Vox: Donald Trump's candidacy is going to realign the political parties

...

Terrifying as Trump may be as a candidate, his rise has exposed the limits of the current Republican coalition. There is probably no putting the pieces back together now — especially if Democrats can exploit the divisions.

So here's my prediction: Over the next decade or so, the Republicans will split between their growing nationalist-populist wing and their business establishment wing, a split that the nationalist-populist wing will eventually win. The Democrats will face a similar split between the increasingly pro-corporate but socially liberally Clinton wing and a more economically progressive Sanders wing, a split that the Clinton wing will eventually win.

Eventually, the Democrats will become the party of urban cosmopolitan business liberalism, and the Republicans will become the party of suburban and rural nationalist populism (similar to what my colleague Michael Lind has predicted).

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Originally Posted by Odin

Vox: Donald Trump's candidacy is going to realign the political parties

Time will tell, but I think this time around that enough of a majority is hurting and angry at the Establishment than they are afraid of Trump. Every so often in US history (generally in a 4T), a demogogue wins. And the history books are always written in retrospect to prove that the demogogue was not a demogogue.

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

Wow! Back to the Future is now an old movie, but it still holds up very well. I doubt that many people saw Biff Tannen as the Donald Trump of the time... but inheriting big money is about the luckiest thing one could do. Did we really know "the Donald" thirty years ago?

The Right now has its Frankenstein monster, possibly the biggest egoist and egotist ever, someone incapable of seeing how loathed he can be while he sees himself as the greatest personality that ever existed. For all the narcissism there is no real greatness. Most successful businessmen eschew the limelight except as self-parody. There is no Great Soul (the meaning of the Mahatma title of Mohandas Gandhi). Donald Trump is so petty that you can probably find some homeless ex-con with more substance than he.

The biggest legacy of Donald Trump will be his ludicrous run for President of the United States. Sure, there was a "Trump University", but nobody is going to compare that to Carnegie-Mellon University or Vanderbilt University, let alone Stanford University. Should there be a well-endowed university named after Bill Gates, Warren Buffett or T. Boone Pickens... it could be some place worthy of going if one has SAT scores above 700.
Howard Hughes has a great medical research facility endowed by him. Rockefeller and Ford have big foundations.

The only plutocrats whose non-business activities are truly destructive are the Koch brothers -- and then only in politics, to wit their attempted hostile takeover of the American political system. Trump is too much of a piker for that. But he has a more gaudy personality.

I have read a book on the legitimate high achievers in many activities (Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell). Gladwell recognizes that the high achievers in a non-trivial activity as a rule start with high aptitude and find ways to parlay that aptitude into high achievement through great early effort. It takes roughly 10,000 hours of dedicated effort to become a concert violinist or a major-league hockey player. That is the effort needed to achieve in such professions as law and medicine or in academia of any kind.

With a concert violinist, the ones who become the highly-renowned soloists or the violins of renowned orchestras the 10,000 hours of preparation end in the Conservatory. One can be good enough to teach the German equivalent of K-12 education as a school orchestra teacher after about 2000 hours of preparation. 8000? You might be a violinist in a pit orchestra in a musical theater. But think of what 10,000 hours of practice and contests means. The violinists who got to that level were playing a violin in practice for about 30 hours a week while in their mid-teens. Figure that that along with about 30 hours a week in non-musical schooling lives little time for participation in sports, tooling around in cars, watching movies or TV, or dating.

There are no 'naturals' at anything non-trivial. To be sure, employers at a certain level can train someone to handle cash, wait tables, or work at an machine-paced assembly line after that person has never done anything remarkable. You know that person: the one in your high-school yearbook who has no activities after his or her name, or maybe something that takes little effort. That is the waitress at a chain diner, the cashier-checker at a box store, or the teller at a bank can learn the theatrical smile that conceals the misery of economic hardships, bad dates, and suspect relationships at home. That is the fellow who resembles the Tramp character from Modern Times whose job is to tighten the same screw on the same assembly for eight hours a day plus overtime if needed, the highlights of whose life are all banalities, and whose 'song of life' is something like "Sixteen Tons" or "Take This Job and Shove It". (Sorry -- I don't know the female expression of alienation in the workplace). It's not the Waldstein Sonata, the Goldberg Variations, or a full opera, all of which take time to fully appreciate.

