Clinton Takes Ohio, Texas; McCain Seals The Deal

You can read it pretty much anywhere, but Clinton took Ohio and Texas meaning that the democratic primaries are far from over. Unlike the Dems, McCain has locked his nomination for the Republicans by breaking the 1,191 delegates necessary. So there it is. Talk amongst yourselves.

Nash Equilibrium

[eldavojohn (898314)]

Clinton and Obama continue to fight over who's winning the Democratic nomination and meanwhile they become uglier as they turn on each other. Reminds me of Nash equilibrium [wikipedia.org]:

In game theory, the Nash equilibrium (named after John Forbes Nash, who proposed it) is a solution concept of a game involving two or more players, in which no player has anything to gain by changing only his or her own strategy unilaterally. If each player has chosen a strategy and no player can benefit by changing his or her strategy while the other players keep theirs unchanged, then the current set of strategy choices and the corresponding payoffs constitute a Nash equilibrium.

I cringe every time I hear either of them say something even mildly attacking the other--couldn't they agree to just stick to their own personal views and rely on those to win the nomination? But I guess that's politics.

It never ceases to amuse me how McCain supporters will paint Clinton & Obama as hardcore Democrats and call McCain a moderate conservative while Clinton & Obama supporters paint McCain as a hardcore Republican and argue their candidate being a moderate liberal. Because they know the moderate will garner the most votes. I guess one thing they're split on should be the war though if McCain's smart, he'll promise to remain strong in our fight yet distance himself from Bush's attitude towards it (somehow).

I keep hearing people telling me that I shouldn't worry, that everyone's fed up with the war and it's time for a change--there's no way the Democrats could lose this one! Unfortunately, it's shaping up to be all too much like the last election which left me pretty dissappointed, especially in retrospect. Well, at least Clinton & Obama aren't as stoic, wealthy and lifeless as Kerry was. One thing's for sure, I would gladly welcome McCain over Bush as president any day even if people call him a maverick senator.

Re:Nash Equilibrium

[Da Fokka (94074)]

The reason negative campaigning is used so much is basically because it works, no matter how much people hate it. Negative emotions tend to be more salient than positive emotions. In Dutch there is a saying 'Vertrouwen komt te voet en gaat te paard', which can be roughly translated as 'Trust arrives in little steps but leaves with large strides'. Politicians have to make a lot of good impressions to counteract a single bad impression.

I agree with your assessment that the Democrats will have a real challenge, regardless of the candidate they choose. McCain does not really suffer from the huge impopularity of president Bush as much as the other republican candidates (bar Ron Paul) would have. He's got some character, everyone from left to right has to respect a guy who survived five years of torture. And the republicans can start organizing while the Democrats are in disarray. I'm really rooting for Obama but it looks like there will be no Democratic candidate until the convention.

I'm for the liger party

[Himring (646324)]

vote pedro....

Expect a Clinton surge per the Republicans

[JustASlashDotGuy (905444)]

Now that McCain has clinched the nod, expect all those that would have voted for McCain 'when it mattered' to now vote for Clinton when possible. Clinton is by far the easier candidate to beat and everyone knows it. It's very possible the republicans are what helped Clinton win in the Texas primary.

We will now see McCain attacking Obama, Clinton attacking Obama, and republicans voting for Clinton all at once. I hope Obama is up for the fight.

Re:Expect a Clinton surge per the Republicans

[spleen_blender (949762)]

Not in Texas and Ohio, hence OPEN PRIMARIES.

Carry on.

Re:Expect a Clinton surge per the Republicans

[sentientbrendan (316150)]

>I'm not at all certain that Obama is the tougher candidate to beat
>-- he's looked good so far, but that's partially because the press
>hasn't been hounding him. That's beginning to change.

Obama's strength in beating Mccain is tactical in nature and has nothing to do with "how the press is treating him."

Obama and Hilary are extremely similar candidates in that they both have very little experience compared to Mccain; however, Obama has a number of strong points that work well in a general election.

