US Presidential election 2016

[Martino Knockavelli]

I'm wondering at what point the Trump bubble bursts. It has to, surely? Deep down even his supporters must know he'd be a terrible president?

A mop-coiffed, affectedly eccentric (scare quotes), foot-in-mouthed son of privilege parleying buffoonish TV appearances into a position of power?

It'll never happen.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

u tend to feel boris is a smart, media-savvy dude playing to an image. trump genuinely seems a bit dim

 

[Alty]

i'd be really interested in a study on how america became so rightwing. also how the left-right dichotomy transitioned between republican-monarchist, to democracy-non democracy to communism-capitalism. guess it's more traditionalist-pragmatic now

I suppose there's a common view in the US, albeit often subconscious, that people or their antecedents journeyed to America to 'escape' Governments elsewhere. As long as people can have their own house and worship their own God they want the state to stay the fuck away from them.

It's understandable to a certain extent, I guess. Doesn't make for a particularly fair or equitable society though.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

The right wing in the US is brilliant at nurturing a radical fringe that demands respect while also dragging the political centre kicking and screaming further to the right. There's also, you know, the fact that political bribes are basically legal in the US now. Corporations are people my friend, and money is now speech, so they can spend unlimited funds to support campaigns as long as there is no direct orchestration with the candidate (which there obviously but unprovably is).

 

[Alty]

I've watched the first hour or so of the debate. Will catch the rest tonight (I know how to have a good Friday night).

Carly Fiorina has been the stand-out performer so far. Genuinely quite impressed.

Trump being his usual awful self. The nadir was probably when he picked on Rand Paul for being ugly. Totally random.

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

It's worth it. Fiorina really hits her stride in hour 7 or 8, with her doctrine of ZERO TAXES and TOTAL WAR WITH EVERYONE BAD ALL THE TIME FOREVER.

And I won't spoil it for you, but the exchange between world class paediatric neurosurgeon Ben Carson and noted autism/vaccines expert Donald Trump during hour 14 is a doozy.

 

[HertsWolf]

u tend to feel boris is a smart, media-savvy dude playing to an image. trump genuinely seems a bit dim

Don't you believe it. Trump knows exactly what he is doing. As with any election, he doesn't need to appeal to vast swathes of the electorate. He just knows he has to be looney enough to appeal to the mid-West (the party of the country that understands what Sarah Palin says when she opens her mouth) in the primaries. Then when he is chosen, he only has to appeal to the critical margins.

American election campaigns are broadly about raising billions of dollars to persuade three old guys in Kansas to vote one way or the other. Almost.

But it's still absolutely the best election money can buy.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

I don't believe for a second that Donald Trump has any intention of becoming US president. His approach to this has been the same as his approach to everything since his name became sellable, and that's all he's doing, selling his name. I would be amazed if this was all some genius campaign strategy, and not just Trump going out there under absolutely no pressure and saying all the crude and outrageous shit that the hard right conservatives would love to say themselves.

 

[Tilbury]

Bernie's been stagnating in the polls in the last few months or so but he was well received in the democrats tv debate last night.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ep..._democratic_presidential_nomination-3824.html

 

[Alty]

Just watched it. Sanders was very good but I thought Clinton had a good night too. I actually thought O'Malley did quite well and can now see why people were tipping him to do better when he first announced his candidacy.

Webb and Chafee...Jesus Christ. Absolutely dreadful. Why are they even bothering?

"Why did you vote that way?"

"I was new to the Senate and my Dad had just died."

Are you fucking joking?

 

[Tilbury]

Carson has just about over taken the lead in the polls with 24.8% to Trumps 24.6%. Rubio on 11% with Cruz and Bush on 8.8% and 5.8%. He's less of a nutter than Trump I suppose but wouldn't fancy him to do much against any of the Democrat. Thankfully he doesn't think aliens built the pyramids. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...e?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013&section=politics

In the other race Clinton is on 54.8% and Bernie has 32.5%. Still plenty of time to go and I'm confident he can do it.

https://vine.co/v/eLqL2wxJYqm

 

[HertsWolf]

Carson has just about over taken the lead in the polls with 24.8% to Trumps 24.6%. Rubio on 11% with Cruz and Bush on 8.8% and 5.8%. He's less of a nutter than Trump I suppose but wouldn't fancy him to do much against any of the Democrat. Thankfully he doesn't think aliens built the pyramids. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...e?ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000013&section=politics

In the other race Clinton is on 54.8% and Bernie has 32.5%. Still plenty of time to go and I'm confident he can do it.

https://vine.co/v/eLqL2wxJYqm

The alien concept is probably better than saying each pyramid was essentially an ancient Lidl store though.

