, and instead halt the 24/7 news coverage of the conflict as early as possible.

But Democrats believe their job is to make sure that doesn't happen, and keep the issue alive for another 8½ months.
"He hasn't seen the pressure that's going to build," Reid said of McConnell.

 

[a_majoor]

As noted upthread, however, the Democrats and even Obama have literally no legs to stand on in this case, as they have individually and collectively come out on record against such a nomination. For them to argue now that it is OK is the hight of hypocrisy, and really they are trying to either cloud the waters or try to force through the most "progressive" nominee possible now to attempt to block or derail any future presidential Administration's program (most likely both).

 

[cupper]

As noted upthread, however, the Democrats and even Obama have literally no legs to stand on in this case, as they have individually and collectively come out on record against such a nomination. For them to argue now that it is OK is the hight of hypocrisy, and really they are trying to either cloud the waters or try to force through the most "progressive" nominee possible now to attempt to block or derail any future presidential Administration's program (most likely both).

See, I think that nominating a superprogressive anti Scalia would be the wrong move here.

Since McConnell et al have said they will refuse to acknowledge any nominee put forth by Obama, he needs to nominate the love child of Scalia and Thomas. Someone so far to the conservative spectrum that Alito would look like a socialist. Then see how quick they stumble over themselves to move to pass it, only to have the nomination pulled at  the last second.

You just know that Obama is thinking it. It's number 2 on the F@#$ it list.  ;D

 

[a_majoor]

Trump's appeal to the voters. His crushing of the political class on the GOP side is pretty amazing. He is doing far better than Sanders on the left (even accounting for incidents like 90 precincts not reporting and the most statistically improbable coin tosses ever in Iowa), Sanders would only have just tied or barely beaten Hillary.

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/227513/

UNPACKING TRUMP’S APPEAL:

His theme is pride — self esteem. I think the message is: Even if you’re poorly educated — especially if you are poorly educated — you are smart, and you are American, and you should feel great. All those other politicians look down on you, and they look down on the country. They insult it. They use the worst insults, like “racist.” They’d have you believe that it’s racist to say “Make America great again” and to want to preserve the benefits of America for Americans and to increase those selfishly guarded benefits. But it’s not something to be ashamed of, it’s being smart. And he’s very smart, and we — you, with me leading the way — “are going to be the smart people.”

An interesting blend of traditional rightish slogans (America is great) and leftish ones (we’re the smart people). And a natural response to a ruling class that doesn’t much care for the country it rules, and that has gotten uninterested in hiding the fact.

And entirely separately, a big-time journalist — you’d recognize his name — sent me these texts: (note, see attachments)





The well-educated have been flattered beyond their deserts for decades, so it’s only fair. And Trump is, in a weird way, a kind of egalitarian: He thinks he’s so great that everybody else is equal in comparison. His message is “I’m great and you can be too.” Sure, maybe not as great as him, but still really, really great.

 

[Kilo_302]

Excellent piece on how a Clinton/Trump election will end disastrously for the Democrats. It should be pretty obvious, but Clinton is not a real progressive, and she will destroy her party's chances. Gawd how I despise the Clintons.

http://static.currentaffairs.org/2016/02/unless-the-democrats-nominate-sanders-a-trump-nomination-means-a-trump-presidency

Trump will capitalize on his reputation as a truth-teller, and be vicious about both Clinton’s sudden changes of position (e.g. the switch on gay marriage, plus the affected economic populism of her run against Sanders) and her perceived dishonesty. One can already imagine the monologue:

“She lies so much. Everything she says is a lie. I’ve never seen someone who lies so much in my life. Let me tell you three lies she’s told. She made up a story about how she was ducking sniper fire! There was no sniper fire. She made it up! How do you forget a thing like that? She said she was named after Sir Edmund Hillary, the guy who climbed Mount Everest. He hadn’t even climbed it when she was born! Total lie! She lied about the emails, of course, as we all know, and is probably going to be indicted. You know she said there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq! It was a lie! Thousands of American soldiers are dead because of her. Not only does she lie, her lies kill people. That’s four lies, I said I’d give you three. You can’t even count them. You want to go on PolitiFact, see how many lies she has? It takes you an hour to read them all! In fact, they ask her, she doesn’t even say she hasn’t lied. They asked her straight up, she says she usually tries to tell the truth! Ooooh, she tries! Come on! This is a person, every single word out of her mouth is a lie. Nobody trusts her. Check the polls, nobody trusts her. Yuge liar.”

Where does she even begin to respond to this? Some of it’s true, some of it isn’t, but the more she tries to defensively parse it (“There’s been no suggestion I’m going to be indicted! And I didn’t say I usually tried to tell the truth, I said I always tried and usually succeeded”) the deeper she sinks into the hole.

Trump will bob, weave, jab, and hook. He won’t let up. And because Clinton actually has lied, and actually did vote for the Iraq War, and actually is hyper-cosy with Wall Street, and actually does change her positions based on expediency, all she can do is issue further implausible denials, which will further embolden Trump. Nor does she have a single offensive weapon at her disposal, since every legitimate criticism of Trump’s background (inconsistent political positions, shady financial dealings, pattern of deception) is equally applicable to Clinton, and he knows how to make such things slide off him, whereas she does not.