1. He delivers better speeches than either candidate. (btw, It's ridiculous Hilary deprecates this considering what an important skill this is for a head of state).
2. He has strong appeal to centrist voters which are typically Mccain's base. Without the centrist voters, Mccain has to rely entirely on the party base which has already made moves to desert him.
3. He appeals to the young vote, and so is likely to bring more total voters into the democratic side, many of whom despise Hilary over her stance over net neutrality, video game censorship, and general hostility towards the baby boomer generation. In contrast, Hilary's elderly party regulars voting for her in the primary can be counted on to show up at the polls no matter what democratic candidate ends up in the general election.
4. He's demonstrated that he can raise way more money than any other candidate out there, and has run a much better organized campaign than Hilary, despite all of her claimed political experience.
5. He can honestly say he was opposed to the war from day one. Hilary on the other hand is going to get *nailed* for flip flopping in the general election the same way it happened in the 2004 election. After all, if the war was a mistake, it was *her* mistake, and that is not an endorsement for presidency.

Hilary complains that the media went after her more harshly than Obama in part because she is a genuinely weak candidate with lots of points to attack her on. If this were any year other than 2008, when the general election may just be handed to the democrats, no one would take her candidacy seriously. She's just not that strong.

Republicans voting against Obama

[Pizaz (594643)]

There's plenty of evidence that in both Texas and Ohio, Republicans are voting for Hillary in order to "bloody Obama" politically. Rush Limbaugh has been urging his listeners to do that for weeks. http://www.middletownjournal.com/hp/content/oh/story/news/local/2008/03/04/mj030408switchweb.html [middletownjournal.com] Similar stories are coming in about Ohio. The political machine is starting to conspire against Obama from both sides. But I still believe that Obama will win the nomination because Hillary has a math problem. http://www.newsweek.com/id/118240 [newsweek.com] But the feeling of dread comes from the notion that even if she loses the delegate count, that she'll still be able to pull out a victory via her usual shenanigans. She's going to fight to have Michigan and Florida's delegates seated even though in Michigan for instance, Barack's name wasnt even on the ballot.

Still about Florida and Michigan.

[Average (648)]

The nifty thing for Obama, is that he is far enough ahead in pledged delegates that he still doesn't have to go sharply negative. Notice the things he hasn't talked about. Tax returns? Bill's last minute pardons (against the advice of the Justice Department, but for people who paid consulting fees to Hillary's brothers)? Kazakhstan? Clinton library donors? Lincoln bedroom guest list? Norman Hsu? Trying to win the nomination without getting these matters in the mainstream media is a kindness to the Democratic Party that the superdelegates would be blind to ignore.

The only question left is Florida and Michigan. Particularly the latter. If she manages to seat her Michigan delegates and none for Obama (since he wasn't on the ballot), I will be disappointed if Detroit doesn't take to the streets.

Re:Still about Florida and Michigan.

[An dochasac (591582)]

I know the Clinton's skeletons and it really doesn't bother me because life was pretty much good during Clinton's time after the recession under the first Bush. I could put up with it again.

Many people make this mistake. Hillary Clinton is a woman[Tm], not a time machine. Slashdotters should know the difference. Time machines have more knobs and gages.

Even if she were a time machine, it would be very difficult to reproduce the conditions which allowed a decade of prosperity despite the actions (or lack of) of two corrupt and stupid presidents. Imagine going back to 1992 and making sure you don't step on a fly, lest you change these conditions:

