2016 US Presidential Elections Thread [Trump Wins]

[Jauntier]

As a Canadian all i really hear is "Donald trump is literally Hitler" and "well, time to move to Canada" and i'm like "We are drowning in Syrian refugees how in the HELL are you gonna get anywhere. Does someone mind giving me an unbiased breakdown on the current status of murican' politics?

Unbias? In a debate forum? In a politics thread? For the next president?

Oh, honey.

Basically, no one but angry white males likes Blonde Hitler, people are willing to vote for Shillary because sexism and willingly being ignorant of her lies, and Col. Sanders continues to beg for the proletariat's paychecks on Patreon. Everyone else doesn't matter: they are left in the dust.

 

[Ivysaur]

Who knows how that would turn out, right? Especially with the electoral college and all, man, strap in for some really ****ed up election results XD

Remember that if nobody gets 270 EVs, the House will choose the president instead.

And chances are it will still look red unless the Republican party melts down heavily.

 

[Esper]

And chances are it will still look red unless the Republican party melts down heavily.

They haven't already?

No, if the Republicans try this brokered convention thing to give it to someone else it pretty much puts a nail in the coffin for their party's chances (already slim) to win the White House. Too many people hate Trump and either won't vote for him or will vote for the other one (Clinton or Sanders), and too many of his supporters wouldn't vote for someone else if they feel his nomination was "stolen" from him.

 

[Klippy]

There is a biased narrative that "no one but angry white men" like Trump when the reality is starkly different. Granted, his popularity is strongest among lower class whites and whites in general, but there's a serious media push to paint him as a racist Nazi when he does receive support from minority groups. I'm not going to debate about his politics or positions, but his support is broader than you think, just as Bernie's is broader than the media claims.

Bernie "Socialist" Sanders and Donald "Fascist" Trump are the outliers in this election AND the establishment politicians fear them both. The truth is that the Republicans and Democrats are all bought by the same interests - Wall Street, pharma, the prisons industry, and many more. None of these people want Trump OR Sanders. I can almost guarantee that a Republican Congress would choose Hillary over Trump because she is establishment and that means the status quo remains.

 

[FreakyLocz14]

Obama needs to stop obstructing to allow the SCOTUS vacancy to be filled. Obama is responsible for the continued vacancy by nominating unacceptable candidates.

 

[Her]

Obama needs to stop obstructing to allow the SCOTUS vacancy to be filled. Obama is responsible for the continued vacancy by nominating unacceptable candidates.

...What?

The ridiculousness of Obama being obstructionist aside, Merrick Garland is essentially the ultimate attempt to appease Republicans without giving way to their obstructionism. Praised by both parties, an exemplary record, a strong moderate - what's unacceptable to the GOP is that Obama is trying to do his job, which is what they've stood in the way of for most of his entire presidency.

 

[FreakyLocz14]

...What?

The ridiculousness of Obama being obstructionist aside, Merrick Garland is essentially the ultimate attempt to appease Republicans without giving way to their obstructionism. Praised by both parties, an exemplary record, a strong moderate - what's unacceptable to the GOP is that Obama is trying to do his job, which is what they've stood in the way of for most of his entire presidency.

Garland has been shown to be anti-2A. He is grandstanding by nominating candidates who he knows the Senate will not confirm. He needs to nominate a Scalia clone.

 

[Kanzler]

Garland has been shown to be anti-2A. He is grandstanding by nominating candidates who he knows the Senate will not confirm. He needs to nominate a Scalia clone.

Although it might be in your self-interest to say that, give the man some dignity at least. Why Obama would want to nominate a Scalia clone is beyond me.

 

[Her]

Garland has been shown to be anti-2A. He is grandstanding by nominating candidates who he knows the Senate will not confirm. He needs to nominate a Scalia clone.

If it's grandstanding to try resolve an issue without entirely submitting to the pathetic tactics of a party who will only accept a Scalia clone, then you've lost me there.

 

[Kanzler]

Hate to drown you guys in more Bernie content (no i don't really) buuut the latest polls from CNN/ORC has Sanders beating of all 3 Republican candidates in a head-to-head matchup. Clinton beats Trump, albeit at a smaller margin, would tie with Cruz (what?) and lose to Kasich.

Now people might say, well you know these head-to-head polls are meaningless this early in the race and all and electoral college and all blah blah blah But, it's been well documented that Sanders has much greater support from independents than Clinton, so these polls aren't without water.

 

[Klippy]

I do think there's some merit to Trump's belief that he will pound Clinton's flaws into voter conscience come general election. He's barely begun to attack her and he's managed to wipe the floor with seriously backed candidates like Jeb! and Rubio. I do follow the notion that it's too early to tell as we've had no debates between general candidates, but this is certainly an interesting look.

