The GTP Unofficial 2020 US Elections Thread
- Thread starter Sanji Himura
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Joey D
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Basically the NYT is saying that Biden didn't have penetrative sex and that's what counts as sexual misconduct. It's wrong, but that's what its probably going for.
Biden is going to get reamed during the election because you know Trump is going to hammer on this repeatedly.
Biden is going to get reamed during the election because you know Trump is going to hammer on this repeatedly.
DesertPenguin
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Can't really remember an election cycle that wasnt
Danoff
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I dunno... call me an optimist but... I feel like there are some real points of substance to hit Trump on this time around. Definitely poo-flinging from the right. The left could do an entire election on COVID-19 response alone.
Joey D
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I was really hoping Sanders would run as a third party, or at the very least put his support behind a third-party candidate. While I don't agree with Sanders and his policies, I think he probably had the best shot this year to really bolster third-party numbers. But, I guess he figured he'd just support Biden.
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- mustafur
Running 3rd party means Trump wins, and no doubt the media will turn on him hard as well as the powerful who hate Trump.
Without preference voting in every state 3rd party will always win this and it will not have a strong effect in any race to take a leading role.
It sounds emotional satisfying to run as a 3rd party im sure but it doesn't serve anyone.
Without preference voting in every state 3rd party will always win this and it will not have a strong effect in any race to take a leading role.
It sounds emotional satisfying to run as a 3rd party im sure but it doesn't serve anyone.
- 119
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- longshot1314
Third party only splits the vote if a popular candidate abdicates from their party, which as far as I'm aware the only time this ever happened was with Teddy Roosevelt and it effectively handed Wilson the election. This would certainly apply to Sanders if he were to run as an independent. However the examples that get toted as throwing elections like Perot in 1992 and Nader in 2000 weren't actually the case given some of the studies I've seen which indicated that the third party votes were drawn fairly evenly from people who had voted democrat or republican in the previous election with over 60% of the third party votes coming from voters who likely would not have voted otherwise. You can always make the argument that if those voters had been forced to vote for one of the two parties that it may affect the election, but if those voters are choosing to stay home if they can't make that vote it's effectively a moot point. It just gets picked up by the media and propagandized because it threatens the status quo maintained by both parties.
I would like to think this would be a better year to vote third party since Biden's health and some of allegations against him, along with Trump being Trump is a worse match-up than Clinton v. Trump, though I also thought that last time and the third party performance was lackluster, but that also may have been due to the candidates the Greens and Libertarians put up also being relatively lackluster. As far as the leading candidates for the third parties are this year, the ones I've heard is Jacob Hornberger for the Libertarians and Howie Hawkins for the Green Party. One of the comedians I listen to for political news has spoken nothing but praise for Hornberger so there may be potential there. Hawkins has run for governor and other positions here in NY and has some views relatively similar to Sanders. However if the primaries were any indication I sincerely doubt they'd let them anywhere near the debate stage, even if they polled well enough to get there.
Frankly what I dislike is that the polarization the U.S. faces has worked to further entrenched both sides into the view that we'll take anyone from our side as long as it's not the other side. The irony is that if you were to take a decent portion of Sanders voters, non-voters, and people who voted for Trump for sake of voting against the establishment, you probably could create a situation where you could have four viable parties in the U.S. which would do a lot to change the situation were in now for the better since it would likely force candidates to work harder on pleasing their voters rather than their financial backers. Despite what people may say I don't think we will see actual change in the political landscape of the U.S. without having a viable third and possibly fourth party. This election cycle effectively proves that the DNC is always going to go for an establishment candidate. I'd also say, even with including Trump that if you were to look at the last 5 or 6 U.S. presidents, that aside from some differences in social policy and presentation, the overall national situation did not change much if it all based on overall policy. Despite how much the media likes to parrot the DNC taking the high ground, when it's come to policies that have mattered, the DNC has voted right behind Trump (military spending, the present bailout, the patriot act, etc). And if anything Biden's selection proves this, since the DNC made it clear they would take anyone but Sanders, including losing to Trump, though they'll do their best to make it look like they hate Trump and are trying to beat him.
