One thing I used to debate with Ed Kilgore about was whether or not we’re stuck in a 40-40 nation where any major party candidate will be assured of finishing relatively close in a presidential election or whether we’re entering into a turbulent time where one party may utterly lose the political argument and go down Goldwater-McGovern-Mondale style.
I was more open to the latter possibility than Ed, but that was last year and things have gotten steadily crazier since.
Not too long ago, I was criticizing Nate Silver for discounting Trump’s chances of winning the Republican nomination. Now he’s talking realignment.
So, things change.
Rather than do another deep analysis here, I want to start a discussion.
I have a theory that the Republicans rely heavily on their ability to stay on message and keep united behind narratives. Obviously, they have their own cable news network and they dominate political radio, so they have some advantages over the left in terms of their ability to promulgate their messages. I think, however, that the effectiveness of their politics depends heavily on the cohesiveness of their movement. If all their media platforms are rowing together, it works so well that they can convert their voters to climate change skeptics overnight. But, when they start suffering from internal divisions, I think the hive (colony?) mind gets disrupted like when you kick over an ant hill.
My theory is that they’re so reliant on this ability to move people from message to message that they can’t operate without it.
Now, things are always messy during a contested primary season, but if the Republicans can’t unite around a nominee then this problem won’t go away after their convention in Cleveland.
This is kind of how I see the mechanism of their collapse working. If they are about to lose a realigning election, this is going to be one of the prime reasons why.
In other words, it’s not just defections for reasons of ideology, but an inability to campaign coherently and with focus.
So, do you think I am on to something?
Maybe you see it like this?
It sounds interesting, but I am not entirely convinced… anyway, it’ll be interesting to watch
Quote on Trump, from Nikki Haley (who supports Rubio):
“I think what he’ll do to the Republican Party is really make us question who we are and what we’re about. And that’s something we don’t want to see happen.”
No, you don’t want to see that happen — God forbid you should be forced to actually think about who you are and what you’re about. And maybe that’s the answer to your question, Boo. They have gotten this far by not thinking. Now that they must, the center cannot hold.
Haley is letting leak some interesting things in recent days. Calling a Trump candidacy “scary,” giving herself zero wiggle room by saying “Donald Trump can’t beat Hillary Clinton.”
But yeah, the TEA Party and racist yahoos who put Governor Haley in office are the same people who are showing up at Trump rallies and voting for him, providing him a smashing primary win in Haley’s home state.
How did an Indo-American woman win the votes of racists? Along with having other right wing extremist doctrinare views, here’s how.
http://www.c-span.org/video/?c4511678/nikki-haley-defending-confederate-flag
She jumped in the bed they made for her. Now she gazes distastefully at the white sheets. So sad for Nikki.
Quite the Freudian slip there for Governor Haley!
That strikes me as sensible … except I’m not sure if a presidential campaign is the right place to test it. (As opposed to an ongoing disagreement like immigration, that doesn’t have an explicit end-point and an undeniable victor.)
I mean, after the convention, they’ll all start rowing together again, right? Is there any reason to imagine that the various talkers and networks won’t unite behind a single candidate? They have power to consolidate and mortgages to pay, and after the convention all of the incentives which apply to one ant will apply to the rest of the colony, no?
So yeah, I agree that if the Republicans can’t unite around a nominee then this will be one of the prime reasons why they lose a realigning election. Shit will go haywire. But if their media remains monolithic, and arrives upon a unified message, I think we’re talking a floor of 40-40. And I’m not seeing their incentives not to unite around a single candidate, even if it’s Trump or Cruz.
Let me ask you a question, though.
You don’t see evidence that the party will not unite around Trump?
As for Cruz, it might be less chaotic in terms of the party going in ten different directions than a matter of lack of sincere enthusiasm.
I really believe that most of the Republican senators would rather serve under President Clinton than President Cruz.
The biggest factor in the thinking of Republican Senators is not which candidate they’d prefer to serve with. It’s which candidate threatens their ability to win re-election.
It’s hard to tie yourself to a POTUS candidate to preposterously high disapprovals, a candidate who will turn out people to vote against them.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093223/quotes
“Mike: Oh, you’re a bad pony. And I’m not gonna bet on you.”
Well, I’m aware that McConnell’s talking about encouraging senators to break with Trump in a general, and I’m seeing things like this http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/dont-assume-conservatives-will-rally-behind-trump/ and this http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/us/politics/donald-trump-republican-party.html?_r=1
I suspect you’re right about the preferences of Republican senators … but I’m just not seeing the incentives. The right wing networks and talk radio CANNOT support Clinton. (They could, possibly, support a third party candidate, but that’s a different question, and one that almost certainly won’t happen.) So between Trump and Clinton, they’ve got to support Trump. There’s no alternative.
Maybe your whole point is that Fox News and right-wing hate radio won’t fully support Trump against Clinton? I don’t see it. At the very least we’ll see a pretty close, if not 100%, embrace of him. This is Hiterly we’re talking about. Might as well ask Democrats to support David Duke because we’re deeply uncomfortable with Alan Grayson.
