US Presidential Contenders

[Rusty Edge]

I see some democrats are saying Logan Act today - I hope they don't overplay that hand, as they may well be right, but obviously politically-motivated legal actions are extremely poor form.  I may not deplore it aimed at the Clintons and then applaud it for being aimed at the clearly-guilty worst person in the world...

Logan Act: Democrats Accuse Donald T rump of Violating Anti-Collusion Law With Russia Email Comments

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Claire McCaskill D-Mo., said T rump may have broken the law by telling Russia it should find Hillary Clinton's deleted emails.

https://www.facebook.com/topic/Logan-Act/111302372254219?source=wpfrt&position=1&trqid=6312462574252575329

Somehow I knew that it would devolve to this- money ink and media minutes dedicated to proving that the duopoly was unfit for office.

[Buster's Uncle]

[shrugs] If it's limited to bloviating and there's no actual court action/actual congressional inquiries, that's just politics and I approve - he really shouldn't have said that, nothing to do with what else I think of him.  It's pretty disqualifying, on the face of it.

Duopoly?  This is all on him.

[Rusty Edge]

You're right, if this remains rhetorical and political, he brought it on himself.

His remarks are appalling in the context of the FBI statement on Hillary's e-mails, and I would probably disqualify him from receiving my vote if I hadn't already done so long ago. If I were a sitting member of Congress, I would ask that they both be denied courtesy security briefings between now and the election on the basis of her carelessness and his recklessness.

On the other hand, if I believed Hillary that the missing 30K e-mails were mostly about yoga class and recipes ( which I certainly don't ) it would be no big deal, because they would prove her honesty. In fact if I were her I'd be calling for release of them if they still existed, because I wouldn't make such a claim if it weren't true, and I'd be more intent on restoring my good name than caring  about concealing what I ate and when I exercised. Maybe that's just me.

Frankly, I don't want either to go to jail. I simply want them both to withdraw from politics and go away.
NOW!

[Buster's Uncle]

She's bad at handing this sort of thing.  That's no comment on what she is or is not guilty of, and no defense, just an observation.

---

I noticed this thread has been quiet after last week - you haven't had much more stomach to keep up and watch this week than I did last -zero in my case, so you're probably ahead-  have you?

[Rusty Edge]

My wife and I try... we always nod in agreement at the anti- [Sleezebag] stuff... but wind up switching channels.

But a lot of this has me looking at the clock. Kaine's speech, and I find him a likeable and qualified fellow, had me expecting him to continue with...."and I'd like to thank my Kindergarten teacher, my first grade teacher, my second grade teacher, " ad infinitum. 

Obama, likewise began with a bunch of stuff that was a boring rehash of other speeches I've heard from him mixed with boring bits about Hillary... we didn't finish that one either, until we saw some excepts of his wind-up on the news, and went back to look at it. It ended well, the man can speak.

Bill Clinton- well I guess he had his part to play in telling the Hillary story, but I was more moved by his speech for Obama 4 years ago.

It would have gone better if they'd edited their speeches and kept to the schedule.

As  for Hillary herself- she actually refrained from infuriating me tonight, so maybe she believed more of what she said. But at the same time, even though it was a crowd pleaser she prefaced her "Constitutional Amendment to overturn Citizen's United" with weasel words like ( if it comes to it) or  ( if it becomes necessary) . Last time she spoke of it she didn't weasel. It sounded like a priority. I've already posted an article about how calling for an amendment is kicking the can down the road by getting credit for taking the courageous stand, while knowing you'll never have to obey it because it could take a century to pass.

Well, Bernie looked unenthused tonight, even when they were praising him.

Ultimately, I'm probably never going to believe her, but she didn't leave me feeling like I'd been lied to and played for a fool the way she usually does.

As far as I'm concerned the best speech of both conventions was Michelle Obama's . SHE WON.

****


*The longer this goes on the more partisan and less objective I become. I could post a lot more articles bashing [Sleezebag] with regard to charity, because I was researching it to show my wife. She thought he was at least chartable from watching Celebrity Apprentice. She's pretty disappointed, she believes charity is part of conservatism, and he's a disgrace.