Anyone can be a dilettante. Nobody is very good at it. After one becomes a master of an art, a sport, or a profession one might become so proficient at what one does that it is easy to perform at a consistently-high level. But it takes dedication and sacrifice to get to that level.

Donald Trump has started many ventures, few of which have turned out spectacularly well. He is not Bill Gates, Roy Kroc, John D. Rockefeller, or T. Boone Pickens at anything. He has put too much emphasis on himself and his ego to achieve anything beyond superficiality. For most of his adult life he has been a joke to the literati.

Becoming a leader with roughly the same power as Imperator Romanus or Deutscher Kaiser is no joke. Unlike his failed enterprises in business (I have never had Trump Vodka or a Trump Steak) the consequences for failure as President of the United States are catastrophic. Indeed this is a 4T, the time when national catastrophe is but one moral failing, military blunder, or perverse decision away. The typical President of the United States has been a trained lawyer or at the least (Harry Truman or LBJ) a career politician who excelled at every level. Eisenhower at the least had much political activity lobbying Congress for appropriations when (in the 1930s) everything but military preparedness seemed more important, and became a de facto diplomat between the British and American armed forces.

We have seen people with none of the usual preparation for high political office seek the Presidency -- Pat Buchanan, Pat Robertson, Jesse Jackson, and Ross Perot -- seek the Presidency. Perot was the most convincing of the lot. This year we had much attention given to Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson, people who had no more experience in high office than Socks.

I wish that I could say that Donald Trump's quest for the Presidency would quickly show to him what Michael Jordan's effort to play major-league baseball was: a failure. But failing to make the major leagues in a sport after succeeding elsewhere is simply a demonstration of the incompatibility between baseball and basketball. I wish that he had tried something with slighter consequences for failure. Who knows? He might have had one hit with a simple tune and lyrics.

The problem is that people who have the usual preparation for high office are too well socialised into neo-liberalism to conceive of any alternative to it. And that is why so many people this election cycle who see no way out are willing to throw caution to the winds to vote for Donald Trump.
What we needed from Obama (and didn't get) during the last economic crisis was several things. Firstly, retribution against the CEOs of big banks and hedge funds, which by the way we had during the last major financial crisis, the Savings and Loan Crisis. We needed to see people like Lloyd Blankfein doing a perp walk and others committing suicide, as some CEOs did in the 1930s. It could have been done through enforcement of RICO, as was done against Ivan Boesky and David Milliken. We needed this retribution even if we got a worse recession out of it. Instead we got Too Big To Fail and Too Big To Jail. Yes, we needed to see the Big Banks fail.
And we needed a bailout of mortgage holders (or at the least the right of people to stay in homes to which the title was in doubt in life tenancy when there was no clear proof who actually held the mortgage rather than banks. We needed foreclosures dismissed with prejudice as a lesson to banks that mortgages had to stay with the bank that originated the mortgage intact. Even if this resulted in homes that could neither be sold nor borrowed against nor bequeathed to children and were legally worthless until the existing tenant died as an object lesson not to ever market mortage backed securities again.
And then we needed card check unionisation. Or at least an Administration that would fight for it and encourage workers to engage in civil disobedience to get it if Congress baulked at it, Quite frankly, we needed that more than a health care system that modestly forces costs down while still preserving the position of health insurance monopolies, Big Pharma and hospital chains. That was FDR's genius, channelling the energies of angry workers into union organising their workplaces and fighting their bosses instead of having them feel helpless and want to overthrow the government and support a demogogue.
This is what we needed from Obama and didn't get from Obama and why so many Americans are prepared to vote for someone like Donald Trump, simply because The System will not permit anyone other than a wealthy rank outsider to get far enough to challenge it.
And this is why even many Sanders voters will vote for Trump if Hillary gets the nomination. And why Trump may well win.

Originally Posted by Odin

Vox: Donald Trump's candidacy is going to realign the political parties

--- what is that dude smoking?

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

Time will tell, but I think this time around that enough of a majority is hurting and angry at the Establishment than they are afraid of Trump. Every so often in US history (generally in a 4T), a demogogue wins. And the history books are always written in retrospect to prove that the demogogue was not a demogogue.

I assure you -- not in German or Italian history books!

