2020 Presidential Primaries

For the uninitiated, Amaris is a lying sack of shit.

We don’t know. Primary voters are not the same people who vote in the general election. Considerably more people vote in the general than do the primaries. One might as well argue that since Hillary lost the primary in ‘08, it was inevitable that she was going to lose in ‘16. If that logic holds, then Biden losing to Trump is a foregone conclusion since he lost to both Hillary and Obama in ‘08.

Yes, let us leave it at that. Your praxis scores are wonderful and you are a great assistant gym coach. No, I am not impressed by your little brain. Other people may be nice to you and blow smoke up your ass, but I don't have to. You would have trouble lighting an LED with your neural energy. I have seen things from other people hun, and you are not one of them.

So you'd be glad to have me change the oil in your car? PM me. In your reality, I can do it by remote.

Have to give credit to Tim Pool here in response to Biden's you ain't black gaffe:

"When Joe Biden is incoherent he's better off. Think about the things he said when he was actually making sense."

somebody here on wordforge debunked that. I think they said Obama kept whole families in cages rather than split up families like Trump does. I'm paraphrasing here, but the gist of their claim was Obama's caging was not as bad as Trump's. I'm not that well versed in the subtleties of border detainment & processing.

Sorry to say it, but yes it is. Any vote in a FPTP voting system (that Florida and pretty much everywhere else in the US has for president) that isn't for a first- or second-place candidate is a vote for both of them.

Imagine 5 voters. 2 for Trump, 2 for Biden, and you. If you vote third party, one of them wins (in accordance with tie-breaking procedure). If you don't vote, one of them wins. If there's 1 Trump, 1 Biden, and you and two others abstain, one of them wins. If there's 1 Trump, 1 Biden, and 1 Stein, and you and the other guy abstain, one of the three of them wins. 7 voters: 3 Trump, 3 Biden, and you. Only by voting for Trump or Biden do you deny the Biden or Trump, respectively, the win, no matter how much you'd like a third-party candidate to win. Now, if somehow the polling shows your candidate in 2nd or 1st place, by all means, vote for them.

Only by helping create or break a tie for first, does your vote matter (except for ballot access/party recognition).

This is why public polling, the way the questions are worded, is so insidious. It's never, "who would you prefer for President?"; it's always "if the election were held today, who would you vote for?" which creates a self-fulfilling... I don't want to say "prophecy," but it's the closest thing to it. It winnows down who's a viable first- or second-place candidate. You don't have to like the rules (I certainly don't, and I'm trying to change it, locally), but this is how the game works. A vote for neither is a vote for both.

Oh my, someone is having fantsies about being a jiffy lube tech. Dementia is a terrible thing. This is the internet. The information super highway is a metaphor. There are no cars here. Do you understand the words that I am saying?

First you say it would be a vote for Trump, now you're saying it's a vote for both. Make up your mind.

That's some...... interesting logic you have there. But there are no ties in elections. And my reasons for voting on a candidate isn't solely based on denying someone else public office. It's based on who I think is the best one for the job. That is what makes my vote matter, not whether or not that candidate wins. Liking neither of the top two candidates but voting for one anyway based on who you think can win is a voter who has no convictions and just goes along with the herd. A sheep basically.

No, it's how the game works for you. You let pundits and pollsters tell you who to vote for. I look at voting the way an employer looks at hiring an employee. I'd rather vote for a candidate who doesn't win than vote for an idiot just because of media and pollsters. If elections went the way media and pollsters say, Harry Truman would have never been elected president. Trump wouldn't be President. Jesse Ventura (a third party candidate) would have never been Governor of Minnesota.

If you want to be a good little sheep and vote for the lesser of the two evils, be my guest. But you're never going to get me to do the same. I would never stain my vote in such a manner as to give it to a moron who has no business serving in that oval office. I value it too highly. So you're best off feeding that line of bullshit to someone else.

That is so true. Turnout is so much lower in presidential preference primaries than it is in November. No independents take part in those elections unless they are open primaries and even large numbers of Republicans and Democrats only vote in November. Many of whom don't vote party line.

Both includes Trump. Duh.

In what way does it matter? What policies do the winners have to enact because you voted for a loser? Anything? Lying to yourself about the mathematics of it to help you sleep at night? What?

Don't hate the player, hate the game. Fuck, change the game. Make votes for third parties or no one matter. But pretending they matter when they don't is counterproductive, and just keeps the same power structure entrenched. And in this particular case, one of the candidates is obviously orders of magnitude worse than the other. When your choices are Yeltsin and Stalin - which they are because they're leading in the polls - you vote for Yeltsin, even if you'd prefer Kerensky or Gorbachev, otherwise you're supporting Stalin as much as Yeltsin. You should not say that to the pollsters though. You absolutely should answer with who you want as a President, not who you're going to vote for. That's the only way to change who's in the top two.

That's fine, as long as you're comfortable with either of the frontrunners winning. I'm not, not in this election.