I would like to think this would be a better year to vote third party since Biden's health and some of allegations against him, along with Trump being Trump is a worse match-up than Clinton v. Trump, though I also thought that last time and the third party performance was lackluster, but that also may have been due to the candidates the Greens and Libertarians put up also being relatively lackluster. As far as the leading candidates for the third parties are this year, the ones I've heard is Jacob Hornberger for the Libertarians and Howie Hawkins for the Green Party. One of the comedians I listen to for political news has spoken nothing but praise for Hornberger so there may be potential there. Hawkins has run for governor and other positions here in NY and has some views relatively similar to Sanders. However if the primaries were any indication I sincerely doubt they'd let them anywhere near the debate stage, even if they polled well enough to get there.
Frankly what I dislike is that the polarization the U.S. faces has worked to further entrenched both sides into the view that we'll take anyone from our side as long as it's not the other side. The irony is that if you were to take a decent portion of Sanders voters, non-voters, and people who voted for Trump for sake of voting against the establishment, you probably could create a situation where you could have four viable parties in the U.S. which would do a lot to change the situation were in now for the better since it would likely force candidates to work harder on pleasing their voters rather than their financial backers. Despite what people may say I don't think we will see actual change in the political landscape of the U.S. without having a viable third and possibly fourth party. This election cycle effectively proves that the DNC is always going to go for an establishment candidate. I'd also say, even with including Trump that if you were to look at the last 5 or 6 U.S. presidents, that aside from some differences in social policy and presentation, the overall national situation did not change much if it all based on overall policy. Despite how much the media likes to parrot the DNC taking the high ground, when it's come to policies that have mattered, the DNC has voted right behind Trump (military spending, the present bailout, the patriot act, etc). And if anything Biden's selection proves this, since the DNC made it clear they would take anyone but Sanders, including losing to Trump, though they'll do their best to make it look like they hate Trump and are trying to beat him.
Danoff
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It's not about who wins this election. It's about breaking the two-party system for the next one.
If enough people hadn't had that mindset in 2016 and voted for Trump or Clinton or stayed home, a third party candidate would, right now, have access to the same sources of funding and platforms as Trump and Biden, and giving people a viable third choice. But they didn't, because "that would have just handed the election to [Trump/Clinton]" and they made protest votes or stayed home, perpetuating the douche/turd cycle.
And that doesn't serve anyone.
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- mustafur
But all of that requires money to get word of mouth out, and that money is completely monopolised by the 2 main parties, and even if a 3rd party does imerge without it being in the center of them both, it's just going to vote split one side to an easy victory.
Say Bernie runs 3rd party, he will vote Split democrats for an Easy GOP victory, and he is too old to run again so what momentum can he bring honestly?
Without a proper voting system, it's swimming up a waterfall going 3rd party.
It's significantly easier to push the party in the direction you want via the primary process even though it's not easy, not at all but by doing this atleast people understand that you exist.
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Only 55% of eligible voters took part in 2016. It’s not just a problem amongst younger voters.
I also can’t help but feel like statements like yours are contributing to that problem. After all why bother voting when you just get told voting for the person you actually want to vote for is just wasting a vote?
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- mustafur
Sure it could be a reason but it's a reason of one, not all.
There is many other problems with 3rd parties outside of that, including implementation, the senate/House, Media coverage, name recognition(alot of which requires a primary run in a main party to establish).
And the minor problem of you can't push to the left or right of what is there without the vote split.
You don't need to be told that your wasting a vote, with first past the post the majority is wasting their vote.
The point in my statement is that the younger demographic across the board has less voting percentage, it could be for a variety of reasons such as accessibility or the like but it happens and it's incredibly consistent.
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- 86,713
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Cool. So what? Hard things aren't worth doing?
It's hard because too many people display the attitude that you do - that there's no point because it will divide the vote and Douche/Turd will get in, so rather than voting for a third party and breaking the cycle for the next election they vote for the person "opposite" the person they don't want to get in and bitch for four years and bitch about the candidates the next time when they could have done something about it four years previously..
