2016 US Presidential Race - Mod Warning in OP

Thargor

He's toxic, theres a story like this every week about him:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/chris-christie-sells-out-taxpayers-future-for-pennies/2015/03/05/fa3e65f6-c37a-11e4-ad5c-3b8ce89f1b89_story.html

Surprising the amount of resistance to Bush though, they're really screaming about nepotism this time

MightyMandarin

Thargor wrote: »

He's toxic, theres a story like this every week about him:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/chris-christie-sells-out-taxpayers-future-for-pennies/2015/03/05/fa3e65f6-c37a-11e4-ad5c-3b8ce89f1b89_story.html

Surprising the amount of resistance to Bush though, they're really screaming about nepotism this time

Tbh I'd prefer Bush to Christie. Obviously neither would be ideal Presidents imo, but at least Bush looks like he has some backbone; Christie would sell out his own mother if it meant he got power.

Black Swan

No mention of dimpled chads or butterfly ballots? How soon does the American voter forget?

eire4

Black Swan wrote: »

No mention of dimpled chads or butterfly ballots? How soon does the American voter forget?

To be fair I am sure all that will come up a plenty if he does become the Republican nomination for the 2016 presidential election.

Black Swan

eire4 wrote: »

To be fair I am sure all that will come up a plenty if he does become the Republican nomination for the 2016 presidential election.

It's not "news" anymore, was beaten to death in 2000 GE, and I doubt it will be successfully resurrected to the extent that it will provide the ratings that the media uses to attract advertisers and stay in business.

On another issue... I am not a Hilliary Clinton fan, finding her unimaginative and boring, but I do not understand the current massive media and GOP driven issue regarding her use of private emails while Secretary of State. It was not against the rules back then, although methinks it was foolish of her to do so from a security standpoint. But if Hilliary Clinton is to be attacked TODAY for doing so 4 or more years ago, then Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin should also be attacked TODAY for using private emails to conduct state business, going back to when they did so while state governors. Palin's private yahoo account had been cracked too, and confidential governor communications had been spread all over the web back then. This private email issue seems so one sided TODAY, when both Democrats and Republicans running for presidential office are not being treated the same for their same errors in judgment.

jank

Black Swan wrote: »

It's not "news" anymore, was beaten to death in 2000 GE, and I doubt it will be successfully resurrected to the extent that it will provide the ratings that the media uses to attract advertisers and stay in business.

On another issue... I am not a Hilliary Clinton fan, finding her unimaginative and boring, but I do not understand the current massive media and GOP driven issue regarding her use of private emails while Secretary of State. It was not against the rules back then, although methinks it was foolish of her to do so from a security standpoint. But if Hilliary Clinton is to be attacked TODAY for doing so 4 or more years ago, then Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin should also be attacked TODAY for using private emails to conduct state business, going back to when they did so while state governors. Palin's private yahoo account had been cracked too, and confidential governor communications had been spread all over the web back then. This private email issue seems so one sided TODAY, when both Democrats and Republicans running for presidential office are not being treated the same for their same errors in judgment.

Correct, both Palin and Bush should be attacked for using private emails while Governor of their respective states. However, although confidential information may be leaked from these emails it is no where as serious as the Secretary of State using private email accounts. The former is stupid and misguided, the latter is unbelievable display of ignorance that puts the security of the nation at risk. It is expected that she would take more heat from it.

Black Swan

jank wrote: »

Correct, both Palin and Bush should be attacked for using private emails while Governor of their respective states. However, although confidential information may be leaked from these emails it is no where as serious as the Secretary of State using private email accounts. The former is stupid and misguided, the latter is unbelievable display of ignorance that puts the security of the nation at risk. It is expected that she would take more heat from it.

Poor judgment is poor judgment, no matter what office you hold on behalf of your citizens, and you are judged upon that past judgment when running for new and higher offices. Your poor judgment should not be forgiven or overlooked, if also your good judgment is to be used to qualify you for higher office.