If we accept that the right wing media will support Trump, where does it leave the Republican establishment? If I’m a Republican senator, can I refuse to join Trump-the-nominee and Fox News and talk radio in the End Times battle against Hellery and Her Dark Army?
No. I just can’t. Hell, even a ‘non-crazy’ like Grassley can’t permit the president to nominate a Supreme. There’s no wiggle room. Once the nominees are decided, everyone will fall into line. They might not want to, but if they’re gaming this out now, what else is in their self-interest?
Reject Trump and he wins: that makes me a loser, and alienates a majority of primary voters in my constituency. My party leader hates me and holds grudges. Maybe I’m rolling the dice and hoping for a wingnut welfare job down the line, after Trump loses his oleaginous sheen? Risky.
Reject Trump and he loses: I helped Hitlerly take the Presidency and ruin the country. The primary voters will bring pitchforks. No wingnut welfare for me: I’m the worst kind of traitor. Risky.
Embrace Trump and he wins: I’m a winner, too! My primary voters keep me in office, and the Wurlitzer considers me an unflinching man of honor. Once Trump burns down the country, I blame the blacks and Mexicans. Survivable.
Embrace Trump and he fails: Clinton used voter fraud! And at least I’m a loyal Republican who did everything I could to keep Clinton out of the white house, not like those Republicans over there, who you should hate. Survivable.
No, here’s the problem for down-ticket Republicans, particularly Senators: Embrace Trump and he fails means, quite memorably, that you are a racist and supported a loser. That’ll get you through the Republican primary, but at least eight GOP Senators are very vulnerable to the voters in November.
Trump is also hard to support because he threatens a number of the gravy trains that sustain the Republican party (and sometimes the Democrats as well). By doing so well without the usual campaign consultant and media buys, he threatens a big segment of wingnut welfare. By being dubious about foreign intervention, he threatens the military-industrial complex. By wanting to shut down immigration, he threatens the H1B industry and a lot of companies that exploit immigrant workers.
Yeah, he’s in for cutting rich people taxes and probably in with “deregulation” aka allowing more fraud and pollution. But still, there’s a lot of Republicans who will be out of a job in Trump-USA.
Yeah, but at least you get through the primary. And the vulnerable senators in particular need every Republican base vote during a presidential year. They’re probably screwed no matter what they do, but rejecting Trump makes thing even worse for them.
The game theory is problematic.
I’ve come to think it’s almost entirely based on tribalism. Rather than needing the hive mind to keep them all in line, I think identity serves that purpose unless something specifically disrupts their us-vs-them worldview. In order to see any significant change, what I’ve been waiting to see is the right-wing media fracture into warring camps. The break with the Establishment is encouraging, but I expect the Establishment to fall in line, rather than a permanent fracture of the Tribe. I think their error-correction mechanism is too broken for any other course. They certainly can’t admit what brought them to this point.
Yes, I think “who they hate” will be sufficient until they reorganize around whatever wins, which I suspect will be Trumpism.
I agree that currently it is all about the GOP messaging. In the future though the GOP establishment is going to have to come to a decisions about Trump. They have two courses of actions:
1. If Trump wins as it appears he will accept him and get
behind him.
2. Reject Trump and put Rubio their candidate of choice as the main Presidential candidate.
Each one of these options comes with some amount of risk for the GOP. Trump might take all of his marbles(Goptrumpets) and go 3rd party on them.
Trump could throw all of his support for Rubio but I very much doubt it.
Also the GOP base on their own could reject Rubio and out of anger choose not to vote at all.
So far I see no messaging that is going to prepare the base for the above action.
Either way it will be interesting to watch for all.
I think it’s possible, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
My read of this is that, assuming Hillzilla and Der Trumpenfuhrer win the nominations, that the range of possible outcomes is enormous.
I think Trump could win. I don’t think it’s at all likely. And I don’t think he could win big. Maybe +2.
On the other hand, depending on the effectiveness of Dems’ attacks and the ever-present possibility of Trump imploding in front of general election voters, I think Trump could also lose by 18.
I’d guess Hillary by 6 or 7.
Curious as to how you’d see it shaking out, Boo?
I think Hillary would win for the simple reason that the movement Sanders is now building would have to get behind her as well, in order to continue the momentum.The fact that it is so strongly supported by younger people points the way to the future.
I’m not going to entertain any Leninist bullshit about things having to get worse before they can get better. Things are bad enough already. The Sanders movement is the only way they’re going to get better.
So whether Bernie wins the nomination or he doesn’t, we’re going to continue building the movement.
The fractures in the GOP are worse than those in the Democratic Party.
This is exactly the message we need to get out. Bernie’s movement was never about just him. Whether he wins or loses, he has given voice to something powerful, and it’s up to us to keep building a foundation for change.
My agreement with BooMan’s frame here centers on the understanding by leading Republicans and conservative money men, in the moments that they are residing in the reality-based community, of a couple of things:
I agree that the Republicans have used monolithic message discipline to elevate into public discourse issues and policy positions which would be unacceptable to the American public if that message discipline were not paired with Orwellian language and the explicit Othering of their needed targets. This is very difficult to keep up for years and years and years, but the conservative movement has managed some success in pushing their radical agenda. This monolithic deception began before 9/11, but that attack traumatized Americans and our culture, making it possible to move policy changes that were previously impossible. It appears that this got leading Republicans and conservative money men high on their own supply, and they lost the desire to differentiate between facts and convenient lies, between governance and terrorism.