The whole Clinton campaign has been unraveling from its inception. It fell apart completely in 2008, and has barely held together against the longest of long shot candidates. No matter how likely she may be to win the primary, things do not bode well for a general election, whomever the nominee may be. As H.A. Goodman put it in Salon:

Please name the last person to win the presidency alongside an ongoing FBI investigation, negative favorability ratings, questions about character linked to continual flip-flops, a dubious money trail of donors, and the genuine contempt of the rival political party.

The “contempt” bit of this is obviously silly; we all know levels of contempt have reached their world-historic high point in the Republican attitude toward Obama. But the rest is true: it’s incredibly hard to run somebody very few people like and expect to win. With the jocular, shrewd Donald Trump as an opponent, that holds true a million times over.

Nor are the demographics going to be as favorable to Clinton as she thinks. Trump’s populism will have huge resonance among the white working class in both red and blue states; he might even peel away her black support. And Trump has already proven false the prediction that he would alienate Evangelicals through his vulgarity and his self-deification. Democrats are insistently repeating their belief that a Trump nomination will mobilize liberals to head to the polls like never before, but with nobody particularly enthusiastic for Clinton’s candidacy, it’s not implausible that a large number of people will find both options so unappealing that they stay home.

A Clinton/Trump match should therefore not just worry Democrats. It should terrify them. They should be doing everything possible to avoid it. A Trump/Sanders contest, however, looks very different indeed.

Trump’s various unique methods of attack would instantly be made far less useful in a run against Sanders. All of the most personal charges (untrustworthiness, corruption, rank hypocrisy) are much more difficult to make stick. The rich history of dubious business dealings is nonexistent. None of the sleaze in which Trump traffics can be found clinging to Bernie. Trump’s standup routine just has much less obvious personal material to work with. Sanders is a fairly transparent guy; he likes the social safety net, he doesn’t like oligarchy, he’s a workaholic who sometimes takes a break to play basketball, and that’s pretty much all there is to it. Contrast that with the above-noted list of juicy Clinton tidbits.

Trump can’t clown around nearly as much at a debate with Sanders, for the simple reason that Sanders is dead set on keeping every conversation about the plight of America’s poor under the present economic system. If Trump tells jokes and goofs off here, he looks as if he’s belittling poor people, not a magnificent idea for an Ivy League trust fund billionaire running against a working class public servant and veteran of the Civil Rights movement. Instead, Trump will be forced to do what Hillary Clinton has been forced to do during the primary, namely to make himself sound as much like Bernie Sanders as possible. For Trump, having to get serious and take the Trump Show off the air will be devastating to his unique charismatic appeal.

Against Trump, Bernie can play the same “experience” card that Hillary plays. After all, while Sanders may look like a policy amateur next to Clinton, next to Trump he looks positively statesmanlike. Sanders can point to his successful mayoralty and long history as Congress’s “Amendment King” as evidence of his administrative bona fides. And Sanders’s lack of foreign policy knowledge won’t hurt him when facing someone with even less. Sanders will be enough of an outsider for Trump’s populist anti-Washington appeal to be powerless, but enough of an insider to appear an experienced hand at governance.

Trump is an attention-craving parasite, and such creatures are powerful only when indulged and paid attention to. Clinton will be forced to pay attention to Trump because of his constant evocation of her scandals. She will attempt to go after him. She will, in other words, feed the troll. Sanders, by contrast, will almost certainly behave as if Trump isn’t even there. He is unlikely to rise to Trump’s bait, because Sanders doesn’t even care to listen to anything that’s not about saving social security or the disappearing middle class. He will almost certainly seem as if he barely knows who Trump is. Sanders’s commercials will be similar to those he has run in the primary, featuring uplifting images of America, aspirational sentiments about what we can be together, and moving testimonies from ordinary Americans. Putting such genuine dignity and good feeling against Trump’s race-baiting clownishness will be like finally pouring water on the Wicked Witch. Hillary Clinton cannot do this; with her, the campaign will inevitably descend into the gutter, and the unstoppable bloated Trump menace will continue to grow ever larger.

Sanders is thus an almost perfect secret weapon against Trump. He can pull off the only maneuver that is capable of neutralizing Trump: ignoring him and actually keeping the focus on the issues. Further, Sanders will have the advantage of an enthusiastic army of young volunteers, who will be strongly dedicated to the mission of stalling Trump’s quest for the presidency. The Sanders team is extremely technically skilled; everything from their television commercials to their rally organizing to their inspired teasing is pulled off well. The Sanders team is slick and adaptable, the Clinton team is ropey and fumbling.

 

[Rifleman62]

Tough choices for the Dems: a avowed Socialist who honeymooned (second marriage) in Russia or a soon to be indicted felon.

Almost as bad as having a choice between a avowed Socialist and a millionaire, former part time drama teacher, snow boarder air head (although not blond).