1. The reasonably peaceful breakup of the Soviet empire. (Clinton and Bush just watched, they didn't even take advantage of the once in a lifetime opportunity!)
2. The invention of computer and internet technology which allowed JIT warehousing, enabled globalization and led to vast improvements in efficiency. (Neither Clinton, nor Bush nor Gore can take credit for this)
3. Opening up of China, Latin America and other markets and their cheap labor while deficit spending and cheap credit allowed us to isolate our labor force from potential deflationary impacts on wages. (O.K Clinton did sign NAFTA and seemed to have a good relationship with Chinese campaign donors so maybe he did have something to do with this, but Nixon, Carter and Reagan probably had more of an impact on China.
4. Global wage arbitrage and productivity increases resulting from computers and internet also allowed the Fed to keep interest rates low, spurring growth here but offshoring the inflation.
5. Oil prices were less than $20/bbl (Clinton signed the "SUV loophole" laws which created the demand for such beasts and helped drive oil back up to $102/bbl where it apparently belongs.)
6. The bulk of our population (Baby boomers) were in their peak earning years so Clinton/Bush et al could sweep the Social Security insolvency under the rug for another 12-18 years... and whistle in the dark, hoping no one would notice. (Gingrich was the perfect diversion from Clinton's numerous non sex related shenanigans, so he took the fall but I assure you that had mother Theresa suggested a Social Security fix as early as the mid 90s, she would have also been put on a skewer.)

It could work, but don't step on any flys and keep your hands inside the vehicle at all times, it is moving at the same speed as reality.

Re:Still about Florida and Michigan.

[Jeremi (14640)]

So is he giving away those books or is he making money off them at my expense? Has he released his vision on his website at least? Maybe a PDF download?

Have you tried your local public library?

Texas is hardly a win

[Dekortage (697532)]

TFA: In the Texas primary, [Clinton] won with 51 pecent of the vote compared to 48 percent for Obama.

3% is winning the state? Remember that Democratic state delegates are divided up by vote percentages, unlike the Republican "winner take all" delegate process. So Clinton's win in Texas is fairly thin, and frankly a poor showing after all the money and campaigning she's spent lately in a state that was always considered an automatic win for her.

Expected it

[cryptoluddite (658517)]

The media was playing it up as Clinton's "last chance", so naturally that will energize people who are emotionally involved with that candidate and get them out to vote... just like in New Hampshire, where women came out strong for their candidate.

Personally, I find the level of racism and sexism involved in propping up Clinton's campaign disgusting. I'd like to think of Democrats as above and beyond that. If you look at the facts, Obama is a better speaker, more motivational, more liked overseas, less divisive. Obama has more experience in public service, he's made better decisions, and he's more likely to win against McCain. He's run a more organized and effective campaign. So given that he pretty much outclasses her in every way as a candidate, you have to ask yourself why people are voting for Clinton, and is it right.

Some people say that Obama is benefiting from being half-black by winning the black vote 10:1. I don't think that's really true, I think he'd be winning the other groups that much if not for the factors working against him. For instance, the Hispanic community has historically been at odds with African Americans. And whites and women, obviously, have a bias for a white woman. It seems to me that by merit he should be winning close to that ratio among most groups.

Delegate Math

[Gailin (138488)]

This was shamelessly copied from this post:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/3/4/162042/3056/80/468751 [dailykos.com]

This assumes that Hillary somehow magically wins by 10% in every race. Which is NOT going to happen unless Barack gets caught with a dead girl or live boy.

After today, there are 10 states left, plus Guam and Puerto Rico.

Number of 3 delegate districts left: 1
Number of 4 delegate districts left: 19 (including all 8 in Puerto Rico)
Number of 5 delegate districts left: 21
Number of 6 delegate districts left: 14
Number of 7 delegate districts left: 10
Number of 8 delegate districts left: 1
Number of 9 delegate districts left: 3
Number of 10 delegate districts left: 1 (Montana)

Setting aside Guam with its 4 delegates, there are 11 delegate apportionments based on statewide popular vote totals.

Wyoming - 5 statewide
South Dakota - 6 statewide
Montana - 6 statewide
West Virginia - 10 statewide
Mississippi - 11 statewide
Kentucky - 17 statewide
Oregon - 18 statewide
Puerto Rico - 19 islandwide
Indiana - 25 statewide
North Carolina - 38 statewide
Pennsylvania - 55 statewide

In order to cross all thresholds except the initial break that give you a +2 delegate swing, you need to win by an extra 200/X%, where X = the number of total delegates at stake. Let's see how this works by easy example - West Virginia and its 10 statewide delegates. 200/10 = 20%. To go from 5-5 to 6-4 there you have to win by over 10% (55-45). But to get ANOTHER +2 you need to add 20% to your win and win by 30% (65-35).