All 3 candidates (H Clinton, J Bush, and S Palin) exhibited the same poor judgment, and in the case of Palin, she was also running for VP of the nation, the 2nd highest position in the USA while governor (and was a McCain heatbeat away from President if they won), which outranks a Secretary of State cabinet position. This obviously GOP driven controversy looks very partisan and biased, especially forgetting Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin's same poor judgment.

jank

Black Swan wrote: »

Poor judgment is poor judgment, no matter what office you hold on behalf of your citizens, and you are judged upon that past judgment when running for new and higher offices. Your poor judgment should not be forgiven or overlooked, if also your good judgment is to be used to qualify you for higher office.

All 3 candidates (H Clinton, J Bush, and S Palin) exhibited the same poor judgment, and in the case of Palin, she was also running for VP of the nation, the 2nd highest position in the USA while governor (and was a McCain heatbeat away from President if they won), which outranks a Secretary of State cabinet position. This obviously GOP driven controversy looks very partisan and biased, especially forgetting Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin's same poor judgment.

All 3 exhibited poor judgement but in the scale of seriousness Hillary by far exhibited the greatest poor judgement as her office was by far the most important where she would have had access to highly sensitive classified information not accessible to the other two. which could have comprised delicate diplomatic negotiations or even national security.

Palin was not VP so bringing up a 'what if' hypothetical scenario does your argument no favor and in fact weakens it by engaging in that tactic. Lets stick to the actual facts.

By all means criticise Jeb Bush or whomever, but that does not give Hillary a pass on this one and instead is an attempt to deflect attention away from the issue, when it clearly should be debated. Two wrongs don't make a right especially given the gravity of her position as SOS.

Black Swan

jank wrote: »

All 3 exhibited poor judgement but in the scale of seriousness Hillary by far exhibited the greatest poor judgement as her office was by far the most important...

Hillary Clinton is running for president based upon her experience in the US Senate and Secretary of State. Jeb Bush is running for president based upon his experience as Florida's Governor. Their experiences are being used to qualify them for 2016 president, and BOTH exhibited poor judgment in using private emails to conduct government business.

Now look at the flip side of this argument. Set aside the same private email mistake that they BOTH made. If Hilliary Clinton's decision making experience is at a higher level than Jeb Bush's, and had more consequences than Jeb Bush's, when both are running for the same office, it may appear that Hilliary Clinton is more qualified than Jeb Bush based upon her higher level decision making experiences overall, not just this one private email issue (which is being blown out of proportion because it builds media ratings that sells advertising, and the GOP has little in their file left to attack her, and are looking desperate to those of us that are independent).

Personally, I do not like either Hilliary or Jeb, finding them both unimaginative, boring, and too heavily influenced by special interest monies. It's truly sad to realise that a superpower of over 310 million people cannot produce leaders that are better qualified to solve both domestic and foreign problems.

jank

Black Swan wrote: »

Hillary Clinton is running for president based upon her experience in the US Senate and Secretary of State. Jeb Bush is running for president based upon his experience as Florida's Governor. Their experiences are being used to qualify them for 2016 president, and BOTH exhibited poor judgment in using private emails to conduct government business.


Now look at the flip side of this argument. Set aside the same private email mistake that they BOTH made. If Hilliary Clinton's decision making experience is at a higher level than Jeb Bush's, and had more consequences than Jeb Bush's, when both are running for the same office, it may appear that Hilliary Clinton is more qualified than Jeb Bush based upon her higher level decision making experiences overall, not just this one private email issue (which is being blown out of proportion because it builds media ratings that sells advertising, and the GOP has little in their file left to attack her, and are looking desperate to those of us that are independent).

Personally, I do not like either Hilliary or Jeb, finding them both unimaginative, boring, and too heavily influenced by special interest monies. It's truly sad to realise that a superpower of over 310 million people cannot produce leaders that are better qualified to solve both domestic and foreign problems.

Hillary Clinton will undoubtedly use her experience as SOS as one of her trump cards. Does that make her more qualified? Who knows. Some people would value federal experience more than running a state as a governor and visa versa. However, questions should be asked of her wisdom to use private emails while in the role of SOS.

If one cannot see that information she would have been exposed to is of much greater national importance and national security then data purely at state level then there is no point continuing the debate.

Personally I think she has more issues with the Bengazhi incident than these emails. These skeletons will come out in time no doubt.

