Presidential Race 2016

[Patch]

9 minutes ago, newtogolf said:

It's 2100 respondents, not a true representation of the general population.  Let's see what happens now that Trump can focus on the national election and not fighting his own team.   

Untill the GOP bigs wigs publically backs  Trump, he will still be fighting his own party. 

Edited May 4, 2016 by Patch

[newtogolf]

8 minutes ago, Chilli Dipper said:

Even if Trump loses in a landslide, we've emboldened every hateful idiot who has been rightfully excluded from public discourse to feel entitled to be taken seriously.

I hope you guys are proud of yourselves.

I'll take Trump over a socialist, sorry.  

[Chilli Dipper]

1 minute ago, newtogolf said:

I'll take Trump over a socialist, sorry.  

I'm not so convinced there's a difference.

[newtogolf]

5 minutes ago, Chilli Dipper said:

I'm not so convinced there's a difference.

How so?

[Chilli Dipper]

19 minutes ago, Patch said:

Untill the GOP bigs wigs publically backs  Trump, he will still be fighting his own party. 

Ultimately, Trump prevailed not by winning over conservatives, but by engaging usually apolitical Americans with a right-wing populist message in sufficient numbers to overwhelm the fractured GOP base. I'm not sure how he or the party proceeds now.

The rhetoric Trump has used to win the nomination is toxic in a general, especially considering the messenger's abrasiveness could convince every eligible voter who even slightly dislikes him to vote for the Democrat in November. But, if he is convinced by the party to moderate his message, will the archetypal Trump voter -- "I was never interested in politics, but I'm with Donald all the way" -- continue to support him, or will he be discarded as a lying bastard like all other politicians?

I think it's interesting that one of the Koch brothers (who have bankrolled the Republican takeover of state governments nationwide in recent years) gave an interview recently, where he said he may end up supporting Hillary Clinton, depending how the primaries unfolded. The brothers ultimately didn't put their money into the GOP race, but they were very high on Ted Cruz when the election cycle began. If you're reading between the lines, it implies that the largest donor to GOP candidates wants nothing to do with Donald Trump. That could be a problem in down ballot races.

[RandallT]

http://fivethirtyeight.com/ doesn't miss too many forecasts, but they missed this one on the Dem side. They also had Clinton with 99% chance in Michigan a while back, but Bernie beat here there.

Projections (Clinton will win Indiana 54-43):

 

Actual results (Sanders wins Indiana 52.5-47.5). But note Clinton gets 43 delegates from IN, Sanders 42:

[Chilli Dipper]

1 hour ago, newtogolf said:

How so?

He hasn't said much that shows he cares that much for individuals' freedoms, or whether free enterprise exists only to serve the interests of the state. Capitalism and authoritarianism make awkward bedfellows.

[Dave2512]

Clinton isn't worried about IN, didn't spend much $ there. She started looking past Sanders a couple weeks ago. Cruz dropping out is big news but the democratic race hasn't been close. Sanders and his massive donation defibrillator have kept it on the shelf way beyond the expiration date. 

[Chilli Dipper]

12 minutes ago, Dave2512 said:

Clinton isn't worried about IN, didn't spend much $ there. She started looking past Sanders a couple weeks ago. Cruz dropping out is big news but the democratic race hasn't been close. Sanders and his massive donation defibrillator have kept it on the shelf way beyond the expiration date. 

If the GOP used Democratic delegate rules, a brokered convention would have been guaranteed; if the Dems used Republican delegate rules, Hillary would have wrapped up the nomination weeks ago.

[Golfingdad]

2 hours ago, newtogolf said:

I'll take Trump over a socialist, sorry.  

Apology accepted. :P

1 hour ago, RandallT said:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/ doesn't miss too many forecasts, but they missed this one on the Dem side. They also had Clinton with 99% chance in Michigan a while back, but Bernie beat here there.

Projections (Clinton will win Indiana 54-43):

 

Actual results (Sanders wins Indiana 52.5-47.5). But note Clinton gets 43 delegates from IN, Sanders 42:

Can somebody do an ELI5 on super delegates?  How exactly does Sanders win and lose at once?

[RandallT]

5 hours ago, Golfingdad said:

Apology accepted. :P

Can somebody do an ELI5 on super delegates?  How exactly does Sanders win and lose at once?

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/superdelegates-might-not-save-hillary-clinton/

Quote

If you look at a Democratic delegate tracker like this one from The New York Times, you’ll find that Hillary Clinton has a massive 394-44 delegate lead over Bernie Sanders so far, despite having been walloped by Sanders in New Hampshire and only essentially having tied him in Iowa. While Sanders does have a modest 36-32 lead among elected delegates — those that are bound to the candidates based on the results of voting in primaries and caucuses — Clinton leads 362-8 among superdelegates, who are Democratic elected officials and other party insiders allowed to support whichever candidate they like.

If you’re a Sanders supporter, you might think this seems profoundly unfair. And you’d be right: It’s profoundly unfair. Superdelegates were created in part to give Democratic party elites the opportunity to put their finger on the scale and prevent nominations like those of George McGovern in 1972 or Jimmy Carter in 1976, which displeased party insiders.

Here’s the consolation, however. Unlike elected delegates, superdelegates are unbound to any candidate even on the first ballot. They can switch whenever they like, and some of them probably will switch to Sanders if heextends his winning streak into more diverse states and eventually appears to have more of a mandate than Clinton among Democratic voters.