Given we have already had a number of absolute lunatic US presidents, surely one more isn't particularly worrying.

 

[G-Dragon]

Not a single candidate looks President material. I would rather re-elect Obama

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

If no-one else minds I would like to use this thread as a virtual storage facility for one of my very favourite genres of paracinema - bat shit insane American campaign ads.

The Choice by John Bel Edwards for Louisiana

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

got u beat

 

[Martino Knockavelli]

Highlights of 16 hours (!) of raw Ted Cruz footage uploaded to an old YouTube account to circumvent rules about candidates working with Super PACs.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/02/politics/ted-cruz-campaign-ad/

 

[Dave-Vale]

Surely Donald Trump isn't going to have a chance? Surely? The man is a joke act isn't he?

 

[mnb089mnb]

Highlights of 16 hours (!) of raw Ted Cruz footage uploaded to an old YouTube account to circumvent rules about candidates working with Super PACs.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/12/02/politics/ted-cruz-campaign-ad/

I started flagging at hour 11. It's not an easy watch.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

Highlights of 16 hours

is this like an online equivalent of the filibuster

 

[blade1889]

Surely Donald Trump isn't going to have a chance? Surely? The man is a joke act isn't he?

I want to know how he's planning on enforcing Muslims not flying to the states. Do all passengers have to draw a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed before getting onto a plain? If you refuse then you're a Muslim and cant travel?

Or maybe he'll just ban all brown people?

Cant believe the guy is still a front-runner, even by republican standards. Was reading a BBC article on how everytime people think he's gone too far he comes out stronger from it...so wouldn't bet that this latest thing has done him in.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

would be great if we banned americans travelling here in response

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

I want to know how he's planning on enforcing Muslims not flying to the states. Do all passengers have to draw a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed before getting onto a plain? If you refuse then you're a Muslim and cant travel?

Or maybe he'll just ban all brown people?

Cant believe the guy is still a front-runner, even by republican standards. Was reading a BBC article on how everytime people think he's gone too far he comes out stronger from it...so wouldn't bet that this latest thing has done him in.

In the primaries they all try and out-conservative one another, then simmer down afterwards. He's just turned that up to eleven. The Democrats must be loving this.

 

[HertsWolf]

The Democrats must be loving this.

As probably do the other Republican candidates. He gives them an unusual platform to seem responsible.

 

[Alty]

In the primaries they all try and out-conservative one another, then simmer down afterwards. He's just turned that up to eleven. The Democrats must be loving this.

Remember when one aspect of being conservative was demonstrating good manners? Oh for those days again.

As probably do the other Republican candidates. He gives them an unusual platform to seem responsible.

I'm not so sure. Jeb Bush in particular has had his campaign completely derailed by a failure to stand up to Trump. Comments about Bush "lacking testosterone" and accusations of being too soft on illegal immigration due to the influence of his hispanic wife have really stuck with a lot of Republican voters, including those who don't actually support Trump.

On a more general point, the shift in American politics in a generation is quite incredible. Bipartisanship was seen for years as a real positive over there. Politicians who could "get things done", even if it meant working with representatives of other parties and none, were the most respected. The adversarial nature of British politics was anathema to a lot of Americans. And yet now they have an electorate that's so polarised. It's fucking insane.

 

[AFCB_Mark]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/12/08/donald_trump_wants_bill_gates_to_close_the_internet/

“We are losing a lot of people to the Internet. We have to do something. We have to go see Bill Gates and a lot of different people that really understand what's happening.”
“We have to talk to them [about], maybe in certain areas, closing that internet up in some way.”

Would love to be a fly on the wall in Gates' office when he gets to hear about this 'idea'

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

Torpedoing himself there. Never attack the internet.

 

[blade1889]

in a very typical american way I can imagine that idea doing more harm to his presidency bid that his previous comments.

 

[Tilbury]

Haha, I really hope Trump continues and gets the nomination. Will be a complete landslide victory for the Democrats.

 

[mnb089mnb]

Torpedoing himself there. Never attack the internet.

Never enrage a geek in possession of a meme.

 

[Tilbury]

in a very typical american way I can imagine that idea doing more harm to his presidency bid that his previous comments.

Quite probably. Won't affect his Republican nomination one bit though, most of his supporters are old and uneducated so the internet is probably as foreign to them as 'the Muslims'.