2020, the election campaigns have begun

[Matrix Dragon]

God, the concept of a government actually providing services back to its taxpayers scares the shit out of some people, doesn't it?

[Rajvik]

Rob, if four congressional investigations along with Bob Mueller and his 13 angry democrat schills couldn't find ANY EVIDENCE of Russian and the Trump campaign conspiring to rig the 2016 election, then either they were not really looking, or it is NOT THERE. thus it is DEBUNKED. Now get over Trump actually WINNING the US election legitimately or at least stop acting like a idiot and ignoring what even the left had to admit.

Also, love how you're completely ignoring the accusation that they are helping Bernie, WHO IS A COMMUNIST, i am not misusing the term, he is a MARXIST-LENNINIST COMMUNIST and everything he espouses aligns with it, or do i need to dig up where i already posted an article showing Bernie's history of talking up Castro and Cuba amongst others and his honeymoon in Moscow during the Cold War.

[Dartz]

Russia is trying to sow division.

Boosting the extremer ends of the Sanders and Trump campaigns/supporters meets the Russian goal of sowing division in the US. Tellingly - they Russians are no longer creating any extremist content- just promoting it.

And Sanders is not a communist. He is not espousing a single party state, for a start. He is not denying private enterprise, or private property. He is not calling for the landholding kulaks to be dragged to the wall and shot or the farmers of Oklahoma to be intentionally starved off their lands. Compared to politics as usual in Ireland, he's a right-wing fucking nutjob.

The funny thing is - we're starting to see some of the same sort of divisive content coming from the supporters of our local nationalist party - single-line cliches and humourous memes and shit, mixed with a rapid 'whatabout' turnaround the moment anyone criticises them.

[robkelk]

Rob, if four congressional investigations along with Bob Mueller and his 13 angry democrat schills couldn't find ANY EVIDENCE of Russian and the Trump campaign conspiring to rig the 2016 election, then either they were not really looking, or it is NOT THERE. thus it is DEBUNKED.

When Trump kept exerting pressure to have the investigation shut down before it could present its evidence, there's no surprise that the investigation was shut down before it could present its evidence. Or are you claiming that Trump is ineffective?

Now get over Trump actually WINNING the US election legitimately or at least stop acting like a idiot and ignoring what even the left had to admit.

I've never said he didn't. You're confusing me with a straw man there.

Also, love how you're completely ignoring the accusation that they are helping Bernie,

What accusation would that be? It hasn't appeared in the mainstream media up here.

WHO IS A COMMUNIST, i am not misusing the term, he is a MARXIST-LENNINIST COMMUNIST and everything he espouses aligns with it, or do i need to dig up where i already posted an article showing Bernie's history of talking up Castro and Cuba amongst others and his honeymoon in Moscow during the Cold War.

Do you even know what a Marxist-Leninist is? There's a rather long Wikipedia page about Marxism–Leninism. Give me a link to any speech given at any time by Saunders that shows he believes in the two-step policy described on that Wikipedia page. Or retract your position.

[hazard]

What accusation would that be? It hasn't appeared in the mainstream media up here.

Sanders was briefed on Russia's efforts to boost his campaign sometime over the past month according to himself when he was asked. Note that he promptly added that he wants the Russians to stop interfering with the USA electoral process and that if elected Putin is going to find him a staunch opponent of interference by any foreign entity.


Also relevant; the Democratic party has passed a number of bills in the House on towards the Senate designed to safeguard USA elections from foreign interference. No such bill was even presented on the Senate floor by McConnel, let alone debated and voted on.

[robkelk]

What accusation would that be? It hasn't appeared in the mainstream media up here.

Sanders was briefed on Russia's efforts to boost his campaign sometime over the past month according to himself when he was asked. Note that he promptly added that he wants the Russians to stop interfering with the USA electoral process and that if elected Putin is going to find him a staunch opponent of interference by any foreign entity.


Also relevant; the Democratic party has passed a number of bills in the House on towards the Senate designed to safeguard USA elections from foreign interference. No such bill was even presented on the Senate floor by McConnel, let alone debated and voted on.