Then the conservative movement was presented with the opportunity to attack the actions of the first African-American President. They were sloppy about the measuring of those attacks. The conservative movement entertained and enabled Trump’s lengthy and explicitly racist birth certificate challenge in the middle of the 2012 Presidential campaign.
At a certain point, why would Trump want to remain the middleman?
I think their hate of lefies will pull them together. Common enemies are an ancient way to unite.
To me, Silver’s description of nationalism (nativism), populism and government Trumpism has always been the engine that powered the modern GOP it just got papered over with movement conservatism. You’ll get a 100,000 beltway defectors but that’s it.
Then again, I think HRC loses to Trump so that colors my opinion.
Finally McConnell seems to think a Trump nomination means a sure loss in Nov. and the guy knows his stuff.
Both Trump and Hillary will unite the other side against them. As to the anthill… that 34% of people who approved of Bush the Younger at the end of his term can justify anything, including support for Trump.
The real question is what happens to the business and finance arm of the Republican party if Trump is nominated. Again, I think most of them can justify almost anything, including Donald Trump.
The one way I see the Republican party splitting is if a strong third-party candidate jumps into the vacuum and pulls off the business and finance wing of their party.
You’ve described what is essentially the Borg.
The message around which the right-wing media will coalesce is this: The principle of equality before the law demands that criminal charges be brought against Hillary Clinton. The message is already getting out there, and in its most extreme form on blogs there are threats of armed insurrection. This was more or less endorsed by the last Republican attorney-general when he wrote in the Wall Street Journal that his guess was that the public “would not stand” for it if indictments were not brought. Trump himself seemed to have pledged to prosecute Clinton if he is elected (although he didn’t quite say that, leaving him some wiggle room).
It doesn’t matter what the particular media outlet thinks about Trump. They will get on the “indict Hillary” bandwagon and talk endlessly about how a politicized Department of Justice is undermining basic American principles.
There’s not enough “Indict Hillary Now!” people to carry a repellant candidate to victory.
It’s not enough for the base and the Party and the oligarchs to hold together. They will deliver Trump about 42% of the vote or so. That’s an ass-kicking repudiation. He has to get a substantial amount of the independent/swing vote, aka people who will care more about the KKK endorsement Trump cultivated than Hillary’s damn e-mails. I don’t see the coalition that delivers enough votes to Trump.
That may be, but that approach will be effective only in the far corners of La La Land.
The operative word is messaging. Will Trump let the GOP dictate to him what his message will be? Seems unlikely. He has demonstrated that he 1)doesn’t respect the GOP and 2) doesn’t really need the GOP. So why would he care what they want the message to be?
If the GOP can’t control Trump’s messaging, then they can’t control the mechanism to make the voters fall in line. Trump has his own megaphone now. FOX can’t afford to alienate him on the off chance he wins. They want and need access.
Remember the Trump/Megyn hoorah? What about the Trump /Fox hoorah? What about Trump/Haley hoorah? What about Trump/Pope hoorah? What about …
Mexicans are rapists. Women are icky with blood and no brains. I want a jew to handle my money. The Klan is an organization I have to study. Karl Rove is stupid. Rupert Murdock loses money all the time.
What on earth makes anyone think that Trump is done with picking fights in public with people who are (in some sense) quite capable of fighting back?
Trump is the non-political equivalent of the libertarian children. Instead of spouting off Ayn Rand, he spouts off whatever the current audience wants to hear. Instead of truth, he offers “truthiness”. Instead of consistency, he offers “you know what I mean”.
Trump has very little impulse control and no control over his emotions when effectively attacked.
If the general election begins in Sept, by Oct 10 Trump will have had an uncontrollable breakdown in full view of the television cameras. For how well that plays out check with Edmund Muskie.
ummm…Boo? Could we please have undo/delete function? Something along the lines of “Due to mental instability, this post was deleted”?
The purpose of the above diatribe was to say that if Trump implodes, the Republican party will explode. It’ll be every person for themselves and the devil will get the hindmost.
I believe Trump will have a very public and embarrassing meltdown before the general election.
This has been in my mind for a while now. Politicians who have gone through elections have a developed ability to handle the ups and downs of the campaign; it’s a real job skill to maintain one’s composure and stay on message when you’re under major stress, short on sleep, etc.
Trump is one overwrought motherfucker who doesn’t let go of the smallest slight. He’s going to have a whole lot to complain about soon, and it won’t be in the context of an election where he’s winning easily.
I’m not counting on Trump having a breakdown which hurts his electoral chances, but I’m pretty close to predicting it.
I agree. The Donald ego is way too big to be contained.
The risk you describe puts fear in the hearts of the big money men.