Clinton knows this all too well; it’s exactly what happened to her in 2008 during her loss to Barack Obama. According to the website Democratic Convention Watch,¹ Clinton began with a substantial advantage in superdelegates, leading Obama 154 to 50 when New Hampshire voted on Jan. 8, 2008. Obama narrowed his deficit in February and March, however, and overtook Clinton in superdelegates in mid-May. By the time Clinton ended her campaign on June 7, 2008, Obama had nearly a 2-to-1 superdelegate advantage over her.

But how close would the outcome have to be for superdelegates to tip the nomination to Clinton? You can find that calculation in the table below.

How far can superdelegates get you?

IF A CANDIDATE HAS THIS PERCENTAGE OF ELECTED DELEGATES …	… SHE NEEDS THIS PERCENTAGE OF SUPERDELEGATES TO WIN THE NOMINATION
58.8%	0.0%
55.0	21.6
52.5	35.8
50.0	50.1
47.5	64.3
45.0	78.5
41.2	100.0

Superdelegates are mathematically relevant when a candidate has 41.2 percent to 58.8 percent of elected delegates. Below that range, a candidate couldn’t win a first-ballot majority even with the votes of every superdelegate; above that range, the superdelegates’ help wouldn’t be necessary to clinch the nomination.

 

[saevel25]

An interesting take on taking the cost of advertisement time and using that to project what the free publicity is for the candidates due to media bias.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/upshot/measuring-donald-trumps-mammoth-advantage-in-free-media.html?_r=0

 

[Braivo]

10 hours ago, saevel25 said:

That isn't a nice number 

 

These types of polls are meaningless. In 5 months many things will have changed. A good chunk of the GOP hated Romney and McCain, yet they grit their teeth and voted for them anyway. The same will be true of Trump, and he will get crossover votes from the dems because of his liberal social stance. 

10 hours ago, Patch said:

Just read that Cruz dropped out of the race when he lost Indiana. However Trump is not guanteed the nomination.  

It's over. The chairman of the RNC has called it. That's as official as it gets. 

10 hours ago, Chilli Dipper said:

Even if Trump loses in a landslide, we've emboldened every hateful idiot who has been rightfully excluded from public discourse to feel entitled to be taken seriously.

I hope you guys are proud of yourselves.

Quite proud, actually. I saw this win coming way before most, and I showed my support for him when it was quite literally dangerous to do so. Damn right I'm proud. 

The same people claiming that "Trump can't beat Hillary" also claimed he had zero chance to win the GOP nomination. Think about that for a moment. He has wrapped up his party's nomination BEFORE Hillary wrapped up hers. He is going to destroy her and win in a landslide. This nation is waking up. 

[newtogolf]

1 hour ago, saevel25 said:

An interesting take on taking the cost of advertisement time and using that to project what the free publicity is for the candidates due to media bias.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/16/upshot/measuring-donald-trumps-mammoth-advantage-in-free-media.html?_r=0

 

I heard Cruz campaign people whining about this topic last night.  Bill O'Reilly had the best answer, Trump got the press coverage and air time because he was "making" news.  

The "dumb", "racist", "sexist", "xenophobic" and "outrageous" statements Trump made throughout his campaign warranted news coverage and it kept his name in the headlines and on the teasers for all news outlets.  

Trump spent the least amount of money and by far received the most news coverage and air time of all the candidates.  O'Reilly also blamed the other candidates for refusing to come onto his show and other Fox shows out of fear they might become part of the Trump circus.  

The campaign coordinator for Cruz admitted they miscalculated the push he was getting from news coverage until it was too late but still blamed the media for covering Trump to the level they did.

[Braivo]

2 minutes ago, newtogolf said:

I heard Cruz campaign people whining about this topic last night.  Bill O'Reilly had the best answer, Trump got the press coverage and air time because he was "making" news.  

The "dumb", "racist", "sexist", "xenophobic" and "outrageous" statements Trump made throughout his campaign warranted news coverage and it kept his name in the headlines and on the teasers for all news outlets.  

Trump spent the least amount of money and by far received the most news coverage and air time of all the candidates.  O'Reilly also blamed the other candidates for refusing to come onto his show and other Fox shows out of fear they might become part of the Trump circus.  

The campaign coordinator for Cruz admitted they miscalculated the push he was getting from news coverage until it was too late but still blamed the media for covering Trump to the level they did.

Some of us could see this coming months ahead of time. When people would come to me (knowing I supported Trump) and tell me "did you hear what he said about xyz?" I would always respond with "well, people are talking about him, aren't they?" 

He played the media brilliantly, now he will sit down with Megyn Kelly in a few weeks, both of whom are far more popular from their little fight than they ever would have been without it. Brilliant. 

He's already playing Hillary too, she is tweeting out that "woman card" and "kindness trumps hate" stuff that only makes his case stronger. 

[Patch]

The popular vote means little right now for Trump. He now needs to focus on those 270 electoral votes needed to win potus. All potus candidates do this once nominated. 

Myself I am happy Trump has won his party's nomination. This shows a positive change in American politics. 

[newtogolf]

A different take on Trump

 

[Golfingdad]

3 hours ago, RandallT said:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/superdelegates-might-not-save-hillary-clinton/

 

I see.  Thanks!