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

The problem is that people who have the usual preparation for high office are too well socialised into neo-liberalism to conceive of any alternative to it. And that is why so many people this election cycle who see no way out are willing to throw caution to the winds to vote for Donald Trump.
What we needed from Obama (and didn't get) during the last economic crisis was several things. Firstly, retribution against the CEOs of big banks and hedge funds, which by the way we had during the last major financial crisis, the Savings and Loan Crisis. We needed to see people like Lloyd Blankfein doing a perp walk and others committing suicide, as some CEOs did in the 1930s. It could have been done through enforcement of RICO, as was done against Ivan Boesky and David Milliken. We needed this retribution even if we got a worse recession out of it. Instead we got Too Big To Fail and Too Big To Jail. Yes, we needed to see the Big Banks fail.

Allegedly, skyscrapers since the 1930s were built with non-opening windows in part to prevent suicides by jumping. September 11 proved that a myth.

For the worst of the worst, the people who gambled big on Other People's Money, took their cut first for lavish lifestyles, and parlayed the wealth of others into failure... might I have suggested hara-kiri?

Bank of America (after acquiring LaSalle Bank, which had acquired Standard Federal, which had acquired Michigan National Bank) is no longer in Michigan. Wells Fargo, after acquiring Norwest Bank, is still in Indiana.

...It is the speculative boom, and not the subsequent crash, that does the real damage. A speculative boom devours capital that could be put to less grandiose uses (like plant and equipment in private industry or public investments in infrastructure). That is where the damage comes; the Crash is only the recognition that the speculative boom was sheer waste.

And we needed a bailout of mortgage holders (or at the least the right of people to stay in homes to which the title was in doubt in life tenancy when there was no clear proof who actually held the mortgage rather than banks. We needed foreclosures dismissed with prejudice as a lesson to banks that mortgages had to stay with the bank that originated the mortgage intact. Even if this resulted in homes that could neither be sold nor borrowed against nor bequeathed to children and were legally worthless until the existing tenant died as an object lesson not to ever market mortgage backed securities again.

The mortgage boom of the first twenty years of the post-WWII era depended upon ultra-conservative guidelines for lending. The best way to qualify for a loan was to prove stability on the job. Being a factory worker getting lots of overtime was practically the optimum. Starting a business? Be a renter. Taking some accounting courses so that you don't have to keep driving a truck? Forget the mortgage loan until you have been an accountant for five years. Bankers had gotten stuck with the task of saying "no" to people with hare-brained schemes to make quick bucks, much like everyone else. Banking attracted the laziest, most unimaginative, and least entrepreneurial of people in business. As mortgage issuers they needed not seek business. They told applicants to put up more collateral, show stability, and stick to the norms that other borrowers followed -- but if you couldn't do that, then the tellers will guide you in the way of thrift.

Bankers typically recycled capital, issuing a loan and collecting it, with the collections supporting the next series of loans. But they had to stick with the mortgages that they got. Later there would be specialists -- initial lenders who took the loan (and application fees) as income, only to farm the loan off to another entity.

And then we needed card check unionisation. Or at least an Administration that would fight for it and encourage workers to engage in civil disobedience to get it if Congress baulked at it, Quite frankly, we needed that more than a health care system that modestly forces costs down while still preserving the position of health insurance monopolies, Big Pharma and hospital chains. That was FDR's genius, channelling the energies of angry workers into union organising their workplaces and fighting their bosses instead of having them feel helpless and want to overthrow the government and support a demagogue.

Big Business used to promote from within, finding the most competent workers to go up the career ladder. Such insured that people with normal behavior, including some empathy for Humanity as a whole, would get ahead. Such people respected the reality of their subordinates' lives. Having spent real time on the shop floor they could never develop or maintain the pathological narcissism or even sociopathy that has become endemic in Corporate America. Anyone who has spent appreciable time in genuinely proletarian tasks is now disqualified among the people who who have never gotten their hands dirty in hard toil on the job.