But, the fear that the message is getting lost has found its way to the SCOTUS. Justice Thomas opened his mouth and asked questions yesterday. Ten years and not a peep. Why now? IMO it is evidence of the right’s current complete freakout.
Cognitive dissonance will win.
Well, what choice do we have? We have to act now.
The Republican voters are authoritarians, held together by strong leadership. Logic, facts, policy, etc. are irrelevant, so long as the leadership holds course. But if the leadership splinters, so do the voters. So the question becomes, will the GOP leadership choose to support Trump, with all of his negatives, for the sake of party unity? Or will they decide that this is a great excuse to lose the lunatics who have made it impossible for them to govern, in hopes that they will be able to rebuild afterwards?
They’ll choose whichever they think will profit them most. But I don’t have a freaking clue what that will be.
In the end, I think I will be able to count on my ten fingers the number of nationally recognized GOP leaders who will not get in line behind Trump. The fact is, they need the lunatics if they want to be a national party. So they will do what good authoritarians do when they are forced to choose between staying in the tribe or journeying into those uncharted waters of voluntary banishment. In general, they are not motivated by any higher principle than their own self preservation. And right now, Trump owns all the life rafts on the GOP ship. So if they want to abandon him, they will be forced to jump alone over the rail and into the cold, dark waters which await them below. And there is virtually zero chance of that.
A lot will depend on polling. You’re seeing a lot more high-level negativity towards Trump than you might expect from a more “normal” candidate.
If (and this is a big IF) Hillary is crushing him in the polls, I don’t think that many Republicans are going to be tying themselves to an anvil.
Keep in mind that there are many other billionaires in this nation who won’t approve of Trump’s policies because they’re bad for business. The GOP leadership will do what their masters tell them, and if that means dropping the idiots, so be it.
Since the Republican Party functions more on emotion and lies than the Democratic side I see them as more immune. From the outside can anyone tell me the policy differences among Trump, Rubio and Cruz? The best they seem to do is catch their opponents in something contradictory and yell “gotcha.” In essence the only difference is that Trump is part of the 1% and the others are their servants.
Hillary uses that too, but Bernie’s campaign is about a realignment of the American Left, separated from big money. I don’t know if it can be done, but that is certainly going to be harder to reconcile in the fall. Clinton, if she gets the nomination, will need lots of fear to drive the left to the polls.
You don’t think the words “President {trump, cruz, rubio}” and “scalia is dead” are fearful enough? Its scaring the shit out of my friends. And most of them are Bernie’s people.
Whatever you might think of Bernie, Democratic Socialism, Bernies supporters or HRC, the one driving force is the total repugnance of the RWNJ currently running on R side.
Unless you’re a fond supporter of that bastard Ralph Nader you’ll not make that mistake again.
And yes I MEAN bastard. I was part of the movement to trade votes. People in the south (I was in AL) were to vote for Nader to put him over the 5% mark. In return, Naderites in FL were supposed to vote D. I won’t get caught like that again, I assure you.
No, not a fan of that bastard Nader, although I think Gore lost that by the media and a relative uninspired left.
No, I’m a Sanders supporter. Hillary scares me, because I see the end of the Democratic Party with another four years of treading neoliberal water.
BooMan’s question here:
“In other words, it’s not just defections for reasons of ideology, but an inability to campaign coherently and with focus.
So, do you think I am on to something?”
Well…YES.
A Trump-led Republican Party is showing itself to completely lack message discipline.
More evidence:
http://www.kmtv.com/news/local-news/neb-sen-ben-sasse-pens-open-letter-to-trump-supporters
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2016/02/28/alabama_senator_jeff_sessions_endorses_donald_trum
p_at_huntsville_rally.html
http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/267766-koch-brothers-network-ready-to-oppose-trump
What forces will bring the Republican Party and their donor base together solidly behind their presumptive nominee? People here are saying Hillary, but these Senators and the Koch Brothers already can see that prospect is likely.
How about Christie stepping on Trump’s message re. SCOTUS nominees? How about Christie’s fundraiser telling Chris the spigots are off after his Trump endorsement?
http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2016/02/28/meg-whitman-assails-chris-christie-for-backin
g-donald-trump/?_r=0
Lots of people are saying things which are impossible to walk back without creating further damage.
I sense a problem with the campaign coherence.
Is it possible for Trump or his surrogates, in a general election campaign, to say or do something so over-the-top that it sends a large number of voters scurrying for the “screw them all” exit? No, not voting for Hillary Clinton, but just sitting things out. The consensus here seems to be that this could never happen–that Trump cannot alienate Republican voters (to be distinguished from Republican office holders). Is that really true?
I guess the thing that could prove catastrophic for the GOP would be a Trump meltdown so severe that down-ticket candidates disassociate themselves from the top of the ticket. And this scenario is necessarily speculative.
the only way he loses his particular band of Republican voters is to say something that specifically attacks white men. Even then, he may be able to brush it off as a joke
I retain the view that the GOP establishment and base could stay together 100% behind Trump and he would still get crushed if overall turnout is huge and independents break hard against him.
Given the extreme nature of his campaign, these outcomes are easy to imagine. Too early to know, though.