To work through one more example, Indiana and its 25. You start with someone winning 13-12. To get an additional +2 swing (ie, 14-11), you have to win by 200/25%, or 8% even. 54-46 + 1 vote is a 14-11 split. You can also calculate this way: 13.5/25 = .5400. 14.5/25 = .5800 (58-42 is a 16% win).

So, let's look at if Clinton wins every statewide total by 10%:

Wyoming +1
South Dakota 0
Montana 0
West Virginia +1, giving her the +1 vote benefit of the doubt.
Mississippi +1
Kentucky +1
Oregon +2
Puerto Rico +1
Indiana +3
North Carolina +4
Pennsylvania +5

Total +19 delegates.

Do you see how totally impossible it is, and how completely significant Obama's South Carolina and February blowouts were? Remember, Obama beat Clinton by 8% in Iowa (a huge win) and netted only 1 extra pledged delegate.

Now, let's assume, in a very unsurgical way, that this 10% is exactly the margin in all the congressional districts.

1 3-delegate district: +1
19 4-delegate districts: 0
21 5-delegate districts: +21
14 6-delegate districts: 0
10 7-delegate districts: +10
1 8-delegate district: 0
3 9-delegate districts: +3
1 10-delegate district: +1, let's give her the 1 extra vote benefit of the doubt.

Total +36 delegates

Overall total +55 delegates.

And it probably is +58, see below.

Obama currently leads by 160 pledged delegates.

Not by delegate count

[Mark_in_Brazil (537925)]

The Obama campaign appears to be much better organized than the Clinton campaign. Clinton tried to run an "inevitability" campaign like Bush did in the Republican primaries in 2000. When that didn't work as well as expected for Clinton, it really looked like they weren't ready with any kind of backup plan. Also, Hillary Clinton is still following the strategy that allowed Bill Clinton to win the presidency twice: ignore huge parts of the country, take others for granted, and focus on a few "swing" states to get the minimum amount of votes to win. Obama's team appears to have understood the rules of the primaries and caucuses better than Clinton's, which is surprising, given how much Clinton plays up her experience as a Senator, an activist, and yes, as the wife of Bill Clinton. I can't imagine how they could not know how Texas's apportionment of delegates works, and yet they claim they didn't. While Clinton won the popular vote in three of four states (Rhode Island, Texas, and Ohio, but not Vermont), Rhode Island and Vermont basically canceled each other out (each was a blowout and both states have few delegates). Clinton won the popular vote in Texas and Ohio, but the final delegate count will be either a very small (single-digit) number of net delegates going to Clinton or even possibly Obama padding his three-digit lead by a few more delegates.
Obama's campaign ran hard and organized even in the states where he was way ahead. The result was blowout victories, which makes a difference in the primaries, because the apportionment of delegates depends on the margin of victory. Clinton scored one blowout yesterday and was blown out in another state, so the net effect is probably about 1 net delegate for Clinton. In the bigger states, Clinton scored two narrow victories, and in Texas, the combined primary-caucus may end up giving Obama a net win in delegates.
Clinton's campaign has tried to change the rules during the contest more than once, which is really lame. There's talk that the Clinton campaign will now sue over the nature of the Texas caucus-primary, but they had the same access to the rules as the Obama campaign did. They just seem not to have planned as well.
Obama appears to be more of a party-builder, like Howard Dean and his "50 State Strategy." While moron pundits like Paul Begala derided paying party workers to "pick their noses" in places like Montana and Mississippi, Dean set up the structure not only for the Democrats' retaking both houses of Congress in the 2006 elections, but also for extending their majorities and making gains in the state legislatures nationwide. Obama seems to have embraced that strategy, and it would make a difference in places like Texas, where Rick Noriega could have a chance of unseating Senator Cornyn if the presidential candidate doesn't ignore the state, and at the very least the Democrats could force the Republicans to spend money to defend what previously would have been considered a very safe seat. Clinton's campaign, as recently as last week, when it thought she might lose in Texas, was saying that "Texas does not figure into the electoral calculus of a Democratic (Presidential) candidate." That is a ridiculously narrow view, and since so many of Hillary's advisors and consultants also worked for Bill, I wonder if the Clintons' philosophy is responsible for the fact that Bill Clinton managed to win the White House, but then the Democrats almost immediately lost control of both houses of Congress, setting the stage for the Bush presidency, when White House power was basically unchecked by a Congress all too willing to let Bush and Cheney do whatever they wanted. Including taking a surplus and making it into record deficits. Oh, and a multi-trillion dollar war that destabilized the region and created more terrorists by making bin Laden and his ilk look really smart as the US government acted just as al Qaeda and others said it would.