Black Swan

As sad as it was, Bengazhi is not "news" any more, and lacks any ratings traction with the news media advertisers, as will this private email issue lack traction in a couple months. The same can be said of former Gov Jeb Bush's total incompetence in running the 2000 general election in Flordia with dimpled chads, butterfly ballots, and voting machine failures that gave brother GW Bush the presidency by a few hundred votes. It's not "news" anymore.

Amerika

Black Swan wrote: »

On another issue... I am not a Hilliary Clinton fan, finding her unimaginative and boring, but I do not understand the current massive media and GOP driven issue regarding her use of private emails while Secretary of State. It was not against the rules back then, although methinks it was foolish of her to do so from a security standpoint.

Wasn't there very specific guidance by the Obama administration back in 2009 to agencies all across the government, that employees in the Obama administration were to use their official e-mail accounts when they're conducting official government business? And in the rare occasion that personal e-mail accounts were used, those records were to be preserved consistent with the Federal Records Act?

Amerika

Black Swan wrote: »

As sad as it was, Bengazhi is not "news" any more, and lacks any ratings traction with the news media advertisers, as will this private email issue lack traction in a couple months.

Apparently we won't know that is the case regarding Bengazhi unless the government can gain control of her private server, and be able to retrieve any official government business e-mails she decided to delete.

Black Swan

Amerika wrote: »

Apparently we won't know that is the case regarding Bengazhi unless the government can gain control of her private server, and be able to retrieve any official government business e-mails she decided to delete.

And as a fair exchange, should Jeb Bush release all his private emails at the same time as Hilliary Clinton does, especially those that pertained to the incompetently conducted and questionable results of the 2000 Florida general election (that gave his brother GW Bush the presidency), neither deleting anything that may place them in a bad light, given that BOTH showed the same error in judgment, and BOTH are running for the same office in 2016?

Amerika

Black Swan wrote: »

And as a fair exchange, should Jeb Bush release all his private emails at the same time as Hilliary Clinton does, especially those that pertained to the incompetently conducted and questionable results of the 2000 Florida general election (that gave his brother GW Bush the presidency), neither deleting anything that may place them in a bad light, given that BOTH showed the same error in judgment, and BOTH are running for the same office in 2016?

Sure. If he did his official business as governor using a private email, that is.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/jeb-bush-e-book-emails-115054.html

Notice Hillary’s very careful wording in her press conference? Sure looks like with Hillary, America's in for another lovely bit of governance by “It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is.”

And how long till she destroys the hard drive of that server? My money is on 31 March, 2015, the day before she announces here candidacy.

Now the money trail for the Clinton Foundation might be a tad harder to hide than her emails.

Brian?

Amerika wrote: »

Sure. If he did his official business as governor using a private email, that is.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/02/jeb-bush-e-book-emails-115054.html

Notice Hillary’s very careful wording in her press conference? Sure looks like with Hillary, America's in for another lovely bit of governance by “It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is.”

And how long till she destroys the hard drive of that server? My money is on 31 March, 2015, the day before she announces here candidacy.

Now the money trail for the Clinton Foundation might be a tad harder to hide than her emails.

That's quite the theory. Complete nonsense but imaginative.

What Hilary Clinton did was wrong, but it was hardly the cardinal sin you make it out to be and there is zero chance she'll compound this error by attempting to destroy evidence.

What's this about the money trail for the Clinton foundation?

Amerika

Brian? wrote: »

That's quite the theory. Complete nonsense but imaginative.

What Hilary Clinton did was wrong, but it was hardly the cardinal sin you make it out to be and there is zero chance she'll compound this error by attempting to destroy evidence.

Hillary won't give up the server. And if there comes a subpoena under the Freedom Of Information Act to look at the server to see if emails can be recovered, I think there is little doubt that it won't be destroyed to "ensure Clinton privacy" (wink, wink) in the face of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy resurgence.

What's this about the money trail for the Clinton foundation?

First question is is... what does the Clinton Foundation do? Then look at some of the large donations that come from Middle Eastern countries that run counter to what the Clinton Foundation espouses. It really is not hard to deduce the Foundation appears to be little more than a PAC to get Hillary elected president, and whispers are (even within the Clinton circle) it’s a Pay-to-Play political favor front. Follow The Money!

I think it's a far bigger scandal than the emails or Benghazi.