As I said, it's not about this election, but about breaking the two-part system for the next election, so you aren't faced with douche/turd next time. Though this doesn't seem to be getting through.
Dotini
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It may be easier to get a 3rd party - or Independent - presidential candidate elected than it would be to have a 3 party system fully in place.
Teddy Roosevelt with his Progressive or "Bull Moose" party in1912 and Ross Perot's 1996 run with his Reform Party failed to get even close to election, and the parties they stood for soon foundered and disappeared.
With a Congress seated with 3 or more parties, majority votes required for legislation or confirmations might be harder to come by. The nation might be harder to govern, less dynamic, and less responsive to evolving global problems and public demands. In short, an America with 3 or more parties could be crippled and enfeebled in enterprise and progress. While this might be desirable for the rest of the world, it's probably not what most Americans have in mind.
Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell were unpleasant persons but valued as racing drivers.
Presidents are not elected because they are pleasant persons, able scientists or doctors. They are elected to provide peace and prosperity, and that's it. Jimmy Carter was a very pleasant man, but an ineffectual President.
Teddy Roosevelt with his Progressive or "Bull Moose" party in1912 and Ross Perot's 1996 run with his Reform Party failed to get even close to election, and the parties they stood for soon foundered and disappeared.
With a Congress seated with 3 or more parties, majority votes required for legislation or confirmations might be harder to come by. The nation might be harder to govern, less dynamic, and less responsive to evolving global problems and public demands. In short, an America with 3 or more parties could be crippled and enfeebled in enterprise and progress. While this might be desirable for the rest of the world, it's probably not what most Americans have in mind.
Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell were unpleasant persons but valued as racing drivers.
Presidents are not elected because they are pleasant persons, able scientists or doctors. They are elected to provide peace and prosperity, and that's it. Jimmy Carter was a very pleasant man, but an ineffectual President.
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- longshot1314
I'm not sure if majority issue would be as pronounced as one might think if it's coming down to simple yay/nay votes in passing legislation since the legislation itself would still be a binary vote. One of the problems with our present system is that with only two main parties it enhances polarization and there's not much room for overlap. With say four parties (Green, Dem, Libertarian, Rep), it's likely there would be ideological overlap and this would likely promote more collaboration when seeking to pass legislation, as well as improve accountability since there would be a greater likelihood of people shifting parties.
The issue with Teddy and Perot is they both founded their own parties to run, so neither party had been established within the political system up until that point, and thereby lived and died by their candidates success. At present the Green and Libertarian parties have been around long enough and are well established enough where they feasibly have a better chance of changing the system, and both parties have overlap with the main line parties in terms of ideology.
The issue with Teddy and Perot is they both founded their own parties to run, so neither party had been established within the political system up until that point, and thereby lived and died by their candidates success. At present the Green and Libertarian parties have been around long enough and are well established enough where they feasibly have a better chance of changing the system, and both parties have overlap with the main line parties in terms of ideology.
Dotini
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Ayrton Senna and Nigel Mansell were unpleasant persons but valued as racing drivers.
Presidents are not elected because they are pleasant persons, able scientists or doctors. They are elected to provide peace and prosperity, and that's it. Jimmy Carter was a very pleasant man, but an ineffectual President.
If the US were a V-8, it's running with a stuck valve, bad rings, contaminated oil and water in the gas.
Presidents are not elected because they are pleasant persons, able scientists or doctors. They are elected to provide peace and prosperity, and that's it. Jimmy Carter was a very pleasant man, but an ineffectual President.
Obviously at present we have our problems.
If the US were a V-8, it's running with a stuck valve, bad rings, contaminated oil and water in the gas.
Dotini
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Our enemy, the novel coronavirus, has crippled our economy, navy, social life and only added new problems for our politics. At the moment, we don't need any drag races. What we need is tractors, harvesters and trucks to keep running. We need to work together because we are at war, and the path to victory is only dimly in view.
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