*As for the convention, it's ironic that the party that's against The Wall convenes behind one, and that the party that ridicules voter ID requires ID to participate. Then there are the marches and protests which I have yet to see televised.  I  came across a Jill Stein article I'd like to post, and will if I can find it again because it's newsworthy, but the Democrats have a different spin-

Essentially, regardless of her intellect, she is unqualified for the office. She was a town council person, and then a professional candidate ever since. Some of the GREEN party ideas are outliers by American standards, but Green Party elected officials are largely in local government, so Jill Stein is the best they've got. Jill hurts Hillary with the voters she takes and the things she says.
Jill will be like Nader, a spoiler. She has no path to victory because she's too radical to win  red states, and the same goes for an election with no majority in the electoral college and decided in the House.

* Gary could actually win that way, according to the New York Times recently, and not just the libertarian leaning magazines and blogs.

Thing is, while she and Gary are mostly civil to each other, ( they debated each other 4 years ago, and have jointly filed a lawsuit to be included in the debate with the [Sleezebag] and Hillary ), without a decision on the lawsuit, and without an endorsement or cooperation with Bernie, Jill and Gary are in direct competition for voters that would otherwise go democratic or stay home.  Very unlikely they will both poll high enough to make the  15% in 5 polls Labor Day cut for inclusion in the debates.

Well, maybe all she really expects is the 5% threshold in the general election to get establish the GREEN Party and get federal funding.

*Gary and Bill think they could win outright if they could get into the debates and news coverage as equals, and I think Gary is the best compromise candidate if it goes to the House, where the majority detest Hillary,  and the Democrats and many of the Republicans fear [Sleezebag], and Johnson has a track record of looking at every bill as a separate issue with no grudges in a state where he was a minority party. Bill & Gary are speaking of forming a coalition cabinet, since they don't have enough qualified Libertarians to draw on.  I'm sure they'll be disappointed with less than the 5% of the popular vote threshold for establishing the party nationally ( and making it eligible for federal funding,  ironic as that is for the Libertarians ) but the main goal is making it much easier for their caucuses or primaries to put candidates on the ballots everywhere. .

*Speaking of qualified candidates to draw on, there is a trickle of GOP state legislators flipping Libertarian and endorsing Johnson. So that looks good for the future.

*Oh, the DNC issued an apology to Sanders for their comments and bias, but it wasn't accompanied by resignations. More of an "Oops. My bad. You still lose."

* Hillary was walking away with electoral college, and securing all of the largest swing states, even with the slide in popular vote after the FBI pronouncement.  But follow that with the GOP convention, and follow that with WikiLeaks...  and suddenly the popular vote polls are converging and she's averaging only 274 votes or so, meaning that if Gary won his home state instead of Hillary, the election goes to the House.

It could get even worse for her, because there hasn't been a Pennsylvania poll for 2 weeks. If it flips to [Sleezebag], ( not far fetched because it's one of the top gun ownership states, and Hillary couldn't resist preaching to the choir at her convention ) then she's starting to look like the underdog.

Silver doesn't know yet if her slide is a trend or a blip. [Sleezebag]'s bounce was avg. to low. 

Just checked 538 again, Well, it looks like Clinton's starting to get her bounce.

[Rusty Edge]

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/06/2016-campaign-election-hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-green-party-jill-stein-progressives-liberal-213972

Think You’ve Got It Locked, Hillary? Meet Jill Stein.

The Green Party candidate insists it’s her year to get noticed—and she may make it onto 47 state ballots.

By Bill Scher

June 19, 2016

After an anxiety-inducing and divisive primary, Democrats are starting to breathe easier. Bernie Sanders, while not formally conceding to Hillary Clinton, has turned his fire on Donald [Sleezebag]. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the darling of the left before Sanders, has effusively endorsed Clinton. So at last the presumptive nominee can hope to gather in all those unhappy Bernie voters and lead a united Democratic Party in the fall, right?