Big Business wants unions outlawed so that workers can become serfs. The optimum for Big Business was Nazi Germany, where employers decided what they would pay (as little as possible -- near-starvation wages) and what hours they would demand (about 60 hours a week, as opposed to the 40 hours a week becoming the norm in America. Workplace accidents became more commonplace as employers became more demanding and reckless about human life. Unions tied to the Nazi Party (and run by Party hacks), rounded people up for assemblies to glorify the Volk and Fuehrer, bled the workers for 'charitable' contributions, and exhorted workers to toil harder with more dedication for the Good of the State and Volk so that they could deserve more. To make things really bad, employees could not change employers without the consent of the employer. That is serfdom! Where Nazi aggression expanded that nightmare, the Nazi norm was enforced. Even in countries poorer than Germany things got worse.

Was that the worst possible? Hardly. There were labor camps. Grumble about working conditions, and one might work to exhaustion on starvation rations and either learn the folly of your ways and be thankful to be a serf in Nazi Germany or die of exhaustion, hunger, or violence. Big Business liked that arrangement. It was exploiting the labor in the labor camps.

Even without genocide and political violence, Nazi Germany was a workers' Hell. It's telling that the Germans that the British and Americans first trusted after the defeat of the Third Reich were industrial workers, even if the senior officers implementing the occupation were of middle-class or upper-class origin like those American or British officers.

Big Business wants no labor unions other than stooge entities like those in Nazi Germany. It wants people working to exhaustion on near-starvation pay just to pay off loan-sharks. You can count on this: if America gives full power to the Republican Party this year, America will become a cheap-labor country because labor unions will be either outlawed or so proscribed that they are nothing more than social clubs (or worse, the sorts of unions that bleed workers for contributions to dubious charities, round people up for political demonstrations that glorify the Party, and exhort workers to simply work harder and longer for the benefit of the ruling elites).

This is what we needed from Obama and didn't get from Obama and why so many Americans are prepared to vote for someone like Donald Trump, simply because The System will not permit anyone other than a wealthy rank outsider to get far enough to challenge it.

Donald Trump simply rejects the style of recent conservative politicians like Bush, Huckabee, and Walker. He has gamed the system before for his own gain, and he will accede to the desires of other plutocrats who want to do much the same. Thus if some chain restaurant prefers Ukrainian waitresses who will live in barracks-like accommodations instead of trailers or flats that they share with three or four other such waitresses before those waitresses quit when they get married, he will arrange the appropriate visas for such a plan -- and ensure that those Ukrainian-born waitresses never get to meet men who might marry them, so they might stick around until they are no longer pretty, after which time they are deported to Ukraine. Of course they get no pension, and they don't qualify for Social Security. Most of what those waitresses get as pay will go into meeting rent for their barracks.

And this is why even many Sanders voters will vote for Trump if Hillary gets the nomination. And why Trump may well win.

Except for disdain for the economic Establishment, voters for Sanders and for Trump have little in common. Trump supporters are heavily white, and toward the bottom in educational and economic attainment.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

I'm still amazed that you can do all those colors in those maps. I can't find any way to make those from the election atlas site.

I don't know where you polls come from either. But I am sure Nevada is not going to go for Trump.

Trump has been a big patron of the casino business, one of the big job-creators in Nevada. But note well: he is in trouble in Arizona and Texas for insulting the Pope and Latinos. The sudden bad poll for him in Colorado may reflect that. I also remind everyone: watch Florida. Maybe Louisiana, the most Catholic state in the South except for Florida and Texas.

The Michigan poll is telling. Michigan is typically about D+5 now, and a situation in which Trump can lose Michigan by something like a 57-41 margin could put Indiana in play. Indiana?

The strongest Democratic wins of Michigan (1964, 2008, 1936, and 1932) correspond with the only Democratic wins of Indiana since 1900. Michigan, which this poll suggests is out of contention, and has only House races up for grabs in 2016, will not be a big market for political ads this year. Indiana, in contrast to Michigan, has an open Senate seat up for grabs that the Republican Party cannot afford to lose.

I am beginning to see Marco Rubio as a thoroughly-unqualified hack.

Originally Posted by Odin

Sounds like the Clinton supporters. They don't care that she is a corporate tool they just want "their side" to win because it is "her turn".

No, you're confused, again.

We want to win so as to put a Progressive on the SCOTUS and change everything for the better.

I recognize that you are currently incapable of having that seep through the GOP tropes you have fully bought in.

