2020 Democratic Candidates Tracker

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theprestige said:
Your question was stupid. I think the principle I articulated is entirely reasonable. But it looks like we've reached the end of this particular line. Until next time, Belz...
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Oh, no, you don't get to run away from your own argument, unless you want to concede that it was, indeed, stupid.

People who download MP3s or drive a bit over the speed limit are not "against society", and it's ridiculous to suggest that they are. You've argued yourself into a corner and now you don't want to deal with the consequences of what you posted. That isn't my problem, but don't pretend like I'm the one who made the conversation silly. Own your words.
 
Delvo said:
Biden...

In the Democrats' previous brilliant performance at losing with a winning hand, they faced a sexual harasser who at least claimed to also be a sexual assaulter because he thought that was something to "brag" about, so they carefully targeted that specific issue by sending Bill Clinton's prime enabler against him. After seeing how that worked, do they really think it's a better idea to put him up against not merely an enabler but literally a fellow sexual harasser/assaulter this time... particularly one whose history of groping & pawing is easily observable public knowledge rather than just a claim, but who still wouldn't even admit that it was what it was & tried to weasel out of it with obvious lies about how they were all grieving over one thing or another and just couldn't make it through without a not-at-all-hug-like "hug" from a complete stranger?

It just doesn't seem possible to be that stupid.
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It's almost like Biden can't run on his own. No, the Democrats made him do it. Right?
 
portlandatheist said:
That's a really stupid reason not to support her.
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I agree, especially since she's a former prosecutor. There are probably quite a few bad guys who'd like to do her in. But the CW among Democrats and especially liberal Democrats is that guns don't make you safer; they put you more at risk.
 
BobTheCoward said:
Why?
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Because in the bigger picture it probably doesn't matter as much as her chance of beating Donald Trump or being a good promise-keeping president.

I hope we don't see this kind of widespread pettiness when push comes to shove and we have to face Trump in the general, but I fear I'm expecting too much from some people.
 
A bit more on the media bias on gender:

Christian Science Monitor (a decent news site): With so many women running for president, why is focus still on the men?
Senator Harris and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota are getting substantially less media coverage than their fundraising and polling numbers would suggest.

Senator Harris is running third in the latest Morning Consult poll and has raised more money than any Democratic contender except Senator Sanders. However, she’s been mentioned only about half as many times as Mayor Buttigieg on major cable news channels recently – though that was during a time period leading up to the formal announcement of his candidacy. Similarly, Senator Klobuchar came in sixth in fundraising for the first quarter but ranks 10th in recent media mentions.
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And we know the harm lack of media coverage can do.
In 2016, for example, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush outraised all 16 other candidates in the 2016 GOP primary race yet struggled to attract the spotlight. Indeed, Donald Trump’s ability to dominate the news cycle was a consistent source of frustration to all of his opponents.
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It's not just volume:
...a recent [limited] media review from Northeastern University in Boston, which concluded that coverage of the female 2020 candidates has been more negative than that of their male counterparts. The unique words used to describe the women often had to do with controversies – such as Senator Warren’s Native American claims or Senator Klobuchar’s use of a comb to eat her salad after staffers failed to get her utensils before a flight – rather than substantive policy ideas or positive traits.
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Some call-out-shaming is in order:
“We’ve added Buttigieg, who now seems to be blowing everyone out of the water in terms of positivity,” he says – but the women are still at the bottom.

Many scholars who study women in politics, most of whom are women themselves, say this is partially the result of political journalists being mostly male. According to the Women’s Media Center, men author nearly three-quarters of articles about U.S. elections on eight news websites, including The Washington Post and The New York Times online, CNN, Vox, and Fox. In the 14 print publications surveyed, the disparity is less glaring but still evident, with men writing 61% of articles.
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Bet if these men got a few letters from readers highlighting their bias they might make an effort to change.


The Hill: We seem to be ignoring the women running for president
This lack of diversity in media has vast impact. Political coverage continues to reinforces the old tropes that men with charisma have potential or are rising stars, even where they lack experience, while women with experience are nagging, radical, or worse, not worth talking about.

The fact is, the coverage of the presidential candidates is already seriously skewed and the impact of that skewed coverage is vast. For the women running, the coverage gap poses a serious problem. Dem candidates need large numbers of donors to meet the debate threshold set by the DNC. How do they get to those numbers if not through media? The ground game in a country as large as ours only gets you so far this early on. With such uneven coverage and the boy wonder narrative persisting, it’s worth asking, can’t we do better?
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Here's a sample letter excerpt that can be sent to multiple editors:
A simple solution: every network should commit now to ensuring 50/50 male/female representation on every show. And while they are at it, networks and newsrooms should commit to a more serious effort to recruit, advance and promote more women and people of color on air and in the senior producer ranks. Major newspapers, who have been, to their credit, increasing the number of women editors, should commit to ensuring at least 50 percent of op-eds published are written by women. They should make a serious effort to call for and actively solicit voices that are underrepresented, especially women of color who have been left on the sidelines of public discourse for so long.
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And here is the person to credit for the quote:
Lauren Leader is the co-founder and CEO of All In Together, a non-partisan women’s political leadership organization. She is also the author of "Crossing the Thinnest Line, Why Increasing Diversity from the Office to the Oscars Makes America Stronger." Follow her on Twitter: @laurenleaderAIT.
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Fivethirtyeight is tracking the coverage.
In addition to watching polls and endorsements, we’re tracking every mention of the 2020 Democratic primary candidates on CNN, Fox News and MSNBC. ...
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They are also doing some comparisons of what was covered. For example:
Mentions of Buttigieg often came alongside mentions of “Mike” and “Pence” — Buttigieg said the vice president cited his religious beliefs as a way to obscure his discrimination against gay people; Pence accused Buttigieg, his fellow Hoosier, of leveling “attacks on my Christian faith.”
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cullennz said:
Decades of scientific research shows seat belts stop your head being thrown into a dashboard at 100 kph in a front end collision

Decades of scientific research does not show scientist picking 3-4 strains of flu that is likely to emerge out of the many that exist and continue to morph' in a certain year one off get it right the majority of the time.