Not if Dr. Jill Stein has anything to say about it.

The longtime Massachusetts environmental activist and presumptive Green Party nominee (the Green convention is not until August 4) is hungrily eyeing disgruntled Sanders voters—many of whom have been saying that even now, with the nomination all but locked up, they still won’t vote for Hillary. And Stein appears to know her audience, declaring on CNN right after the California primary that she represents “a plan B … to continue to fight that revolution.”

She is also undaunted by the Democratic coalescing around Clinton. Asked in an interview with Politico Magazine this week whether the Warren endorsement presents a problem for her, Stein suggested that the Massachusetts senator lacks the progressive credibility to sway Sanders voters: “Elizabeth Warren has very good proposals regarding Wall Street, but she really has not been leading the charge for single-payer health care … and is pretty much a war hawk in alignment with Hillary Clinton.” (Stein is not the first voice on the left to criticize Warren’s foreign policy record as militaristic.)

You may be wondering: The Green Party? What’s that—one of those European lefty outfits? And do they have a prayer of getting more than a fraction of the vote? As of today, Stein is but a blip. Eighty-seven percent of voters don’t know enough about her to register an opinion in a late May Quinnipiac poll. And Clinton’s lead over [Sleezebag] appears big enough to weather a little left-wing erosion. But with a recent Bloomberg poll showing that only 55 percent of Sanders voters are ready for Hillary, the conditions exist for Stein to spark a larger exodus–if she can raise her profile and if Democrats can’t unify at next month’s convention.

And while the Greens have been under the radar in America for the past several years, they proudly claim at least 100 municipal officeholders, and from 2007 to 2015 they controlled the mayoralty of the 100,000-person city of Richmond, California. Now, like the Libertarian Party, the Green Party sees its moment in this season of widespread discontent, when both Clinton and presumptive GOP nominee Donald [Sleezebag] begin the general election campaign with record-high unfavorables. Stein’s platform is nearly identical to Sanders’, only more pacifist (the two diverge on the use of military drones) and more ambitious (beyond providing free college, Stein would cancel all existing student debt).

And Stein may be making big strides toward being treated like a legitimate presidential candidate. In her 2012 Green Party run, she appeared on only 36 state ballots. But her campaign’s ballot access coordinator told Counterpunch last week that “we fully expect to get on the ballot in all but three states due to our petition drives” and will then litigate the “onerous” requirements in the three remaining states in hopes of hitting 50.

That’s not bluster. Ballot Access News publisher Richard Winger told Politico Magazine in an email he expects Stein to reach 47 as well. If so, Stein would break the ballot access record for the Green Party, topping the Ralph Nader 2000 effort by four states.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/06/2016-campaign-election-hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-green-party-jill-stein-progressives-liberal-213972#ixzz4FmURhRSp
Follow us: @politico on Twitter | Politico on Facebook

[Buster's Uncle]

I've seen absolutely ASTONISHLY little online today to indicate that the convention last night even happened.  I don't know what to make of that - I haven't had to go looking for news related to the previous night at either convention before. 

-It does mean they didn't screw up.

I'm calling -only moderate confidence- that between going last for a change and just putting a better show -not the same as a good show; it was frequently terribly boring, but they didn't screw up, not least with the getting counterchanting going at key points when the bernieheads acted out, and I'm seeing nothing trending on Facebook about any stunts from them when Mrs. Clinton spoke, and impressive that that was headed off- there's going to be a meaningful bump from this.  -Anything can happen by November, but those in the Clinton campaign who coordinated various levels of running the details of the convention show pulled off a masterpiece.  Make sure to hold onto the key parties in that for the communications office in the White House.

[Rusty Edge]

I've seen absolutely ASTONISHLY little online today to indicate that the convention last night even happened.  I don't know what to make of that - I haven't had to go looking for news related to the previous night at either convention before. 

-It does mean they didn't screw up.