Truman was first or second in every state. It's fine to vote for whoever's in first or second. Trump was in first or second in every state. It's fine to vote for whoever's in first or second (although there's plenty wrong with voting for Trump, especially having, you know, seen anything of the last 3.5 years). While the polls never had Ventura in the top 2, he was rising between every pair of polls, and he and Coleman's margins of error overlapped in the last poll. And the only reason we care about Ventura is that his election was such an outlier, one that was nevertheless widely cast as a 3-way race. That's one election in the last, what, how many thousands of elections have there been in the US since the two-party system started up? With races as well-polled as the Presidential races, particularly in swing states, we will never be surprised by third place winning. And since no-vote or none-of-the-above in ineffectual and non-binding (except in Nevada for some races some years), the same goes for not voting.

You might value it highly, but that's strictly emotional and neither affects the outcome nor changes the system. Game theoretically, voting third party will probably mean throwing it away (unless that third-party candidate is polling competitively by the end of the campaign), which is equivalent to voting for both frontrunners. That's a fact. This is an opinion: this race is too important for that. Trump has to go. That means, modulo a major change in the race, ugh, Biden. (But I'm still going to lie to pollsters and tell them who I wish I could vote for. Cause then there's a tiny chance that could become useful, and I will.)

This game fucking sucks. But pretending that playing to lose is somehow noble when you think there's a real difference between the candidates (and, opinion: you're a moron if you think there isn't one this time) is just that: pretending.

The complete counter-argument is that Obama's Administration was caught on it's heels by an unexpected surge of refugees which exceeded the capabilities of the infrastructure (not unlike those overwhelmed NY hospitals last month) and the short-term temporary cages were an emergency measure (like the field hospitals in NY)

The Obama Admin didn't WANT them in cages, didn't see such as a deterrent to keep others from coming, and yes didn't split families on purpose.

The Miller/Trump plan was expressly and unashamedly DESIGNED to be intentionally as cruel as possible under the theory that others wouldn't come if they knew their kids would be stripped from them and they would all be caged like animals long term.
Which didn't work as planned.

The Libertarians have their sacrificial lamb. https://reason.com/2020/05/23/jo-jorgensen-wins-libertarian-party-presidential-nomination/

https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/falling-through-cracks
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/despite-obama-immigration-is-still-splitting-up-families/
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...tion-separate-families-immigration/728060002/

It did happen, though it was reported as incidents that weren't official blanket policy.

You know what happened under Obama's administration, though? This:
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-administration-holding-more-immigrant-children-shelters-ever-949099

And this:
https://www.aclu.org/press-releases...-detaining-asylum-seekers-intimidation-tactic

And these:
https://www.aclu.org/press-releases...-widespread-abuse-child-immigrants-us-custody
https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...cb31a8-5e00-11e8-a4a4-c070ef53f315_story.html
https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/05/25/aclu-immigrant-minors-often-mistreated-during-obamas-term/
https://www.aclu.org/blog/immigrant...rder-patrol-was-monstrous-under-obama-imagine
https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily...tion-for-detaining-migrant-women-and-children
http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/obama-administration-hit-lawsuit-locking-potential-asylum-seekers

(Some of those stories might converge in places)

I swear to all things good, if anyone wants to defend or downplay any of these, they can go fuck themselves right now.

Seriously, if anyone wants to respond to this with any kind of apologetics, don't even fucking bother, I won't read it. I watched the GOP sell every last shred of its soul for Donald Trump. I'd rather not watch my friends prostitute their own for sex predator, racist ass Joe fucking Biden.

As for you, rub your fucking nose in it.

You too, @Ancalagon. You'd protect a sex predator, and one of you is such a dumb fuck he's protecting a sex predator politician in the U.S. while living in another country. That's you, @Rincewiend. @14thDoctor already knows he's a dumb fuck.

Stop. Lying. You. Lying. Sack. Of. Shit.

Be careful, if you stop being polite some of them *14th* might not think you are one of them faggots they tolerate as long as they know what is good for them.

That is rich.

I do have to say I am sorry to @T.R , @Zombie , and @Lanzman . I see the sort of supposed left wing hypocrite that has been hanging around these parts. If this is what you have seen of liberal peoples I get where you would feel the way you do about them.

Wow...
You actually lost the plot...
And you will lose friends...
I've said in a thread in TNZ that i think Biden and Sanders should not have run, neither one was the best choice out of the field of candidates...
It feels like the other candidates gave up when Biden entered the race...

But saying Biden is a rapist and racist based on hardly any evidence?
You really, really lost it @Amaris...

That's really what this boils down to for you. You're the type of person who would hold his nose and vote for Jeffrey Dahmer if he was the democrat nominee against Trump. For you it's all about voting for the lesser of two evils and screw morals and integrity because the ends justify the means. I don't operate under that philosophy and I never will. It's not about changing the game(not sure why you keep blabbing on about that) it's about picking the best candidate. So again, try that line of bullshit on someone whose younger and isn't as wise to political games, because it won't work on me. I'm not voting for Trump or Biden. Period. Deal with it.