Hang in there; the fever will break.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

The problem is that people who have the usual preparation for high office are too well socialised into neo-liberalism to conceive of any alternative to it. And that is why so many people this election cycle who see no way out are willing to throw caution to the winds to vote for Donald Trump.
What we needed from Obama (and didn't get) during the last economic crisis was several things. Firstly, retribution against the CEOs of big banks and hedge funds, which by the way we had during the last major financial crisis, the Savings and Loan Crisis. We needed to see people like Lloyd Blankfein doing a perp walk and others committing suicide, as some CEOs did in the 1930s. It could have been done through enforcement of RICO, as was done against Ivan Boesky and David Milliken. We needed this retribution even if we got a worse recession out of it. Instead we got Too Big To Fail and Too Big To Jail. Yes, we needed to see the Big Banks fail.
And we needed a bailout of mortgage holders (or at the least the right of people to stay in homes to which the title was in doubt in life tenancy when there was no clear proof who actually held the mortgage rather than banks. We needed foreclosures dismissed with prejudice as a lesson to banks that mortgages had to stay with the bank that originated the mortgage intact. Even if this resulted in homes that could neither be sold nor borrowed against nor bequeathed to children and were legally worthless until the existing tenant died as an object lesson not to ever market mortage backed securities again.
And then we needed card check unionisation. Or at least an Administration that would fight for it and encourage workers to engage in civil disobedience to get it if Congress baulked at it, Quite frankly, we needed that more than a health care system that modestly forces costs down while still preserving the position of health insurance monopolies, Big Pharma and hospital chains. That was FDR's genius, channelling the energies of angry workers into union organising their workplaces and fighting their bosses instead of having them feel helpless and want to overthrow the government and support a demogogue.
This is what we needed from Obama and didn't get from Obama and why so many Americans are prepared to vote for someone like Donald Trump, simply because The System will not permit anyone other than a wealthy rank outsider to get far enough to challenge it.
And this is why even many Sanders voters will vote for Trump if Hillary gets the nomination. And why Trump may well win.

Here's the problem with all your shoulda's - that was the past, and for the future, if you suggest any of this to the GOP including Trump, the nice ones will just laugh at you while some of their minions, if given the chance (and there will be more chance) will beat the shXt out of you.

Obama '08 made the mistake of thinking he could work with the a-holes; you and others are making a mistake that will make his a footnote.

Originally Posted by Odin

Nah, they are all "third way" conserva-Dems, now, like the ones you suck up to.

What next you're going to throw Teddy Roosevelt under the bus? Maybe Abraham Lincoln?

Too funny.

Originally Posted by playwrite

No, you're confused, again.

We want to win so as to put a Progressive on the SCOTUS and change everything for the better.

I recognize that you are currently incapable of having that seep through the GOP tropes you have fully bought in.

Hang in there; the fever will break.

If you think Hillary is going to put an actual progressive on the SCOTUS I have a nice space under the bridge to sell you.

Originally Posted by playwrite

What next you're going to throw Teddy Roosevelt under the bus? Maybe Abraham Lincoln?

Too funny.

Gee, I didn't know you were old enough to vote back during the 4th Party System.

Mordecai might be interested to know that Hillary was the first politician I have heard to mention toxic water in other places besides Flint, tonight. Sanders said the same thing soon afterward.

If we want our government to do the right things for the people, we need Hillary or Bernie in office, and not any stupid crap Republican.

#neverRepublican

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

I assure you -- not in German or Italian history books!

Ah, but they lost the war.It just goes to show that the winner of the major war establishes the next's saeculum's Regime of Truth.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Mordecai might be interested to know that Hillary was the first politician I have heard to mention toxic water in other places besides Flint, tonight. Sanders said the same thing soon afterward.

If we want our government to do the right things for the people, we need Hillary or Bernie in office, and not any stupid crap Republican.

#neverRepublican

Bernie has alluded to this in other statements and I have no idea what he may be saying in other communities with lead poisoning from pipes that he has been campaigning in. The candidate that has the most to lose from this lead toxicity is John Kasich, who like Tom Snyder in Michigan, is a penny pinching governor who has done nothing about this problem--in Cleveland, Toledo, Sebring (near Akron) or Cincinnati. There is speculation that Kasich can benefit from Democratic crossover voters distressed at Trump. See http://wcbe.org/post/crossover-voter...-ohio#stream/0 . But not if John Kasich gets a black eye over lead poisoning as the Ohio campaign heats up.
Pennsylvania and New Jersey too. http://articles.philly.com/2016-02-0...ood-lead-level.