I'm calling -only moderate confidence- that between going last for a change and just putting a better show -not the same as a good show; it was frequently terribly boring, but they didn't screw up, not least with the getting counterchanting going at key points when the bernieheads acted out, and I'm seeing nothing trending on Facebook about any stunts from them when Mrs. Clinton spoke, and impressive that that was headed off- there's going to be a meaningful bump from this.  -Anything can happen by November, but those in the Clinton campaign who coordinated various levels of running the details of the convention show pulled off a masterpiece.  Make sure to hold onto the key parties in that for the communications office in the White House.

Just hearsay and anecdotal evidence, but- Well, I did read somewhere that Bernie's diehards staged a walkout before the Hillary coronation, but I didn't see a hint of it on TV. In fact it was reported that it was a packed house ( and so it appeared), and the doors were closed by order of the fire marshal.

Well, today I heard that one of the delegates claiming to be a Bernie delegate said that after he walked out, he left the protest outside and returned out of curiosity, only to find that his section was full of people he never saw before. There was also a claim of a local ad offering $50/night for seat fillers, who only had to sit there, applaud, and wave the signs or banners they were given.

Likewise, Black Lives Matter was protesting outside with a sign which said "Hillary Delete Yourself"

The show was well managed, or there was collusion with NBC, or both.

I've been doing stuff and haven't had much chance to surf the web today.

[Buster's Uncle]

I don't know what NBC could have to do with it - I watched what I could stand to on PBS.

[Rusty Edge]

I'm just saying that they didn't show me a walk-out or an outside protest. They seemed to be able to cut to the discussion panel or a commercial if things veered from the unity message.

In contrast, during the GOP coverage, they conducted floor interviews when there was a rules fight, and again when  Cruz defied Donald, to add fuel to the fire.  I don't mean that to sound whiney, because as far as I'm concerned both parties deserve to disintegrate for giving us such flawed candidates.

It's not that I don't know NBC/MSNBC has a liberal bias, it's part of why I listen to them, to get that perspective, ( the other part is that I really like the local news and weather )but like the DNC e-mails, I thought that they'd be more impartial and less brazen, have more journalistic integrity.

****

The Obamas are great orators, but I don't really think Hillary gets a quarter million per speech because she's mesmerizing, and she's gotten a lot of practice in the last year or so.. That's my lasting impression of the Democratic Convention.

****
Gary is taking flack today from both the Theocons and the Libertarians. The issue is "Religious Liberty". The subject came up in a recent interview or two. Gary took some heat for standing up for the '64 Civil Rights Act in a debate at the Libertarian Convention this year. Purist Libertarians believe that the government has no right to tell you what you can do on your own property, or penalize you for what you think or say.

Theocons seem to disregard the Golden Rule, and use the term to deny services to people they don't approve of, or refuse services they don't approve of - Pharmacists denying birth control pills because they believe life begins at conception, Doctors refusing to perform abortions and sterilizations, County Clerks denying marriage licenses to same sex couples, Social workers denying them adoptions, businesses denying various service to gays.

Gary's thinking is that religious based discrimination is still discrimination, which is wrong. If you can discriminate against sinners, why not other religions, too? First the gays, then the Muslims. Where does it end?

Maybe somebody might  think it's not a problem in the age of social media, but then maybe they  haven't lived rural where there's a lack of goods and services, much less competition.

[Buster's Uncle]

Go tell Elok that in the trans bathrooms thread, please.

[ColdWizard]

... journalistic integrity.

I think I saw that once, when I was a kid.

[Rusty Edge]

It's a new month, so I can access this New York Times article which is widely referred to, -

The 2016 Race

Donald [Sleezebag]’s Path: What Map Should Democrats Fear the Most?
A Tie at 269–269

In this map, Donald [Sleezebag] wins five close swing states: Nevada, Iowa, Ohio, New Hampshire and North Carolina. 

By NATE COHN and TONI MONKOVIC

July 27, 2016


Each week, Nate Cohn, The Upshot’s elections analyst, based in Washington, and Toni Monkovic, an Upshot editor in New York,  discuss the 2016 race and post a lightly edited transcript of their written exchange.