Here's the thing: I'm pushing 40, and Bill Clinton was far and away the best president of

Fraud - AGAIN!

[swordgeek (112599)]

So after hearing about Clinton winning Texas and Ohio (and Rhode Island, for that matter), the second thing I read about the crazy pre-election election that seems so popular in the US right now was this article:
http://www.click2houston.com/news/15492166/detail.html [click2houston.com]

Seems that someone "helped" seniors register to vote, and then filed absentee ballots in their names.

Thing is, every election, every vote, every ballot that happens in the US seems to be tainted by fraud of some sort. Identity theft, ballot stuffing, turning away voters, rigged machines, middle-of-the-night changes to the law, you name it--it's all going on, and seems to be going on all the time. The worst part is that it hardly ever raises an eyebrow from the voting public or the media. In this example, there is solid evidence of election fraud, and it's getting a few column-inches on a local website. Why isn't this on the front page of the Houston Chronicle?

Don't you people even CARE about the failure of your democracy anymore?

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[AoT (107216)]

It means that she won the popular vote, which is translated by the media into a win these days. Obama is set to win the caucuses. What this is really is the media finally turning on Obama. From Russert's vile line of questioning about Farrakhan, "Why won't you say that you would stab him in the face, huh?" He would never have asked Kerry about the endorsement from LaRouche, yet he feels the need to act like Farrakhan actually matters.

Re:No, it NEEDED to be asked

[RingDev (879105)]

I hear child molesters and dog abusers are big fans of Tim Russert. They watch his show religiously and purchase products from his advertisers. There for, every guest who come on his show has the responsibility to ask him for his side of the story, in a similar fashion:

"Tim, we all know that a lot of people who like kicking dogs and throwing puppies off cliffs are big fans of yours. We also know that you are widely respected in the child porn industry. What do you have to say about that?"

That's not a hard question, that's a loaded question. A hard question would be:

"Our economic advisers believe that your economic policy will fail for reasons X, Y, and Z. Explain how your plan will work to avoid X, Y, and Z."

But watching a man defend an economic policy is no where near as fun as watching him defend himself from accusations of being a terrorist, a Black Panther, Muslim, corrupt, Jewish, antisemitic, etc... If you want some tough questions, get some English interviewers over here to badger the candidates on the issues. If you want BS and fluff, stay tuned to American TV for it's 'Entertainment Value'.

-Rick

Re:No, it NEEDED to be asked

[moeinvt (851793)]

"No one ever grilled Ron Paul on the support he gets from far right wing racist groups on air . . ."

No one ever gave Ron Paul much air time to begin with, and we all know it.

This whole "guilt by association" thing is one of the most ridiculously flawed arguments in political discourse, whether we're talking about specific issues, parties, or individuals. The frequency with which this propaganda technique is used however highlights the unfortunate fact that it must be an effective one.

1. Person/Group A is BAD
2. Person/Group A supports P
3. Therefor P must also be BAD

It's utterly and completely absurd.

