2020 Democratic Candidates Tracker

[angrysoba]

He is trying to raise his profile this week.

Okay, good answer. Now, why would he be your candidate?

 

[varwoche]

I can't believe Beto has to apologize for a throwaway line about how he helped his wife raise the kids. Seriously, no normal people care about that.

Similarly, how abnormal do you have to be to care about stories he wrote when he was 15?

This is manufactured outrage of the highest level.

When they scrape this low, it goes to show how worried some people are about his candidacy.

 

[The Atheist]

This is manufactured outrage of the highest level.

Well, he's done very nicely in the early donation stakes, beating Sanders' first 24-hour total.
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I do love the way US politics is dominated by how much money one raises. Isn't that how you got Trump as President?

I see Kamala Harris is [rightly] being attacked for her lack of action on Herbalife.

There is no way in the world the fact that her husband worked for Herbalife's lawyers had anything to do with her not chasing one of the worst, most insidious and longest-lived pyramid schemes in the world.

Seems perfectly legit to me that this woman refused to take action against a company that exploits the bottom rung of the socio-economic ladder.

Jesus H Christ, Dems, you have to do a lot better than this.

How can you show yourself as a genuine alternative to the Republicans when one of the leading runners is supping from the same trough as Betsy De Vos' husband? If Herbalife goes down, so does Amway.

Words fail me at just how spectacularly stupid the people running the Democratic Party are.

Just waiting for Uncle Joe - surely the timing is good for this weekend, Joe?

Do it, man. Just do it.

 

[theprestige]

Well, he's done very nicely in the early donation stakes, beating Sanders' first 24-hour total.
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I do love the way US politics is dominated by how much money one raises. Isn't that how you got Trump as President?

Nope. Trump raised and spent only a fraction of what Hillary did. It's actually a pretty good case study about the diminishing returns of raising more campaign funds. There are many others as well. US politics at all levels tend to be about raising enough to get into the game. But the winner of the game is quite often *not* the one who raised the most.

 

[JoeMorgue]

That and there's a trend to see "The candidate that raised more money won" when it's not cause and effect, it's two causes with the same effect.

The more popular a candidate is more money and votes they are going to get. One is not causing the other.

It's not an exact science you have to factor in things like what demographics the supporters come from but it's definitely there.

 

[theprestige]

That and there's a trend to see "The candidate that raised more money won" when it's not cause and effect, it's two causes with the same effect.

The more popular a candidate is more money and votes they are going to get. One is not causing the other.

It's not an exact science you have to factor in things like what demographics the supporters come from but it's definitely there.

It also depends where the money comes from. Getting lots of money from a few large donors has very different vote-getting implications than getting lots of money from lots of small donors.

One candidate can go around to Wall Street types and wealthy philanthropists and say, "my campaign has a fantastic vote-getting machine. It just needs fuel to run, and that fuel is your donations. Give me enough money, and I'll get all the votes. All of them." In this scenario, the amount of money raised may or may not map to more votes - it depends on how good the candidate's machine actually is.

Another candidate can go around to the masses and say, "vote for me - and send a few dollars my way, to keep my campaign going!" In this scenario, the amount of money raised is much more closely related to the amount of votes the candidate can reasonably estimate.

In practice, it seems like most candidates go for a mix of both - a well-funded vote-getting machine sponsored by large donors, and raising many small donations from direct appeals to likely voters. And of course money is fungible, so the exact degree of distinction between the two is probably irrelevant anyway.

 

[phiwum]

I can't believe Beto has to apologize for a throwaway line about how he helped his wife raise the kids. Seriously, no normal people care about that.

Agreed. His comments about his wife doing most of the child rearing are probably true, given his schedule, mentioned with humility rather than an air of arrogance, and really nothing to give a damn about.

I'm not particularly a fan of Beto so far. I don't think that the kerfluffle over his child rearing comments makes much sense.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

This is probably the worst time for political coverage of the primary. Several people have announced, but it's too early for any serious discussion to have started. All the coverage is pretty meaningless and all the polls are basically just name recognition. Reporters need to fill the time, but I don't really take any of the reporting that seriously.

 

[BobTheCoward]

Okay, good answer. Now, why would he be your candidate?

Since I can't pick a candidate in policy views, it is more like a job interview: academic (and interest in learning) achievement, professional experience, and ability to communicate and not be a poopy head with the people you work and supervise. If his Vox performance was a job interview, I would hire him.

 

[mgidm86]

Agreed. His comments about his wife doing most of the child rearing are probably true, given his schedule, mentioned with humility rather than an air of arrogance, and really nothing to give a damn about.

I'm not particularly a fan of Beto so far. I don't think that the kerfluffle over his child rearing comments makes much sense.

Agreed. Don't know much about him but it's a silly thing to complain about. He should have told everyone to grow up.

Nobody is good enough to be elected in todays society. The finger-pointers rule. I'm a little disturbed by his fiction writing, though he was fifteen I think. Isn't that when serial killers start killing small animals though? It's a pretty sickening story. It goes a little further than just running over children.

I don't see him getting very far.

 

[JoeMorgue]

I'm not particularly a fan of Beto so far. I don't think that the kerfluffle over his child rearing comments makes much sense.

It makes perfect sense. It was a case of probing the defense, seeing how he would react to criticism to see how much effort should be put into digging up / making up dirt on him.

 

[acbytesla]

Agreed. Don't know much about him but it's a silly thing to complain about. He should have told everyone to grow up.