(At least from the little I have read)
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Venom said:
Because in the bigger picture it probably doesn't matter as much as her chance of beating Donald Trump or being a good promise-keeping president.

I hope we don't see this kind of widespread pettiness when push comes to shove and we have to face Trump in the general, but I fear I'm expecting too much from some people.
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Gin control is an important issue to a portion of Democrats. Like abortion, it is a redline for some.
 
TragicMonkey said:
You're crazy. Clinton's quite attractive for a woman of her years. Some of her outfits were mistakes, though. I think she should have tried to look more English county than American business. I bet she'd look good in a tweed jacket over an off-ivory blouse with moderate frills. Definitely stick to earth tones and neutrals, the bright primary colors are too young for her.
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Mmm. I'm definitely gay, but... yeah. Hillary is far more attractive as a woman than Trump is as a man, regardless. Physically and personality-wise. As for hotness of the current candidates... For the women, I count Gabbard and Warren as the best. For the men... on a quick look, Messam catches my eye the most, followed by Booker. This is odd to me since I tend to rather like men with good hair. Buttigieg's third, I think? I'm not at all repulsed by the good boy look.

Brainster said:
Kamala Harris comes under fire (sorry) for owning a gun:
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Meh. I roll my eyes at anyone who thinks that simply owning a gun in the US is grounds for complaint. There are many things related to guns that are grounds for complaint, of course, but that isn't one of them.

Brainster said:
I agree, especially since she's a former prosecutor. There are probably quite a few bad guys who'd like to do her in. But the CW among Democrats and especially liberal Democrats is that guns don't make you safer; they put you more at risk.
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Mmm. I'd say that it's notably more complex than that, but... it is true that anti-gun sentiment among the Democrats has likely been growing - as backlash to the strides that the pro-gun lobby has been making to erode and oppose gun safety and responsibility. This does, unfortunately, easily lend itself to oversimplification in the messaging. More complex concepts like that gun ownership does tend to reduce some kinds of risks to an individual, but tends to increase other risks for oneself and everyone else tend to be glossed over too easily as people try to specifically push to move things one way or the other.

theprestige said:
After making such a big deal about Manafort interfering in the Ukraine, I don't think they can call out Biden on that point.
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Why? Fear of the GOP's dishonest oversimplifications? The nature of the interference was notably different. That's not to say that I find either one to be acceptable, but Manafort's was orders of magnitudes worse, by the look of it. But then... I have no problem with criticizing either Democrats or Republicans where warranted.
 
theprestige said:
After making such a big deal about Manafort interfering in the Ukraine, I don't think they can call out Biden on that point.
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Sure we can. If he took political action on behalf of his son, it should be called out. The current POTUS is so corrupt, we certainly don't want to give the voters something to say they all are.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
So?

Typical right wing BS thinking the Democrats support of better gun control means we are all anti-gun everything.
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Way to miss the point, which is that the Democrats are internally conflicted about guns. Of COURSE not all Democrats are "anti-gun everything", but some are, and the link exposes that rift. Some Democrats, like Harris, think it's OK to own a gun. Some Democrats, like the author of the article, think it's not OK to own a gun. Which side will win the intraparty fight on the issue?
 
Ziggurat said:
Way to miss the point, which is that the Democrats are internally conflicted about guns. Of COURSE not all Democrats are "anti-gun everything", but some are, and the link exposes that rift. Some Democrats, like Harris, think it's OK to own a gun. Some Democrats, like the author of the article, think it's not OK to own a gun. Which side will win the intraparty fight on the issue?
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Don’t bring an op-Ed piece to a gun fight.
 
Ziggurat said:
Way to miss the point, which is that the Democrats are internally conflicted about guns. Of COURSE not all Democrats are "anti-gun everything", but some are, and the link exposes that rift. Some Democrats, like Harris, think it's OK to own a gun. Some Democrats, like the author of the article, think it's not OK to own a gun. Which side will win the intraparty fight on the issue?
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I'm a Democrat and I own a few guns.I'm also for much stronger gun laws.

I don't think anyone needs semi-automatic rifles that can be easily modified to being an automatic rifle.

I don't think people like my older brother should ever access to a gun considering he's been hospitalized many times for mental illness. Nicest guy you ever want to meet unless he's having an episode. Some people should not be able to own firearms

Just because i want sensible gun laws doesn't mean i want to take away all guns.
 
acbytesla said:
I'm a Democrat and I own a few guns.I'm also for much stronger gun laws.

I don't think anyone needs semi-automatic rifles that can be easily modified to being an automatic rifle.

I don't think people like my older brother should ever access to a gun considering he's been hospitalized many times for mental illness. Nicest guy you ever want to meet unless he's having an episode. Some people should not be able to own firearms

Just because i want sensible gun laws doesn't mean i want to take away all guns.
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No one is disputing that. What is at issue is how are you going to form a coalition with the ones that do want to take guns away around a candidate who can win the primary.
 
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