1. Hitler was evil
2. Hitler was a vegetarian
3. Therefore vegetarianism(vegeterians) must be evil.

Right? :-)

It's an emotional BS argument that has no place in an intelligent debate. In fact, the Nazis and Hitler are used for this purpose so often that someone coined a term "Reductio ad Hitlerum" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_Hitlerum) to define the phenomenon.

We definitely need a new term in the lexicon of U.S. politics to represent the frequent attempts to associate people and organizations with racists/racism because of such ridiculously tenuous connections.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[callistra.moonshadow (956717)]

Well, Texas has a caucus. She took the primary but Obama took more in the caucus which is a smaller percentage of the delegates. As to her actually *winning* one must wonder if Rush Limbaugh may have contributed to Republicans cross-voting just to up the contention between Clinton and Obmana and further muddy the outcome for the Dems. --cally

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[Shotgun (30919)]

one must wonder if Rush Limbaugh may have contributed

I just have to wonder if Limbaugh's advice is counterproductive.

From what I've seen in this election cycle, more than any other is that people are basically led around by the talking heads on TV. The will vote for whoever is getting the most press. With the Republican nomination cynched by McCain, the only thing that will be in the news will be Obama/Clinton. Come November, people will be saying, "McCain? Who is that?"

It isn't a matter of the media reporting badly about McCain. It is a matter of them simply overtly shutting him out of the news coverage altogether, like they did with Paul, Kucinich and later Huckabee. The talking-head, 24-hour news cycle is an extremely powerful tool that amounts to free political adds for whoever the network controllers consider a "front-runner", whether that be Giovanni or Thompson. Having Obama/Clinton being the "news of the day" for the next few months will not help McCain.

Media exposure could be bad.

[Valdrax (32670)]

With the Republican nomination cynched by McCain, the only thing that will be in the news will be Obama/Clinton. Come November, people will be saying, "McCain? Who is that?"

I actually volunteered to assist a candidate in an election in 2006 that followed an acrimonious primary, and I guarantee you that this is in fact *good* for McCain. With the two candidates beginning to bring out the knives against each other (especially in the form of Clinton's reprehensible scare ads), they are both turning off their base and giving ammunition to the other side. Clinton's tactics are straight out of Republican campaign history, and she's already framing her arguments in terms of "Obama can't win against McCain on issues of national security." (i.e. She's running the Republican's campaign for them in case Obama wins, ensuring a Pyrrhic victory if she wins.)

I saw the effects of this in 2006 when the two candidates did their absolute best to turn voters away from the other candidate. The end result after the primary was a lot of people who were so burned by the attack ads, that they refused to aid the winning candidate against the opposition with campaign donations. (Many also refused to vote in the upcoming election, but most said that they'd hold their nose and vote for our candidate but that they intended to donate money to other members of the party in other elections.)

The net result: A landslide victory for the opposition as the candidate who won the primary was never able to reenergize the party base and unable to match the opposition's funding afterwards. Our candidate tried to run on issues and on the corruption of our opponent, and the opposition ran on personality and won hands down after the sour note left by the primary.

If voters are left saying, "Who's McCain?" then that's not necessarily a good thing if all they can remember about Clinton or Obama is months of attack ads. Brand recognition isn't a good thing when the product's tainted.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[JudgeFurious (455868)]

Where I work I've spoken to 6 different dedicated Republicans who said they also voted for Clinton on the Democrate side. They all agreed that they did so for no other reason than that they'd rather face her than Obama in the general election.

  I usually vote Republican but after the last 8 years under GWB (I confess that I voted for him the first time. Who knew he was going to turn into "Big Bubba" on us?) I am so disappointed in the right that I'm actively searching for a Democrat to support. I like Obama and I'm voting for him in the general election if he gets the nomination. If he doesn't I'm going to go ahead and throw my vote behind McCain. I know several people who feel the same way I do, in particular my wife. She's a lifetime Democrat but she swears that if Hillary gets the nomination she's voting for McCain.