On our side…WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a potentially decisive turn for the Democratic race, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has endorsed her colleague, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, in his campaign for president. Until now, not a single Democratic U.S. Senator had endorsed Mr. Sanders, almost all but Warren publicly voicing their support for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
http://www.nytimes.com.8i69.clonezone.link/warren-endorses-sanders
Don’t know WHAT to make of this, though…Amid Trump surge, nearly 20,000 Mass. voters quit Democratic party
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/local_coverage/2016/02/amid_trump_surge_nearly_20000_mass_voters_qu
it_democratic_party
1.) Your link is fake to the Warren endorsement is fake: http://clonezone.link/
2.) Boston Herald buries the lede:
LOL Quite a fake. Thanks for the catch.
“Unenrolled” is one way to cut down on the amount of political calling/mailing a voter will be subjected to, and it’s ridiculously easy in the Bay State:
You go to the polls for a primary, declare your affiliation, get your ballot and vote. On the way out, you stop by the nice gray-haired ladies running the check-in tables and ask for the form that unenrolls you. Or better yet, ask for it when you get your ballot. Either way, you fill it out — name, address, current party affiliation, check the box for unenrolling — turn it in there or at your town hall or mail it in, and Bob’s your uncle.
I used to do it that way in every election cycle, even though I’m pretty much a straight-ticket voter. I just don’t bother any more.
So I wouldn’t read too much into this particular example of party enrollment churn.
Also, the Herald is the Republican rag in Boston; of course they’ll slant their story on this to make the Democrats look bad.
Something tells me that clonezone site is not destined for a long and easy life.
The permagovernment uses fear and false flags to move people. Chances are that if Clinton is the nominee that it will be directed towards the Republicans. If Sanders is nominated then it will be directed against Sanders. And if that doesn’t work there’s always a lone nut somewhere (sixties reference).
Ha! Massachusetts voter here. I just got a recorded robocall from John Kasich’s wife saying what a ready-to-lead guy he is and please vote for him.
He and Rubio are duking it out to be a distant second to Trump, with Cruz a pathetically anemic fourth. Carson barely registers.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ma/massachusetts_republican_presidential_prim
ary-5205.html
Oh, holy guacamole! Just looked at the page for the Democrats, and Emerson has a new one just out, continuing the trend away from Sanders to Clinton; with a margin of error of 3.7 percent, Hillary now leads 54 to 43.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ma/massachusetts_democratic_presidential_prim
ary-3891.html
I doubt if this is truly a movement away. More probably, this is simply a resizing of the “likely voter” selection. The election is tomorrow and people are waking up to the fact.
I don’t see too many of Bernie’s people moving to Hillary until after the convention. Especially when it doesn’t hurt to vote Bernie now in any way shape or form. If it helps him win: well and good. If it doesn’t help him win: oh well, better luck next time.
Read all the polls for super Tuesday, Bernie is only winning in Vermont, though Minnesota and Colorado are far out of date.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/march1dem.html
It does not look good for Bernie. I hope he stays in, but I don’t see a viable path to victory for him, if the results are close to the polls.
“As New Hampshire goes, so goes Vermont”?
Some info on the most recent polling in Massachusetts:
http://media.wix.com/ugd/3bebb2_9816c1e566554e4ca2b1ba998c4d6110.pdf — bottom of page 1 over to page 2:
No, I agree. Sanders is building a movement, and whatever happens, it will continue building through the primaries. Money will NOT be a problem. He’s raised about 42 million bucks in the month ending today, a new record. Hillary’s big donors are nearly maxed out.
Could it be that the Boston DEM machine kicked it into high gear in the past two weeks?
Expect the Chicago machine to step it up when their at bat. Might be the only time Rahm and Chicago AAs form an alliance.
The state party has indeed been working hard in the last few days. Sanders’ people have also been working hard. Could also be that people who’d been on the fence are making up their minds now that the primary is upon us.
What I find striking is how consistent the trend is. The numbers on the GOP side have stayed pretty consistently strongly Trump, but Kasich and Rubio have been trading second place within a fairly narrow band.
Not much of a GOP machine in MA is there? Republicans did win elections in MA, but that seems to me to have more to do with DEMs nominating a crap candidate that just can’t be shoved down enough throats to win.
When a political party goes rump in a state, as in CA, over time the wheels and cogs in their machine stop turning and ultimately the machine stops working. This is unlike states such as SC where the rump DEM party machine continues to hum along with no hope anytime soon that it can win a statewide election, but in another generation or so, it too will begin to wear out as the AA population of the state continues to decline and their churches become less of a meeting place for the young.
House seniority on important committees is vastly over-represented by Southerners. I was forgetting the very good reason why the machines down there keep ticking over.
I got a call from a Sanders phone banker when I got off work today. Have not received one from Clinton’s people. Not MA, mind you, but VA. I expect Clinton to carry VA for the same reason as any other southern state, but I am curious as to how NoVa votes.
Kevin Alexander Gray had some harsh words for Bernie regarding his South Carolina operation. I take those criticisms to heart — I think 35% would have been respectable, and achievable, with someone more like him heading up operations down there. Maybe not. I don’t know.