My prophetic article is up.
http://philosopherswheel.com/preside...lections2.html

This is the final paragraph, showing an interesting trend.

(quote)
THE SPIRIT OF THE TIMES: URANUS, NEPTUNE AND PLUTO

Another connection I found was very interesting, however. From the time of Teddy Roosevelt, who launched the USA's career as a world power able to make progressive reforms, until the reign of Ronald Reagan, who helped end the Cold War that had kept us so involved in the world, but also turned our nation away from the progress that TR and his cousin FDR had launched, the outer three planets connected our presidents to the zeitgeist, or spirit of the times. 13 out of the 14 presidents between and including TR and Reagan experienced a visit of Uranus, Neptune and/or Pluto over one of their most personal indicators, the Sun, Moon or Ascendant, within orb of a conjunction and in the same sign, sometime during their time in office. This put them in touch with the spirit of the times and the thrust of world progress, and were called upon to serve this higher calling. Plus, JFK had a special posthumous connection, as Uranus and Pluto joined together exactly on his Moon in Virgo 2 years after his death, showing how his revolutionary work lived on in the efforts of his successors.

But after Reagan, and probably because of the direction he took the country, the next 3 presidents didn't have this connection; not either Bush, nor Bill Clinton. This indicates what we all know; that these 3 recent presidents failed to lead us toward the high potential that lies within the spirit of these times.

None of the current leading Republican candidates in 2016, except possibly the pragmatic underdog John Kasich (whose Moon in Capricorn is now being contacted by Pluto), give us this key connection; this tap well and direct line to the higher Spirit flow. But both Bernie Sanders, whose Moon-Mars conjunction in activist Aries (the sign of the happy warrior) is being visited by revolutionary Uranus, and Hillary Clinton, whose sympathetic Moon in Pisces is now getting connected to visionary and compassionate Neptune, have the opportunity to get us back on track, IF we elect one of them. And since Barack Obama was also connected to Neptune through his Ascendant, (which we now know thanks to Trump's pressure on him to release his birth certificate), Hillary is right that she will continue the work Obama started. I hope also that, if we elect Hillary or Bernie, that any future presidents we elect after them will keep us "on the road again" to world peace and progress. It might be worth looking at future candidates' charts to see which of them are up to the task, by looking at which ones show these kinds of connections during their coming time in office to the current positions of these three creative and transcendental planets that represent humanity's genius and communal spirit.
(closed quote)

Notice that Bernie's Moon-Mars sign is Aries, which is a fire sign. Nice symbol there of "feeling the bern!" "Breaking down barriers" is a good description of the meaning of Pisces. The two of them together look like the ones who are getting us back on the cosmic track to the possibilities we can create and make happen. They both have their Moon hooked into this. The Republicans have no connection. Let's make the right choice this November.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

The problem is that people who have the usual preparation for high office are too well socialised into neo-liberalism to conceive of any alternative to it. And that is why so many people this election cycle who see no way out are willing to throw caution to the winds to vote for Donald Trump.

Who is well-socialized into neo-liberalism.

This is what we needed from Obama and didn't get from Obama and why so many Americans are prepared to vote for someone like Donald Trump, simply because The System will not permit anyone other than a wealthy rank outsider to get far enough to challenge it.
And this is why even many Sanders voters will vote for Trump if Hillary gets the nomination. And why Trump may well win.

The American people can be deceived; that is true. It happened in 1980 and it happened in 2000 and especially 2004. Yes indeed; the people can lose their grip and do the wrong thing.

But we don't need an outsider from government. We need an outsider from the wealthy business class. That's what the "Establishment" is.

Only neo-liberals want an outsider from government, because neo-liberals say the "government is not the solution, government is the problem," just as the modern saint of neo-liberalism said.

And if Trump is elected, our government will be a problem, because it will be headed by a madman and a conman.

Originally Posted by Odin

If you think Hillary is going to put an actual progressive on the SCOTUS I have a nice space under the bridge to sell you.

Yea, if you're setting the bar, i.e. a magic pony that poops out Bernie platitudes, then you're correct.