Amerika

Brian? wrote: »

That's quite the theory. Complete nonsense but imaginative.

What Hilary Clinton did was wrong, but it was hardly the cardinal sin you make it out to be and there is zero chance she'll compound this error by attempting to destroy evidence.

Perhaps not complete nonsense?

I just read the Associated Press has filed a lawsuit today under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act against the State Department to force the release of email correspondence and government documents from Hillary's tenure as SOS.

And now The New York Times is musing that the hard drives might already have been destroyed.

jank

Did I hear right that over 32,000 emails was sent to her private server?

MightyMandarin

Whatever the number was, she looks quite shady after this. Deliberately using your personal email is one thing; deleting 30k emails is another. Hillary definitely is hiding something she doesn't want to be seen.

eire4

While we are still in the fake phase of the presidential election (by which I mean various people are obviously running but have not said so officially) I hope we do not see the upcoming campaign once it hits full bore become a mainly smear campaign.
We need serious debates on both macro and micro levels about a whole range of topics.

MightyMandarin

eire4 wrote: »

While we are still in the fake phase of the presidential election (by which I mean various people are obviously running but have not said so officially) I hope we do not see the upcoming campaign once it hits full bore become a mainly smear campaign.
We need serious debates on both macro and micro levels about a whole range of topics.

Every campaign is a smear campaign. Local mayoral elections to Presidential elections are the same in this regard as people will do anything to get elected, even if it means claiming they are 'anti-american' or other ridiculous notions, and it comes from both Republicans and Democrats.

Serious debates are always needed but scarcely happen. Most people vote for a person they can relate to, who's well spoken and doesn't carry too much baggage. It doesn't matter if their economic policies are rubbish, most people will vote for someone purely based on non-policy matters. Whether they re-elect them is a whole other ballgame though.

eire4

MightyMandarin wrote: »

Every campaign is a smear campaign. Local mayoral elections to Presidential elections are the same in this regard as people will do anything to get elected, even if it means claiming they are 'anti-american' or other ridiculous notions, and it comes from both Republicans and Democrats.

Serious debates are always needed but scarcely happen. Most people vote for a person they can relate to, who's well spoken and doesn't carry too much baggage. It doesn't matter if their economic policies are rubbish, most people will vote for someone purely based on non-policy matters. Whether they re-elect them is a whole other ballgame though.

You may well be right about serious debates as against smear being the dominant theme in the upcoming presidential election. I hope your wrong but sadly it's more likely your right that smear will dominate.
As for re-elections that is one of the increasing problems in the current system. So many congressional districts have been gerrymandered so that many members of congress can act however they want with almost impunity given there is next to no chance they can lose their seat. For me one of the major macro issues we need to be debating and sorting out.

MightyMandarin

eire4 wrote: »

You may well be right about serious debates as against smear being the dominant theme in the upcoming presidential election. I hope your wrong but sadly it's more likely your rigth that smear will dominate.
As for re-elections that is one of the increasing problems in the current system. So many congressional districts have been gerrymandered so that many members of congress can act however they want with almost impunity given there is next to no chance they can lose their seat. For me one of the major macro issues we need to be debating and sorting out.

I agree. I'm normally swinging towards Democrats, but in the issue of Gerrymandering, both parties are as culpable as each other. The only way to sort it out is to have a board/agency set up with 'independent' representatives. How this would work, I have no idea, but perhaps each individual state would form a group of eg 10 Republicans and 10 Democrats to appoint eg 6 people to each state's agency. Not sure how this would work, but it's certainly a better option than the one currently being used.

eire4

MightyMandarin wrote: »

I agree. I'm normally swinging towards Democrats, but in the issue of Gerrymandering, both parties are as culpable as each other. The only way to sort it out is to have a board/agency set up with 'independent' representatives. How this would work, I have no idea, but perhaps each individual state would form a group of eg 10 Republicans and 10 Democrats to appoint eg 6 people to each state's agency. Not sure how this would work, but it's certainly a better option than the one currently being used.