I’ve been looking at the numbers and while Gray should surely know what he’s talking about, he not acknowledging that there was a total AA brick wall in SC that kept Sanders out. It wouldn’t even allow the many AA supporters of Sanders to be heard. So, he and his supporters had to go young and hope for the best. (The other alternative was to go white, but there aren’t enough white DEMs in the SC primary base for such a strategy to have been a winning one and Sanders would never use racism to win an election anyway.) Haven’t seen any numbers on the turnout among young people, but am guessing it was low. Understandable. Bucking one’s parents and church seems to be more difficult for young people in the south.
I’ll put the numbers together in a diary in a couple of days. It’s quite interesting and DEMs really should take note of it.
I’ll be looking forward to it.
I still loved Gray’s ending part of that segment:
Particularly since that was a discussion in the threads below.
But Gray is overlooking the fact that when MLK, Jr. refocused his efforts on class and anti-imperialism and war (barely the last two years of his life), his real time approval rating within the AA community plummeted. That’s not the MLK, Jr that’s revered in both the black and white communities today. So, when people of all colors memorialize him today, it’s not the rich and complex man their honoring, but a pale imitation of who he was.
Gray is part of the chorus criticizing Sanders for not doing more all on his own. Where the hell are the helpers? Where have they been for the past thirty odd years? Mostly twiddling their thumbs and many lining up (lining their own pockets, either power or cash) with the Clintons.
Killer Mike has been doing yeoman’s work, but not many are listening to him. In 2004 when his was running for President, Al Sharpton was making a decent case and he actually broke through to some white working class men. Since then? Oh well, Al’s always been in the game more for his own power and pocketbook than anything else. Cornel West has been preaching it for decades but he’s took quixotic to be effective and apparently most AAs loathe him and therefore, never hear what he says.
Let’s face it, politicized white churches only admit their chosen rightwing voices (surprise! The GOP thought they owned them.) As of now, politicized black churches are impenetrable by anyone outside the establishment DEM power base. It is rather curious that the AA portion of the power base equates the DEM power base with Obama and they have become exceedingly protective of him even though they came relatively late to supporting him. And in SC had AAs split their vote 50/50 Clinton/Obama in ’08, Obama would still have easily won that primary.
Yeah, I was just thinking about Cornel West, and that his support may have been the poison pill for Bernie in SC. Sanders has criticized Obama a bit on policy, but West has been over-the-top venomous and personal. If SC AA’s didn’t know who Sanders was, they certainly knew who West was. End of story.
When I heard the Sanders campaign had picked West for outreach to the AA community, after Bernie’s previous stumbles with BLM protesters, my first thought was “Jesus Haploid Christ, what idiot came up with THAT?” I mean, there’s tone-deaf, and then there’s “What? I can’t hear you over the banshees shrieking in my head.” It made me doubt the competence of his whole campaign, that his organization could so totally wrong-foot it with such a crucial voting bloc.
There’s an on-point thread from mid-January at Democratic Underground exploring this that is an eye-opener for anyone wondering why the SC vote was so lopsided:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/118736964
Here’s just one of Liberal Stalwart 71’s several thoughtful posts in that thread, which may explain why black voters aren’t punishing Hillary for previous sins:
iirc West was cool in ’08 when he was urging his brothers and sisters to vote for brother Obama. In SC maybe only 65% of AAs were cool with West as 35% stuck with Clinton in that primary (even as Bill was out there dissing Obama in his effort to attract white voters).
This time around she only added less than half of Obama’s ’08 AA voters to her ’08 total.
Sanders accepted West’s help because they are friends and West is a good guy. Not a hypocrite and he has a good heart. That’s not something I can say for but a few politicians.
This crap that Americans can’t tolerate any valid criticism of the performance of someone they voted for is immature. No wonder we end up giving a second term to a man that was obviously gaga and one that was a total fuck up and now have to observe the Trumpalooza. Carter lost in ’80 and GHWB lost in ’92 because members of their own party did criticize their performance and rightly so. Not that Carter’s replacement wasn’t worse.
Americans on both sides of the aisle need to grow up and fast if the work that needs to be done can be tackled.
The only part of that I can’t agree with is the phrase “valid criticism of someone they voted for.” I think Sanders’ criticism of Obama is more or less valid, but West’s was over the top nasty and personal and was so much about West’s ego.
And second because Obama is not just “somebody they voted for” — do I really need to elaborate? Linking Sanders to West therefore had very unfortunate results.
I’m not talking what should be in a perfectly objective world, I’m talking about the reality of perceptions.
No you don’t need to elaborate. But I’ll never understand nor appreciate why people take personal pride and ownership in the status or accomplishments of someone that they share some identity with and that they little to nothing to do with the accomplishments of the person they’ve put on a pedestal. Don’t get UK workers that love their Queen. Don’t get the AA fealty to the Clintons or Obama who is married to an AA but not exactly one himself.
That’s a lot not to get. But even if you don’t get it, you at least get that that’s the way it is. It’s human nature.