So this is another GOP smokescreen, then.

[Matrix Dragon]

Probably. They make a lot of them, after all. It does help that so many of their followers still believe the Nazi Party were socialists. Or that socialism us automatically communism. They make noise, throw around buzzwords, and people fall for it.

Hey, it worked for Boris Johnson.

[Labster]

So, MSNBC's Chris Mathews called Bernie out for being a communist

Bernie is not a communist. Bernie is a socialist.

You keep making that mistake no matter how many times you're corrected. Learn the difference.

I'm kind of a lefty news junkie so I saw these Chris Matthews things in real time.  Rajvik is essentially right -- Matthews accused Bernie of being a being a socialist with all of the connotations of communism.  I've seen interactions with his fellow host-Chris, Chris Hayes, who is trying to justify Bernie's socialism as essentially being Scandanavian liberalism, and then Matthews starts talking about Fidel Castro.  And the only thing I can think is, man, Chris Matthews is old.
This is the typical snafu of left-wing politics in the U.S., where we make sure our firing squads point in all directions just in case.

Meanwhile Rush Limbaugh is explaining that we can't believe that Russia is interfering in our election because the intelligence agencies made up the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to undermine W, and they're doing it again now to serve the Deep State.  Republicans get in line so well that they just throw away their deeply held convictions to spout the party line.  I mean, seriously, he's dying.  Why is Rush even doing this now?

[robkelk]

The winnowing of the moderates continues...

Pete Buttigieg suspends campaign for Democratic presidential nomination

Amy Klobuchar drops out of Democratic race, will endorse Joe Biden

At least they left the race before Super Tuesday... but not early enough to be taken off of the advance polls.


This leaves:

[Labster]

I feel pretty bad about those people having to share a graphic with Tulsi.

Tom Steyer also dropped out, which unfortunately means we will have a president without a glorious plaid tie. It's not his family's tartan, but it's still awesome.

And I mailed my ballot weeks ago, which means that most candidates on the ballot are not contesting on the election day tomorrow. Presumably many vote-by-mail people will similarly have their votes rendered moot. At least my choice is still in the race... for now. If only there was a way to have a run off election instantly, like writing numbers on the ballot.

[robkelk]

If only there was a way to have a run off election instantly, like writing numbers on the ballot.

That couldn't possibly happen anywhere in North America, you know.

[Labster]

Looks like Joe Biden had a banner night, sweeping across the South. It takes a long time to count California -- votes can continue to come in by mail until Friday, but even if Sanders pulls off the win here, the delegate count won't be too different. Joe Biden won states where his campaign spent no money.

And meanwhile, in what might as well be an alternate universe, Mike Bloomberg beat out Tulsi Gabbard to win American Samoa.

[Labster]

And in my own race, I ended up losing to the person who had never attended a party meeting. I'm not exactly surprised; I've never won a contested election in my life so I doubted I was going to start now. Mainly I was hoping it wasn't going to be contested, like in the east county where people got automatically elected. But I lost an election with 8 seats, 9 candidates. Such is life.

I wonder if I'd win more things if I started caring what other people think of me. Nah, sounds like too much work.

[robkelk]

Well, that didn't take long: Mike Bloomberg drops out of presidential race, endorses Joe Biden

Is anybody (outside of the Bloomberg camp) surprised by this?


So... the standings.

With votes still being counted across the country, The Associated Press has allocated 453 delegates to Biden, 382 to Sanders, 50 to Elizabeth Warren, 44 to Bloomberg and one for Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. The numbers are expected to shift as new states report their numbers and as some candidates hover around the 15 per cent vote threshold they must hit to earn delegates.

The ultimate nominee must claim 1,991 delegates, which is a majority of the 3,979 pledged delegates available this primary season.

Warren was huddling with advisers on Wednesday to determine if there was a reason to stay in the race after a disappointing Super Tuesday performance. She didn't win a single state and finished in third place, after Biden and Sanders, in her home state of Massachusetts.