 

[Neil Peart]

Yep. Once Trump starts smearing Clinton, I think it's game over and time for me to start packing for Canada. Maybe I'll see Ted Cruz there?

 

[Ivysaur]

I don't think it's going to be "game over", simply because there are more democrats who like Clinton (about 70%) than republicans who like Trump (about 50%), and there are more overall voters who hate Trump than who hate Clinton. If this becomes a "we are all pieces of shit but who is the biggest?", then Trump starts in a far worse position- and he really doesn't have room to improve since he's not exactly an unknown quantity that can be re-packaged to the general public. And if it all becomes a "who can turn out their base more efficiently", then Clinton starts with a far better situation- and I don't think there is anything Trump can say to discourage the Black and Hispanic voters who massively like her, who are some of the most important constituencies in the democratic base and who have the most to lose if a white supremacist gets the presidency.

 

[Klippy]

More of these keep happening, and we'll hand over the election to Trump on a silver platter.

I didn't want to detract from the Brussels topic, but I felt this was extremely poignant and predictive. Every terror attack furthers Trump's message and every one pushes people to vote for his hard-line stances. I also was alerted to this article published in January of Trump criticizing Brussels state of affairs. It's something Centipedes (Trump supporters) are latching onto further to push his dialogue.

"There is something going on, Maria," he said. "Go to Brussels. Go to Paris. Go to different places. There is something going on and it's not good, where they want Shariah law, where they want this, where they want things that — you know, there has to be some assimilation. There is no assimilation. There is something bad going on."

Warming to his theme, he added that Brussels was in a particularly dire state. "You go to Brussels — I was in Brussels a long time ago, 20 years ago, so beautiful, everything is so beautiful — it's like living in a hellhole right now," Mr. Trump continued.

 

[Kanzler]

March 22 Primary Results

Trump takes Arizona, and Cruz takes Utah by an astounding margin. Sanders loses in Arizona but trounces Clinton in Idaho and Utah. I've got my ears in the Berniesphere, and there are allegations of voter suppression and election fraud coming out of Arizona.

Thoughts? Has the race changed for either party? Has Sanders gain enough momentum to change the narrative of the race or is it something that might just begin changing? Has last night's primaries improved or decreased Trump's chances at getting 1237 delegates? Do you think the allegations of election fraud have any substance?

 

[Esper]

I'm pretty upset by what happened in Arizona. I think it's fair to call it voter fraud. Tons of people who had been longtime or newly changed Democrats showed up and were told they were registered as independents still, or sometimes as Republicans or Libertarians. Only people registered as Democrats could vote in the Arizona primary so lots of people were told they couldn't vote or were given provisional ballots (which often don't get counted).

Add to that the fact that in Maricopa County (over 3 million people) cut its number of voting places down to a third of what they were in 2012. Voter turnout was a record high.

Add also to that the fact that early mail votes heavily favored one of the remaining two candidates.

It would be so easy for someone to change the voter rolls if they had access. I can't know if something like this happened, but I can be very suspicious. I've already signed the petition on whitehouse.gov:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/pe...-suppression-arizona-3222016-democratic-party

I don't know what else I can do at the moment though.

 

[Sir Codin]

I'm not a fan of the Democratic party by most accounts, but I have to agree that was BS. I think I'll be signing that petition as well, Esp.

 

[Esper]

Things like this are making me more sympathetic toward Trump supporters. I don't like the plans and policies Trump is suggesting for the most part, but I can start to see how he appeals to people.

Someone I was talking to the other day was saying that politics in America is changing from left vs. right (or Democrat vs. Republican) into establishment vs anti-establishment. I wonder if that's true, but if a viable anti-establishment party were to form I think I would jump to it.

 

[Ivysaur]

Watching this is pretty sad, considering how in my country, last December, a newly formed left-wing anti-establishment party did show up, got 20% of the vote -including mine-... and managed to take 69 seats in a 350-strong parliament thanks to our proportional representation system (winning two states, even, with 26%!).

In the US, you'd get between none and a tiny little slice of representation. Yay election systems.

 

[Pokemon Game Fan]

I've always been a huge liberal and it upsets me so much to see things that I thought were on my side (like FB pages that are so-called Liberal and things like MSNBC) being so aggressive and obviously biased towards Bernie. Simply because he's not a Democrat. As far as I'm concerned, Bernie is a real Liberal and Hillary is not. Left vs Right is happening right now, with Bernie vs Hillary.

Unfortunately, the Republican party is ridiculous so I wouldn't even consider voting for them for any reason. Especially not Trump.

It's made me re-think a lot of stuff. I used to think it was left vs right, but now I see that the left is fighting it's own battle within about being real liberals vs establishment hacks.