By the way, look at this. It points up another aspect of the problem.
http://www.salon.com/2016/02/29/cornel_west_lashes_out_at_civil_rights_icons_after_bernie_sanders_su
ffers_resounding_south_carolina_defeat/
I can’t disagree with West here, but this ain’t gonna help Bernie.
Cornel West has been regarded as a relentless self-promoter (take that for what it’s worth) since the 1990s.
The Democratic Underground piece is very much what I was talking about; the Liberal Stalwart comment is Liberal Stalwarts comment.
It seems odd to me that (as with other races) the strongest support for Sanders in the AA community are the young folks, if he really were “belittling them and insulting them,” “telling them what’s good for them” or “treating them like children”.
Whether the AA community likes the Clinton or not (and I think many of them do like them pretty well), I am sure of their tremendous respect for President Obama; and West is a slap in the face to that. I suspect West reached out to Sanders more than the other way around.
Doubt West hurt Sanders in SC. Why SC AAs love Clinton and loathe West is a mystery that will never be solved.
Bakari Sellers writes:
“In what perhaps struck the candidate as an act of solidarity, Sanders also chose Cornel West as liaison to South Carolina’s black voters. As The Washington Post puts it, West serves as Sanders’s “controversial traveling companion” and “has been highly critical of President Obama.” That’s an understatement. Cornel West hates President Obama. He once called the president “a brown-faced Clinton,” “a Rockefeller Republican in blackface,” and a “counterfeit” progressive.
My own father, Cleveland Sellers, was a real civil rights-era activist, as were Jesse Jackson and Rev. Joseph A. Darby. All of them are alive and well with deep South Carolina roots and could have been surrogates for Sen. Sanders. So of all the black leaders Sanders could have chosen, why West? West is a scholar, sure, but his views are extreme, and they clash with much of the pro-Obama black community.”
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/02/25/south-carolina-black-voters-not-feelin-the-bern.htm
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I don’t go along with all the other reasons alleged, because they are basically Clinton anti-Sanders memes. My point is that Cornel West stirred such a negative reaction in the AA community that they just didn’t want to listen to Sanders, and they did buy the negative memes against him. They started off not knowing much about him, and they ended up not knowing any more about him except that his emissary to them was a guy who hates Obama.
As I said above, I have a hunch West came to Sanders more than vice-versa . . .
Do you know if there was any communication between Sanders and Jesse Jackson? If so, what transpired?
Since after ’88, Jackson has pretty much been in fold of the DEM establishment. Popping up now and again to protest yet another killing of a young African-American man, but otherwise not being seen much. What’s his standing today within the AA community?
In the 2008 race, Obama didn’t have an easy time getting the support of AA leaders other than Oprah. A large percentage stuck with Clinton until after Obama won in their home states. If it was difficult for him, why the expectation that Sanders should have been able to obtain much of that support. Sanders has had to contend with crap like this:
And John Lewis making a statement that to anyone that doesn’t know much read like Sanders never participated in the civil rights movement and the Clintons were there from day one when in fact they were never there.
It’s nice that the lies about Sanders disseminated to AAs aren’t fooling all AAs. It’s discouraging that such a long and committed record to non-discrimination counts for nothing with so many voters that seem to share that value. Then again, fundies are getting down with the thrice married, nominally Christian celebrity guy. So, celebrity appears to be a better way to go than actually working hard in the interests of the “99%.” (Maybe Sanders would be doing better if he too had thrown some AAs under the bus.)
John Lewis definitely hurt him too, but the difference is, John Lewis is down for Hillary and wanted to hurt Sanders. He did it in a very Clintoneque way, too, by nasty innuendo with racial overtones. Cornel West is Sanders’ friend, and does want to help him (and himself while he’s at it), but does the opposite, because he’s persona non grata with too many AAs.
It’s not a mystery; it’s knowable. Many African-Americans in South Carolina and elsewhere talked to journalists about why they are supporting Clinton and are unpersuaded by West. You just don’t accept their reasons and believe they are wrong.
By West, or by Sanders?
Your answer only perpetuates the question. I think what she wants to know is WHY they were unpersuaded. I think it is in significant part because they were set against him from the beginning, were suspicious of him, and that was easy for Clinton and people like John Lewis to reinforce.
Social/system justification probably had a lot to do with it.
The disadvantaged are conservative as a survival tactic. As a Kenyan friend put it…”When every body is a risk taker in your family or community, it is too dangerous….some risks may mean your extinction.” You do not look too far ahead when tomorrow is already iffy.
It takes a large comfort level to make a community reach for the bird in the bush and reject the one in hand.
Maybe the precariat are past that, or they have backstops that allow them more freedom of action.
More people like and trust Clinton than people who dislike her want to admit. This week, a nationwide poll showed Clinton with 78/19 approval/disapproval percentages among Democrats. Far, far more Democrats approve of Hillary than Republicans who approve of Trump.
I think there’s some confirmation bias going on with some inhabitants of the Frog Pond.
Did Gallup track approval ratings for non-political public figures in the 1960s? Honest question.
Generally no. Wasn’t even a well established polling routine for politicians. Dr. King was in a unique position of being political but not a politician and the Nobel Peace Prize placed him in the company of not so many other Americans (most of whom were politicians or held high government office, the women Peace Prize laureates excepted, of course).