By now, it’s clear that Donald [Sleezebag] has a realistic shot to become president. He has essentially pulled even with Hillary Clinton in the polls (after the expected, and usually temporary, bounce from his convention). As of Tuesday night, FiveThirtyEight gave him a 47.5 percent chance to win. The Upshot model assigned him a 32 percent chance.

But how would he win? I asked Nate to come up with a map or two for the most plausible way [Sleezebag] could win in a close election. I said I would do the same, independently, then we could compare notes. Readers can play along at this easy-to-use interactive site. (FiveThirtyEight estimates that [Sleezebag] has a higher chance of losing the popular vote but winning the Electoral College than the other way around.) — Toni

Toni A caveat: Dwelling on the Electoral College makes sense only when an election is close. Although it happened in 2000, it’s rare that a candidate wins the popular vote and loses the Electoral College.

But based on the months of polling we’ve seen so far, it appears that if [Sleezebag] wins, it’s likely to be a close election.

Nate Yeah, it’s pretty hard for a candidate to win the popular vote by more than two percentage points and lose the Electoral College. That said, it really can happen.

As Al Gore will tell you.

Toni Yes, President Gore — that’s what many readers remind us (in the comments whenever the issue comes up) he should have been called. Speaking of Florida, it’s pretty much a given in this exercise that [Sleezebag] has to win the state; he has virtually no path without it. Florida is a diverse state, and it’s far from clear that he actually will win it. But it would be pointless to do our mapping otherwise. So let’s assume [Sleezebag] wins by a hanging chad or two.

Nate O.K., let’s give [Sleezebag] the state of Florida.

Toni I see that your map is an exact replica of one of mine. You have a 269-269 tie, with the House determining the winner, and your second map is just a slight variation, with Maine’s Second Congressional District putting him over the top, 270-268. In these maps, if [Sleezebag] loses Pennsylvania, he has to win five swing states: Ohio, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada.

That’s not easy.

[Note: The House would most likely give the election to [Sleezebag] in the event of a tie.]

Nate Look, I think that [Sleezebag] basically has two paths right now. One is to win Pennsylvania, Ohio and Florida. If he does that, he’s on the cusp of victory — he would just need 10 more electoral votes, which would probably come from North Carolina or Iowa and New Hampshire. This isn’t an easy path, but it is a fairly straightforward one if he can win Pennsylvania.

The other path, the one depicted in the chart, is to counter a loss in Pennsylvania with gains in Ohio, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada. Again, tough. But it would leave Clinton just short of the presidency, at 269 electoral votes.

With the exception of North Carolina, all of those states have a well-below average number of well-educated Republicans compared with the number of white working-class Democrats. So I don’t think it’s a preposterous combination.

Toni As you wrote Monday, a high number of white working-class Democrats is positive for [Sleezebag] (he has a good chance to take away some of those votes from Clinton). And a high number of well-educated Republicans is positive for Clinton (she has a good chance to take away some of those votes from [Sleezebag].)

Another Pathway: [Sleezebag] Wins Pennsylvania
Things would get a lot easier for Donald [Sleezebag] if he won the Keystone State.

Your comment on Pennsylvania dovetails with my other map, in which [Sleezebag] wins that state and wins the Electoral College, 279-259. Here, [Sleezebag] would win Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa and North Carolina. (In this case, he wouldn’t even need Iowa, but I figure that if he wins Pennsylvania, he’ll probably win Iowa). Of the two maps I did, I feel this may be the more realistic one for [Sleezebag]. Thoughts?

Nate Well, I’m not entirely sure about that. I guess what I’d say is that [Sleezebag] should hope that’s the easier path, because it implies that he can count on Pennsylvania as a top-flight battleground.

Toni The Clinton camp now seems to be treating Pennsylvania as a top-flight battleground. It recently decided to start an ad campaign in the state. And Clinton and Tim Kaine will campaign together there immediately after the convention, with stops in Harrisburg and Pittsburgh. So they’re not taking the state for granted. [Update: [Sleezebag] is campaigning in Scranton today.]