Nobody is good enough to be elected in todays society. The finger-pointers rule. I'm a little disturbed by his fiction writing, though he was fifteen I think. Isn't that when serial killers start killing small animals though? It's a pretty sickening story. It goes a little further than just running over children.

I don't see him getting very far.

I'm not a big fan of his at the moment not because of the silliness of this nonsense but because all I've heard out him so far is Kumbyyah and pablum. I want to hear what his positions are beyond the immigration issue which to me is a non-issue.

But it is way too early to judge how far he can go. If he does win the nomination though, I think he'll trounce the 75 year old orange turd.

 

[Brainster]

Beto beato Bernie Sanders in first day fundraising:

Six million bucks overnight is impressive and anyone who says otherwise doesn’t understand the game,” said Kirk Wagar, a former top Barack Obama donor who is backing Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.).

 

[angrysoba]

Well, he's done very nicely in the early donation stakes, beating Sanders' first 24-hour total.
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I do love the way US politics is dominated by how much money one raises. Isn't that how you got Trump as President?

Huh? I got Trump in the same way that you got Trump. We all got a case of the Trumps, but I’m not from the US, so I can say without hyperbole that he is not my president.

And when it comes to funding, he benefited more from “hacking the media”. He knew as he knows now, how to get good ratings even if he does so by being outrageous or being perceived as outrageous. The news networks could not keep their eyes off what they assumed was a car-crash campaign.

Nope. Trump raised and spent only a fraction of what Hillary did. It's actually a pretty good case study about the diminishing returns of raising more campaign funds. There are many others as well. US politics at all levels tend to be about raising enough to get into the game. But the winner of the game is quite often *not* the one who raised the most.

There was a Freakonomics podcast on this:
http://freakonomics.com/2012/01/12/does-money-really-buy-elections-a-new-marketplace-podcast/

Basically, as JoeMorgue points out, donors want to back winners. People generally wanted to give more money to Hillary than Trumo because they thought she was going to win. The causal arrow may even go the other way then - winning (or the appearance of it) causes money. Money doesn’t cause winning.

 

[Delvo]

Another issue with Trump & Hillary was that they already knew that Hillary takes big money and votes accordingly but didn't know one way or another about Trump yet.

Similarly, comparing dollar amounts ignores another important distinction: the difference between a dozen $100,000 donors and a hundred-thousand $12 donors. (Bernie's method tends toward the latter; it looks as if Beto's method was probably more like the former but he's not releasing all of the data.)

 

[Foolmewunz]

As we learned in 2016, the "Who's Got The Biggest War Chest" can only get you so far in prognosticating. Trump had no money in the game, but he got millions and millions of dollars in 24/7 coverage from not just the Murdoch Minions but from the mainstream media.

If a candidate can get the right amount of outrage and appeal going, and that's rare, the money will follow.

 

[Aridas]

Mayor Pete did a few appearances lately. Anyone coming around to him? He would be my candidate if I were a democrat.

I like him. I'd like to see more of him in the future. I'm not sold about him being the best of the candidates, though, especially when it comes to dealing with the Republicans in Congress. Still, from what I've seen so far, I'd definitely pick him over Beto and Biden, though, so that's a decent start for him.

I can't believe Beto has to apologize for a throwaway line about how he helped his wife raise the kids. Seriously, no normal people care about that.

Similarly, how abnormal do you have to be to care about stories he wrote when he was 15?

This is manufactured outrage of the highest level.

I saw that and... it really looked like nothing more than throwing a bone to the right-wingers who got outraged at Kavanaugh's yearbook coming into play at all, nevermind that it was coming into play specifically because of the claims at hand that were from that time period.

 

[Travis]

Another issue with Trump & Hillary was that they already knew that Hillary takes big money and votes accordingly but didn't know one way or another about Trump yet.

Similarly, comparing dollar amounts ignores another important distinction: the difference between a dozen $100,000 donors and a hundred-thousand $12 donors. (Bernie's method tends toward the latter; it looks as if Beto's method was probably more like the former but he's not releasing all of the data.)

What?

 

[Brainster]

I can't believe Beto has to apologize for a throwaway line about how he helped his wife raise the kids. Seriously, no normal people care about that.

The throwaway line was about how little he helps his wife raise the kids. I think the issue is that he makes a joke out of it. Granted, in a way it's self-deprecating, but it's in a typical white-male way--talk about your wifey raising the kids.

Similarly, how abnormal do you have to be to care about stories he wrote when he was 15?

This is manufactured outrage of the highest level.

In general, I agree, especially since we know how he turned out. But with the current hysteria over school shootings, suppose for a moment that some kid today wrote those things and it became public? I think the calls for him to be preventively locked up or at least subjected to lots of scrutiny would be quite evident.

 

[Brainster]

I like him. I'd like to see more of him in the future. I'm not sold about him being the best of the candidates, though, especially when it comes to dealing with the Republicans in Congress. Still, from what I've seen so far, I'd definitely pick him over Beto and Biden, though, so that's a decent start for him.

He has apparently qualified for the initial debate on the fundraising grounds:

Buttigieg, who is exploring a White House bid but has not officially announced a campaign, announced Saturday that his team had received more than 76,000 individual donations, passing the 65,000 individual threshold set by the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

I saw that and... it really looked like nothing more than throwing a bone to the right-wingers who got outraged at Kavanaugh's yearbook coming into play at all, nevermind that it was coming into play specifically because of the claims at hand that were from that time period.

What? You can't seriously think Beto's throwing any bones to the right-wingers at this point in the campaign?