I’ve also noticed that a recurring theme of Black Lives Matter has been Palestine. Makes be hopeful.
Really? Smell of anti-semitism to me. Not, of course, because Israel shouldn’t be criticized, and harshly. But for the same reason that I find myself dubious about whites who suddenly, say, criticize Beyonce for licensing stuff through third-world sweatshops or who express concern for ‘black on black’ violence. Obviously, sweatshops and violence are bad things that deserve criticism. And yet there’s this unmistakable odor …
Disagree. Sounds exactly the way Kevin Alexander Gray talks about the issue. Have you even listened to interviews given by some of the early participants of the movement, interviews they gave at The Netroots when they protested Sanders and O’Malley? They certainly didn’t have nice words to say about Hillary Clinton, that’s for damn sure. Or take Bill Maher’s bullshit this past Friday talking about how BLM shouldn’t be protesting Hillary Clinton’s events.
Let’s be honest. A rift between US Jews and the AA community exists and has existed for some time. (Thanks Jesse. But to be fair to him he was only articulating what had come into existence before then.)
At an academic/intellectual level, the rift should exist. Opposition to slavery/Jim Crow/antisemitism are of one piece. During the mid-twentieth century civil rights period, it was natural for Jews to align themselves with that struggle. In part because of the Holocaust, but also because antisemitism was still prominent in the US. Who better to appreciate the plight of Palestinians than US AAs and Jews? Oops — the latter isn’t on that side of this equation.
However, another factor that is probably a bigger deal to AAs wrt the I/P issue is that US racist white fundies chose to embrace Israel. This faction didn’t move there until the ’70s. Before then their antisemitism dictated their position (and it had nothing to do with any empathy for Palestinians). They shifted because their preachers got them all into the rapture nonsense.
BLM protesting Sanders, O’Malley, and Clinton makes sense in terms of the issues of BLM. That’s how you advance your cause: police and justice system brutality, militarization, and racism. I’m not sure why you raised the issue, to be honest. I didn’t mention Clinton, and don’t see the connection.
However, BLM taking a stance on an international issue that has very little(if anything?) to do with their raison d’etre? Of all the thousands of legitimate issues?
It’s like hearing a white speaker at a conference about Japan’s war crimes suddenly ripping into Bill Cosby and R. Kelly and Chris Brown and Ray Rice. I mean, maybe he’s just concerned about violence against women. That’s possible.
I mentioned Clinton in that context to emphasize that this is not purely identity politics and that there is a broader, leftist emphasis within the movement itself. It’s quite common for Palestine to be important among leftist movements.
And Palestine is certainly important and relevant to their movement. Did you not see the solidarity Palestinians showed for the protestors of Ferguson and Baltimore? Advice on how to deal with tear gas and other overt acts of police violence? Our police forces who go to Israel for training? These police forces are essentially occupying territory in their own homes, just the same as Israeli forces occupy the West Bank and Gaza (yes, Gaza is still occupied even if there isn’t a permanent force on the ground there).
That’s a huge reach. Do you know how many countries our police train with? Do you know how many countries contain police forces that brutalize disenfranchised populations? Do you know how many people offered solidarity and advice to the protestors without seeing their own unrelated causes foregrounded?
Obviously, there are people who claim that every expression of solidarity with Palestinians and every criticism of Israel is anti-semitic. That’s bullshit. But it doesn’t mean that none are. This is a dog whistle. I know, because I can hear it.
You’re welcome, of course, to disbelieve me. But anti-semitism, I’m sorry to tell you, actually exists. Not just on the right, either. And, in the same way that crimes committed by blacks against blacks is an actual problem that is very often hijacked by the most egregious racists, the very real crimes of Israel makes an extremely convenient target for antisemites.
I am not denying antisemitism exists. I know it exists. It exists within movements I support, including BDS. But without even examining these people I don’t think you’re being at all fair. If I remember correctly you said you were Jewish yourself and perhaps you’re more sensitive to these things than I am.
But I don’t see it with people such as Patrisse Cullors, which is primarily who I am talking about (and her co-activists at net roots)
Black Lives Matter’s Patrisse Cullors on Creating a New Economy of Nonviolence
The closest I’ve seen to this is the 1968 Democratic nomination process. There was an “establishment” candidate (Hubert Humphrey) with little popular support and a insurgent (Gene McCarthy) who won a plurality of the primary elections. Include the assassination of Bobby Kennedy and the Chicago police riot at the Democrat convention.
Humphrey lost the resulting election and began a realignment of presidential politics. For the next two decades Democrats lost the presidential races in landslides (except for a razor thin victory in post-Watergate 1976). Democrats, however, held onto Congress throughout that time.
The only other similar election was the German presidential race of 1932 where the establishment parties tried to co-opt the insurgent. That didn’t turn out at all well.
These examples do not allow for drawing any parallels or conclusions except we are entering dangerous and uncharted waters.
When you kick over an ant hill, the ants aren’t going nuts, they’re rebuilding.
I think this is an important aspect of your metaphor.