Nate I don’t really see how they can take it for granted. The state voted a hair more for Barack Obama than the nation as a whole in 2012, but it’s above average in terms of how much Obama depended on the support of white voters without a degree, who today are the voters abandoning Mrs. Clinton in big numbers. It has far more of those voters than Florida, Virginia, Colorado, Nevada or North Carolina. So if Mr. [Sleezebag] is going to win this race with a big, narrow push among white working-class voters, then that effect would seem to have a very real chance of manifesting itself in Pennsylvania.

Now, for that same reason, I think it’s easy to imagine how Clinton could survive a loss in Pennsylvania, with gains in those other states I just mentioned.

But it’s really only one of the few ways she can lose this race. So why shouldn’t they defend it?

I thought it was strange that it wasn’t in their original ad campaign.

Toni Right. When you do this mapping exercise, you realize how important Pennsylvania is. (The G.O.P. last won Pennsylvania in 1988.) In a close election, it seems crucial to [Sleezebag]. Without it, he has to win all of those five swing states we talked about earlier: Ohio, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Iowa, Nevada. Let’s assume those will be 50-50 states. If you flip a coin five times and hope to get five straight heads, your odds are just over 3 percent. But that’s what [Sleezebag] would need in this case. [Update: If you add Florida as a coin-flip state, which seems right, that makes it around 1.6 percent.]

Nate And it’s not just a coin flip. Those five states are really different.

Toni For one thing, Nevada, with a fairly large Hispanic population, is thought to lean to the left. But I’m curious about your take on New Hampshire. As you showed in your article Monday, it has plenty of working-class whites. But then consider that it’s right in the middle of a liberal region. Sure, New Hampshire has a long history of conservatism. But over time, people migrate from neighboring liberal states, like New York and Vermont. And that slowly takes New Hampshire toward the left.

Nate Well, New Hampshire has tended to move slightly to the left. But I think it may be a mistake to assume that Clinton can hold recent levels of Democratic support among white working-class people in the Northeast, even in New England.

Toni I also think back to how Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat, hung on against Scott Brown in the New Hampshire Senate race in 2014. It was close, but she held him off against the grain of a dominant midterm year for Republicans.

Nate Well, Scott Brown was an out-of-state candidate.

Toni You’re calling him a carpetbagger?

Nate If you think that term applies outside of the South, then absolutely.

Look, the southeastern part of New Hampshire — where most of the people vote — is decidedly middle class. It’s very moderate. It has a long history of supporting conservatives in a variety of contexts. It was great for both Scott Brown and Donald [Sleezebag] in the primary. Western New Hampshire really has become eastern Vermont at this point, thanks in part to the sort of migration trends you’ve referred to among liberal expats.

Toni  We shouldn’t skip over this part of our maps: You and I put states like Virginia and Colorado into the Clinton camp. [Update: Clinton has stopped advertising in Colorado]. The demographics work well for Clinton in those two states, and the polling has been positive for her. That’s a big deal if it holds up.

But we also made Wisconsin blue. And yet Wisconsin’s demographics aren’t that much different from Iowa’s.

Where Clinton or [Sleezebag] Has More Ground to Lose

Democrats are dependent on white working-class voters in the Midwest, but Republicans are dependent on minorities and well-educated voters in the Sun Belt.

And Iowa seems to be a true tossup state, based on polling.

Nate Those two states don’t look very different in terms of those demographic numbers. If it weren’t for the polling data and the Clinton campaign’s behavior (no advertising in Wisconsin), I’d be inclined to say that Wisconsin’s a battleground, too. But we do have a lot of polling there, and it all tends to indicate that Clinton has a more comfortable lead than what we’ve seen in Iowa.

This doesn’t really show up in the simple demographic numbers, but I would note that [Sleezebag] was extremely weak in the Milwaukee suburbs in the primary. That’s the heart of the Republican base there, and I think he probably has a lot of work among those voters to become competitive.