Of course, there is not currently, nor has there ever been, a SCOTUS Justice that meets your bar.

But keep dreaming the dream while the rest of us actually work toward you being able to live it.

Originally Posted by MordecaiK

Bernie has alluded to this in other statements and I have no idea what he may be saying in other communities with lead poisoning from pipes that he has been campaigning in. The candidate that has the most to lose from this lead toxicity is John Kasich, who like Tom Snyder in Michigan, is a penny pinching governor who has done nothing about this problem--in Cleveland, Toledo, Sebring (near Akron) or Cincinnati. There is speculation that Kasich can benefit from Democratic crossover voters distressed at Trump. See http://wcbe.org/post/crossover-voter...-ohio#stream/0 . But not if John Kasich gets a black eye over lead poisoning as the Ohio campaign heats up.
Pennsylvania and New Jersey too. http://articles.philly.com/2016-02-0...ood-lead-level.

It's Rick Snyder -- not the TV figure Tom Snyder -- who is Governor of Michigan. Until the leaded water scandal emerged I thought he was a possible VP candidate for the Reactionary Party. That's over. He is now up for a recall, and this time with approvals way down. Both Hillary Clinton and bernie Sanders called for Governor Snyder to resign.

Lead poisoning, whether through inhalation of fumes or dusts, ingestion of chips of lead paint (lead salts are in fact sweet), or absorption with drinking water, is an insidious harm. Lead compounds have some similarities to calcium in their chemistry but act perversely in contrast to calcium. They cause learning disabilities and weaken impulse control, which may explain the high rates of violent crime (associated with both learning disabilities and poor impulse control) when Americans were burning the most leaded fuel.

Originally Posted by playwrite

No, you're confused, again.

We want to win so as to put a Progressive on the SCOTUS and change everything for the better.

I recognize that you are currently incapable of having that seep through the GOP tropes you have fully bought in.

Hang in there; the fever will break.

Here's another scenario. It's Trump v Clinton, and the fear factor makes Trump unacceptable; Clinton is elected. On the other hand, Clinton is not a beloved candidate, so a very large number of the voters selecting Hillary choose a straight GOP ticket to balance that as an act of contrition. So how does that SCOTUS happen then?

Originally Posted by pbrower2a

It's Rick Snyder -- not the TV figure Tom Snyder -- who is Governor of Michigan. Until the leaded water scandal emerged I thought he was a possible VP candidate for the Reactionary Party. That's over. He is now up for a recall, and this time with approvals way down. Both Hillary Clinton and bernie Sanders called for Governor Snyder to resign.

Lead poisoning, whether through inhalation of fumes or dusts, ingestion of chips of lead paint (lead salts are in fact sweet), or absorption with drinking water, is an insidious harm. Lead compounds have some similarities to calcium in their chemistry but act perversely in contrast to calcium. They cause learning disabilities and weaken impulse control, which may explain the high rates of violent crime (associated with both learning disabilities and poor impulse control) when Americans were burning the most leaded fuel.

--- well that explains the Donald's constituency then. Isn't Tom Snyder dead?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Here's another scenario. It's Trump v Clinton, and the fear factor makes Trump unacceptable; Clinton is elected. On the other hand, Clinton is not a beloved candidate, so a very large number of the voters selecting Hillary choose a straight GOP ticket to balance that as an act of contrition. So how does that SCOTUS happen then?

Your reasoning here is certainly plausible. At any rate, I wouldn't count on a "wave election" supporting Hillary's political agenda nor her Supreme Court appointments because--

As I posted earlier on the thread "Obama's Legacy, So Far," Mara Liasson of NPR has recently pointed out:

Every president sees his party lose hundreds of positions — it's the price a party holding the White House pays — but no president has come close to Obama. During Obama's eight years in office, the Democrats have lost more House, Senate, state legislative and governors seats than under any other president.

When Obama took office, there were 60 Democratic senators; now there are 46. The number of House seats held by Democrats has shrunk from 257 to 188.
There are now nine fewer Democratic governors than in 2009. Democrats currently hold fewer elected offices nationwide than at any time since the 1920s.