This really could become an even bigger issue in coming years as not only do we have gerrymandered congressional districts there is now also an attempt in some states to allocate their electoral college votes based on congressional district lines. This approach obviously is a blatant attempt to subvert a free and fair presidential election.
Now when it comes to stopping this kind of national level gerrymandering one way to stop it would be a constitutional amendment to get rid of the electoral college and go with a popular vote.
No question at the state level we need to have the ability to rig congressional districts taken out of the hands of the party in power in that state and instead kept under the control of an independant body.

Manic Moran

eire4 wrote: »

This really could become an even bigger issue in coming years as not only do we have gerrymandered congressional districts there is now also an attempt in some states to allocate their electoral college votes based on congressional district lines. This approach obviously is a blatant attempt to subvert a free and fair presidential election.
Now when it comes to stopping this kind of national level gerrymandering one way to stop it would be a constitutional amendment to get rid of the electoral college and go with a popular vote.
No question at the state level we need to have the ability to rig congressional districts taken out of the hands of the party in power in that state and instead kept under the control of an independant body.

We had a crack at this in California a couple of years ago. It's a double-whammy, the redistricting is done by an indepdendent body, and we have also moved to what is effectively a one-time single transferrable vote system. The redistricting wasn't massively successful in itself, as the commission, new as they were, may well have been blindsided by the incumbent Democrat party machine. http://www.propublica.org/article/how-democrats-fooled-californias-redistricting-commission . Maybe they'll be a little more wary next decade when it's time for another re-districting.

However, the STV move, we call it an 'open primary' here, has had more effect. Although the seats are still not likely to change parties, the nature of the seat-holder may change. Suddenly Democrats are finding themselves under assault in the main election by other Democrats, so it's forcing the candidates to take a more moderate position: No longer does winning the party's primary mean you're a shoe-in for your party's district.

(In other words, in the old system in California, a Democrat would be elected by other Democrats to be the most Democratic Democrat possible, as there was little chance that the Republican candidate would win. There were just too many Democratic voters who would vote for even the less-preferred D over the Rep challenger. But with the open primary, it is now possible that the less-preferred D may still have more votes than the preferred D since now we've a bunch of independents and republicans thrown into the voting pool. Republicans objected to the open primary system on the basis that we could have elections with no R candidate at all. My personal opinion is 'tough. If you can't get enough votes to even come second, you don't deserve to be on the ballot').

I strongly object, however, to replacing the electoral college with popular vote. The EC system is suited to the US as a federation of 50 equal states while acknowledging that more populous ones should have more of a say, much in a similar manner to the make-up of Congress.

Black Swan

Manic Moran wrote: »

I strongly object, however, to replacing the electoral college with popular vote. The EC system is suited to the US as a federation of 50 equal states while acknowledging that more populous ones should have more of a say, much in a similar manner to the make-up of Congress.

Had there been no EC in 2000 GE, the Florida voting controversy where Jeb Bush was governor would not have mattered, Al Gore would have won by about a half million popular national votes, and Jeb Bush's brother GW Bush would not have been president. Consequences? Not sure if the two longest wars in US history would have occurred under Al Gore, perhaps Afghanistan if 9/11 occurred, but I doubt the 2nd Persian Gulf War would have occurred. Then again, second guessing history with a lot of "what if's" was problematic.

jank

Black Swan wrote: »

Had there been no EC in 2000 GE, the Florida voting controversy where Jeb Bush was governor would not have mattered, Al Gore would have won by about a half million popular national votes, and Jeb Bush's brother GW Bush would not have been president. Consequences? Not sure if the two longest wars in US history would have occurred under Al Gore, perhaps Afghanistan if 9/11 occurred, but I doubt the 2nd Persian Gulf War would have occurred. Then again, second guessing history with a lot of "what if's" was problematic.

Don't forget that Nixon beat JFK in the popular vote in 1960..
I think for better or worse the EC suits the presidential election. It is a federal country after all.

Brian?

jank wrote: »

Don't forget that Nixon beat JFK in the popular vote in 1960..

Kennedy bear Nixon by 112,000 votes in the popular vote. I actually believed it was the other way around until just now, I've heard it stated as fact so many time.

Nixon win more states, 26-22, but Kennedy won both the electoral college and popular vote.

I think for better or worse the EC suits the presidential election. It is a federal country after all.

I agree.

Manach

Surely we just need to ask the NSA what were the emails about ...