If I were the Clinton campaign, I would still entertain airing advertisements in the Green Bay, La Crosse and Wausau media markets.

Toni People rage about a certain procedural issue during a campaign, then tend to forget about it once it’s over. But we should briefly review the recent change to the superdelegate system for Democrats. The Clinton and Sanders camps agreed to a deal, and the Democratic rules committee voted to bind roughly two-thirds of the superdelegates to state results, significantly cutting their influence.

When you consider a strong superdelegate system, I think some Republicans would say that the nation never needed it more than in this election cycle. And yet the Democrats are making this change.

Nate Ha. The Republican race would have been so different if they had Democratic rules on proportionality and superdelegates.

Who knows where it would have ended up? But it would have been very different for [Sleezebag].

If I were proposing the rules for either party, I’d probably eliminate superdelegates as a standard element of the process but put triggers in place to make them available in the event that they were needed — to resolve a deadlocked convention, if someone were indicted or killed, if there were reason to think that the early primary results were unrepresentative (say, a new candidate jumps in the race).

The two triggers: No candidate gets a majority of pledged delegates (either heading into the convention or on the first ballot); two-thirds of superdelegates vote to give themselves a vote on the floor.

I think that would be a high-enough bar that no one would presume that they were going to decide the race under anything other than extraordinary circumstances.

Toni It’s hard not to peek at polling numbers now, even though we know that they tend to be less predictive because of bounces during convention season. But does anything stand out to you about recent numbers you’ve seen?

Nate Not really. It looks like a fairly typical bounce that has left a tied race or a slight [Sleezebag] lead. There are still a lot of undecided voters, and there aren’t many polls showing [Sleezebag] near 50 percent. We’ll see where we are in a few weeks.

Toni It happened: Bernie Sanders gave Hillary Clinton his full support at the convention. (Never in doubt, right?) Any final thoughts on whether the Bernie holdouts might come around in the end?

Nate Well, I think the remaining Bernie holdouts are a diverse bunch. There are conservative white men who disapprove of Obama and Clinton, but still consider themselves Democrats.

There are people on the ideological left who might not ever come around; I’d guess a bunch of them didn’t vote for Obama in 2012. I’d guess these are the Bernie or Bust folks at the convention.

The biggest group, though, might be young voters who don’t trust Clinton very much. I think a lot will come around.

Many might not.

[Bearu]

I also found the current article for why people should dump T rump:

National SDS Calls for Students to Dump T rump



For the past several months, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) chapters across the country have led protests against Republican presidential candidate Donald T rump. Anyone who has been following T rump's campaign has seen examples of the war mongering and racist policies he supports. Deporting over 11 million undocumented immigrants, building a wall on the US-Mexico border, banning Muslims, and carpet bombing Syria are just a few examples of what T rump is trying to accomplish. SDS is anti-war, anti-racist, and supports legalization and tuition equity for all undocumented immigrants. It would be against everything SDS stands for as a progressive student activist organization, to not challenge T rump’s agenda or encourage people to stand up and fight back!

Donald T rump's right wing populism has become a rallying point for anti-immigrant, Islamophobic and white supremacist violence. Donald T rump’s refusal to condemn the KKK as a white nationalist organization, which was formed to attack the democratic rights won by African Americans through struggle, being an example of this. T rump’s campaign also has the support of Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder and former leader of France's far-right National Front party, which campaigns mostly on anti-immigration policies. Overall, Donald T rump’s proposed state policies are against the interests of workers, people of color, women, and LGBTQIA+ people, while also supporting Wall Street’s wars abroad from Latin America to the Middle East.