This type of deliberately false hyperbole adds nothing to the debate, but shows only that you are not capable of presenting your arguments in rational terms. Consider the following points:

1) The US political system is seriously broken in a large number of ways, but we live in reality, not in "what might have been". And in reality, barring some really unforeseen change, either Joe Biden or Donald Trump will be elected president in November. (And if something does change, it will happen enough ahead of time that people can adjust their voting intentions accordingly. If one of them should die suddenly, for example, people would simply adapt their reasoning to the new situation. But I am talking about the situation as we can now see it.)

2) Joe Biden will/would not be a great president. He isn't up to it. But at the very least, he is extremely likely to appoint competent people and let them work, rather than letting important policy be set by his family and people whose prime qualification is licking his boots.

3) If the alternative was (or appeared to be) neither significantly better nor significantly worse, there is every reason to express one's disapproval of the system by voting third-party. I have done so myself a number of times.

4) Donald Trump is a disaster. He is worse than a disaster. He is not "approximately equal" to Biden in terms of how good or bad he would be. As long as there is an alternative that is an improvement, it is perfectly rational to choose that alternative, no matter that it is not fully satisfactory, or even close to it. It's like deliberately driving your car into a ditch at a high speed rather than letting yourself be run into head-on by a semi. You are not saying "This is a good thing" by such a choice, but only "This is less bad, by enough of a degree to make it worth it."

5) If the Democrats had a candidate who is or appeared to be as bad as Trump, then point number 3 would apply. That is why your "you would vote for Jeffrey Dahmer" nonsense is just nonsense. But it is not the case.

6) The Democrats have a candidate who satisfies almost no one fully, but who was the choice from way back for the simple reason that he is the one with the highest chance of beating Donald Trump.

So vote for who you want, but don't pretend that you are so much smarter or more informed than highly intelligent posters like Order2Chaos. Stick to saying you disagree with his analysis, without claiming it is childish. You are the one who appears childish when you make that kind of claim.

I've already presented my arguments in rational terms. We've been back and forth enough to the point that now we're just going in circles. That line was the basic gist of his argument : You need to vote biden because a vote third party or not at all is a vote for Donald Trump. I explained that my view of voting is different and I provided my reasoning. You might not like my answers, but they were rational.

No one is arguing against that. I think you both are missing my point: I DON'T CARE. that either them will be the winner. I'm not going to vote for someone based on that fact. Ever.

You're kidding right? You admit that neither of them are up to the job but pick Biden because he's more likely to hire good people underneath him? No thanks. I'll either find a better candidate or just leave it blank.

You guys keep coming back to this and it mystifies me. Where at any point in my arguments have I talked about voting in order to buck the system? The system has nothing to do with my decision making at the voting booth. Zero. Nada. Nothing. My votes have spanned pretty much all the parties by this point. If he or she is the best candidate, then they get my vote. I don't care what party they belong to. Putting up a senile old man who can't keep his hands to himself and saying. "vote for this democrat instead of Trump" isn't going to earn my vote.

No, a better example would be peer pressure telling me those are my only two options when a third alternative exists"Slow down or stay off the road."

Yeah, I heard that same story four years ago with Hillary. She was a sure thing. How did that work out for you?

I'm not trying to pretend anything , but I'm very much informed on these type of discussions. As far as the "intelligence" of posters on this website...I'm fine with you believing whatever helps you sleep at night.

I never said the word childish at any point in the debate you dipshit. And I'll say whatever I please ,whenever I please, to whomever I please. If you don't like it, you can fuck off.

She ticks all of the proper boxes, but the LP is so weak. She compares this stimulus to the bank bailouts and I don't think that's a fair comparison.

It depends upon what she means by that. If she’s criticizing the stimulus because it did more to help corporations than individuals, she’s right. If she’s criticizing it because she doesn’t think that this is the kind of thing that governments should be doing, she’s wrong.

This.

It's more about the spending. Normally I'd agree, but extraordinary circumstances require extraordinary solutions. I've never been against bailing out the people when necessary. I don't know if the stimulus has helped corporations more than the people, but I don't think that only the market can work this out. I think it's going to take more than the free market.

She’s done already, unless her campaign takes a radical shift. It’s been utterly tone-deaf so far. Absent the pandemic she might have had a case on all the shortcomings of the other candidates, but it’s been standard LP boilerplate so far. I might still vote for her (since CA is safely in Biden’s column), but that’ll be largely for ballot access next time around.

I might vote for Jeffrey Dahmer too.

Just for the lulz factor.

"Don't leave the Ambassdor alone with the President at any time. These negotiations are too important"

Five minutes later......

"GOD DAMMIT!! I TOLD YOU ASSHOLES NOT TO LEAVE THEM ALONE TOGETHER."

"How will we spin this in the news? Let's start with Don Lemon."

She's pretty mediocre. By saying she supports every plank in the party tells me all I need to know.