If she drops out, that would effectively makes it a two-person race. (No, having one delegate at the convention doesn't get you anything other than a footnote in the history books.)

If she doesn't drop out, she could be the kingmaker at the convention. The usual forms at Canadian leadership conventions for candidates who are conceding the contest are "I ask my delegates to vote for ___" (and hope they're sufficiently loyal to her to follow her request), or "I release my delegates" (letting them choose who they want to vote for - which is the interesting-as-in-faux-Chinese-curse way to concede that reporters love).

[Bob Schroeck]

But... but... he swept American Samoa! How can he give up all that momentum?

[Labster]

I voted for Warren. Funny story, I believe in voting for the person one wants to win. If she just ends up as a kingmaker at convention that’s fine too

This result was kind of predictable to those of us who still believe in realpolitik. Warren has policy objectives similar to Bernie, and a personality similar to Biden. If she left the race, I honestly don’t know where her support would go.

[robkelk]

Which is why I'm hoping she stays in the race and becomes the deciding factor at the convention.

You folks need the drama of a Canadian-style leadership convention, to either pull the party together or split it down the fracture line into two parties. (History shows that these things usually look like the latter while actually being the former.) So does the GOP, but they aren't having a convention this year.

[robkelk]

Elizabeth Warren is out.

She can still play kingmaker, though; she hasn't yet stated support for any of the candidates still in the race.

[classicdrogn]

I was disappointed at Buttigieg leaving, not for policy reasons but because I wanted to be able to say "Running for US President? That's so gay!" and be 100% legit.

[Black Aeronaut]

With Biden sweeping up all the voters from the candidates that have dropped out, I will be pleasantly surprised if this doesn't turn into 2016 Elections Part II - The Electric Boogaloo

[Matrix Dragon]

Fucking Biden? Seriously. Could you get any more generic old-school rich white guy politician?

[Labster]

It's called a return to normalcy. Note, Americans still have the option to vote for an angry old white guy politician instead, or a profane old white (orange) guy politician. Also, Tulsi: she exists.

I suspect that Bernie is the richest candidate running, followed by Biden who was once the poorest Senator, and followed then by Trump who owes more money than he has (allegedly).

But you're not the only one upset that he most diverse field ever has been narrowed down to two old white men.

[Matrix Dragon]

A Jewish president with a history of supporting human rights, to the point of being arrested for supporting anti-segregation protests decades ago, and never really stopping, coming in after the racist egomaniac would be a wonderful concept of sanity taking hold. But the world is likely going to have to deal with Biden at best.

[hazard]

Depends on how the following months develop. Sanders currently has a disadvantage but it's possible for him to make up for it. Keep in mind though that where the support for the politicians running for lies is very different for Sanders and Biden (Sander's voters largely skew younger, Biden's largely skew older), Biden and Trump both have a large dependence on older voters, and that younger voters have different voting behaviours than older voters. And one of the differences is that younger voters generally don't care as much about primaries. That Sanders has a disadvantage but a much smaller one than during 2016 is telling; Biden is not considered as favourable a candidate relative to Sanders as Clinton was to Sanders during 2016.

Should Biden win the primary he might well lose the election because the Republicans and Trump have such a large investment from the older section of the population whereas the younger voters see it as a choice between two undesirable candidates and will largely refuse to vote or vote for third party candidates. Should Sanders win he might lose because older people are more likely to vote, but going by the 2018 voting records that gap might be much closer and rather noticeably, Trump lost the popular vote by a large margin in 2016. You can say much about Sanders, but the man knows how to make people who have historically not been invested in politics interested, which is something he might be able to translate to a victory should he become the Democratic Party's candidate.

Still it's something we'll need to see for the next few months until the DNC happens and the candidate is selected.

[robkelk]

Biden vs. Sanders: Comparing the candidates on how their policies would affect Canada

One major implication involves trade policy, as Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have both made clear they would like to negotiate new international commercial arrangements.

That's where the similarities end. Because the candidates have strikingly different views on international trade, and have different deals in mind.

The article also compares both candidates' policies on energy and the environment, and on NATO and defence.