In response to T rump’s statements and calls for attacks on oppressed people, SDS has mobilized campuses and communities to express their disdain for T rump and his aspirations. SDS chapters in Tampa, Florida, Tallahassee, Florida, Houston, Texas, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and West Chester, Pennsylvania, have organized several events in the form of “Dump T rump” protests, rallies, and piñata bashes, which have garnered the support of hundreds and thousands of people. SDS’ affiliates, such as the Progressive Student Union in Arlington, Texas, have also organized against Donald T rump and his bigotry. SDS in Chicago, Illinois, and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, have co-hosted events with the aim of opposing T rump; SDS even took a role in organizing the Dump T rump protest in Chicago last week, which saw over 5,000 people demanding an end to systemic oppression and T rump’s support of it. This event caused T rump to cancel his Chicago campaign appearance, and subsequently flee the city.

SDS is nonpartisan, but we believe people have a right to protest T rump’s hate speech, especially as progressive students committed to actively struggling for social change across campuses. Every #DumpTrump protest from Tampa to Chicago has shown that what Donald T rump fears most is the power of the people, not other politicians. Students and all people have the power to unite against right-wing racists supported by or part of the powerful 1% like T rump. Such actions as Tallahassee SDS uniting hundreds of students against the KKK on campus, which historically received support from the U.S. government including the FBI and police departments, illustrate this fact. SDS is committed to leading campaigns that struggle against University Administrations, who are the 1% on campus that profit from systemic oppression, and who allow T rump’s hate on campus grounds!

[Bearu]

And for equality . . .

National Students for a Democratic Society on the Democratic National Convention


With the Democratic National Convention approaching, it has now been confirmed that Hillary Clinton is the Democratic Party nominee in the 2016 Presidential election. While SDS’s focus is primarily on building organizational power within our communities and carrying out direct action, this result is not irrelevant to us. Multiple chapters from SDS will be marching on the DNC along with many other organizations to protest the racist, warmongering platform of the Democratic Party.

Despite her rhetoric, Hillary Clinton ultimately represents the interests of the Wall Street billionaires and the rest of the 1%. As the perfect ‘status quo’ candidate, Clinton carries out a neoliberal agenda, having a history of racist, warmongering, anti­-immigrant, and anti­-worker pursuits and policies. Domestically, Clinton is notorious for “superpredator” bills contributing to mass incarceration, mass deportations, austerity, spending cuts, and the continued support of big business. Abroad, Clinton promotes war over peace, and has been involved in NATO­led wars against Libya, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, as well as coups in Honduras and Ukraine. Hillary Clinton’s record and platform, on par with the policies of both major parties, contribute to the continued attack on all workers and oppressed people.

Clinton secured her nomination by outperforming Bernie Sanders, a candidate who is less of a ‘major player’ in the Democratic Party, but who was able to find a base of support in the youth. The Bernie Sanders campaign, despite his widespread popularity, demonstrates the need to continue as independent organizers. Ultimately, Bernie Sanders could not win the nomination because the interests which control the Democratic Party supported the Clinton campaign. As an organization that supports education rights, economic freedom, social justice, and many other causes that were important to the Sanders campaign, we invite those who wish to continue the struggle to join in political organizing to build people’s power.

While SDS has put out the call to “Dump T rump”, we are not letting the Democratic Party slide either. The neoliberal agenda pursued by the Democrats and Republicans alike is responsible for the economic crises, police brutality, mass deportations, and mass incarceration that have allowed for the rise of a racist, sexist, anti-­immigrant demagogue like Donald T rump. While the Donald T rump campaign is a more openly and acutely racist, anti­-immigrant, fear mongering platform, ultimately the interests of the people are not represented by either party. In fact many of the fears about a potential T rump presidency are already being actively carried out by the current Obama administration, including the deportation of more than 2.5 million immigrants, drone strikes in 7 different countries, anti­-worker austerity measures, and mass incarceration.

Ultimately, the only way to victory is through building people’s power. This is why National SDS is calling upon progressive students and youth everywhere to carry the momentum from the “Dump T rump” rallies forward into the marches on the Democratic National Convention. To those who are disillusioned, do not let the fight end with the Sanders campaign. Join us at the DNC, and then bring that fight back to your communities and schools, and build organizations of people’s power. Our only path to victory is through working together and building a mass movement independent of the establishment.

I cannot tolerate the thought of either Hillary or T rump as the president of the United States of America.