And as Chris Hedges alluded to in his Truthdig column today:

The Republicans, energized by America’s reality-star version of Il Duce, Donald Trump, have been pulling in voters, especially new voters, while the Democrats are well below the voter turnouts for 2008. In the voting Tuesday, 5.6 million votes were cast for the Democrats while 8.3 million went to the Republicans. Those numbers were virtually reversed in 2008—8.2 million for the Democrats and about 5 million for the Republicans.

Hillary may trounce Trump in the general election, but she will hardly have "the wind at her back." At best, she'll be fighting a rearguard action to preserve hard-won progress on Obamacare and a variety of social issues. And quite frankly, I'm not interested in a status quo or rearguard candidate. I will support a vanguard candidate who seeks to overturn corporate power and give power back to whom it belongs--ordinary people.

Hillary is a neoliberal candidate through and through. She personifies, as did her husband--the old civic order that must be replaced by a radical new policy framework. Bernie Sanders is the only serious candidate who speaks to that aspiration.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Here's another scenario. It's Trump v Clinton, and the fear factor makes Trump unacceptable; Clinton is elected. On the other hand, Clinton is not a beloved candidate, so a very large number of the voters selecting Hillary choose a straight GOP ticket to balance that as an act of contrition. So how does that SCOTUS happen then?

The Democrats educate the voters about how important it is to vote, and vote Democratic, in other races. This is a civics lesson that millennials and all of us apparently need to review and review until we get it.

Originally Posted by Teacher in Exile

Hillary may trounce Trump in the general election, but she will hardly have "the wind at her back." At best, she'll be fighting a rearguard action to preserve hard-won progress on Obamacare and a variety of social issues. And quite frankly, I'm not interested in a status quo or rearguard candidate. I will support a vanguard candidate who seeks to overturn corporate power and give power back to whom it belongs--ordinary people.

Hillary is a neoliberal candidate through and through. She personifies, as did her husband--the old civic order that must be replaced by a radical new policy framework. Bernie Sanders is the only serious candidate who speaks to that aspiration.

I agree with your point of view. But; Hillary may be the lesser of two evils, or the evil of two lessers; but she's not a neo-liberal through and through. No need to exaggerate. If we can't get Bernie, then the best thing is to vote strategically. Vote for Hillary if you live in one of the 9 or 10 swing states. Otherwise, vote for your principles, and vote for Jill Stein or some other candidate that represents your principles, or write in Bernie.

Originally Posted by Teacher in Exile

Your reasoning here is certainly plausible. At any rate, I wouldn't count on a "wave election" supporting Hillary's political agenda nor her Supreme Court appointments because--

As I posted earlier on the thread "Obama's Legacy, So Far," Mara Liasson of NPR has recently pointed out:

Every president sees his party lose hundreds of positions — it's the price a party holding the White House pays — but no president has come close to Obama. During Obama's eight years in office, the Democrats have lost more House, Senate, state legislative and governors seats than under any other president.

When Obama took office, there were 60 Democratic senators; now there are 46. The number of House seats held by Democrats has shrunk from 257 to 188.
There are now nine fewer Democratic governors than in 2009. Democrats currently hold fewer elected offices nationwide than at any time since the 1920s.

And as Chris Hedges alluded to in his Truthdig column today:

The Republicans, energized by America’s reality-star version of Il Duce, Donald Trump, have been pulling in voters, especially new voters, while the Democrats are well below the voter turnouts for 2008. In the voting Tuesday, 5.6 million votes were cast for the Democrats while 8.3 million went to the Republicans. Those numbers were virtually reversed in 2008—8.2 million for the Democrats and about 5 million for the Republicans.

Hillary may trounce Trump in the general election, but she will hardly have "the wind at her back." At best, she'll be fighting a rearguard action to preserve hard-won progress on Obamacare and a variety of social issues. And quite frankly, I'm not interested in a status quo or rearguard candidate. I will support a vanguard candidate who seeks to overturn corporate power and give power back to whom it belongs--ordinary people.

Hillary is a neoliberal candidate through and through. She personifies, as did her husband--the old civic order that must be replaced by a radical new policy framework. Bernie Sanders is the only serious candidate who speaks to that aspiration.

We need to vote as if it is 2008 all over. The difference is that we will be replacing a very good President instead of a very poor one. We need to beat the cheat. If our Congressional Representatives are awful we need to vote them out, gerrymandering be damned!