  I can't believe the Democrats will be stupid enough to run Hillary. She's the one candidate that the Republicans will pull together to keep out of the White House. Obama's pulling in Independents and liberal minded Republicans (yes, we exist). Hillary will send us all into McCain's camp.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[JudgeFurious (455868)]

You see, my beliefs cannot be neatly packed into labels of "conservative" and "liberal". I'm extremely conservative about some things and extremely liberal about others. In short I have "core beliefs" but they straddle the two ideologies that you appear to be capable of seeing. Your use of the term "socialist" to describe Obama tells me that you have a typical American grasp of what that word means and so I don't see any point in discussing it with you.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[JudgeFurious (455868)]

You know, I spent a lot of time pondering that as well. Why does this candidate rub me the wrong way so badly? I didn't mind her husband as President and so I naturally started wondering if it was because of her gender. Was I being sexist without recognizing it? Ultimately I concluded that my biggest problem with Hillary Clinton was her personality and the almost palpable ambition she seems to give off. It's like the woman is just starving for power and will step over just about anybody or anything to get it. I haven't had this kind of negative feeling about a candidate or President since Nixon. Despite his actions I don't much get it from GWB. I do get a sense of it from Cheney however.

  She goes into a series of primaries with agreeing to certain terms (like Florida and Michigan not counting for instance) and then when it seems like she might not get her way she starts making noises about changing those terms. She enters a primary in Texas fully aware of how the primary works in Texas (and any protests otherwise she might make border on being insulting in my opinion) and then again you start to hear rumblings from her campaign about the possibility of filing suit to have this changed because it does not favor her. She goes into debates talking about being "co-President" and trying to leverage her husbands coat tails (which I do not fault her for doing mind you) but then denies any real involvment when failures or negatives from his administration are brought up. I see this and think "You were either the co-President or you weren't so what's it gonna be?"

  This is the kind of behavior that makes me just cringe at the thought of her being President of the United States.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[fishdan (569872)]

Both sides are fascism. As Ron Paul said : "We're not moving toward Hitler-type fascism, but we're moving toward a softer fascism: Loss of civil liberties, corporations running the show, big government in bed with big business. So you have the military-industrial complex, you have the medical-industrial complex, you have the financial industry, you have the communications industry. They go to Washington and spend hundreds of millions of dollars."

Ralph Nader put it best: Republicans and Democrats are competing to serve their corporate masters.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[notamisfit (995619)]

More of Ron Paul being hated for his (insignificant) virtues rather than his (plentiful) vices. Like many on the left, you seem to not be able to discern economic power from political power. The biggest, nastiest, most impersonal corporation can never *force* you to act against your own nature and trade with it; they can only entice. Now, I will concede, as a result of the horrific government violations of rights in the economic sector, some businessmen (who probably couldn't have put a lemonade stand in the black otherwise) are able to use pull to gain favors and bring ruin to their fellows. This pull did not originate in the businessmen, it is now and has always been the sole function of government. Achieve a proper separation of economics and state, under a proper, objective law, and the pull dries up.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[Admiral Ag (829695)]

"The biggest, nastiest, most impersonal corporation can never *force* you to act against your own nature and trade with it; they can only entice."

That's Randian sophistry. If a corporation acquires a monopoly on food distribution in my town, then while it isn't rifling through my pockets and then dumping food into my bags, I may well have no practical option other than to shop there. It real terms it is not much different from a country where the communist party owned the local store. Of course, right wing people will delight that I am free to starve to death, but I'm sure the communists would have said the same.

I love it how Randians try to blame corporate corruption on governments. "There's only corruption because of government regulation!!". It's like saying: "There's only murders because the police are trying to prevent crime!!". Of course no corporation would ever bribe officials or suppliers, or blackmail people or hire goons to beat workers or journalists, or to sabotage its competitors, or spread malicious rumours about the content of rival's products, or hire or sell a car that would blow up if you backed it into a post, or impale you on the steering column if you went in frontwise.

No... that would never happen. Like that time all those people in Eastern Europe got poisoned because the food companies were all grinding up lead paint into their products to make them look nicer.

It would result in a nation of Al Capones.

I'd love to see a Randian country come into being. It'd be like Cambodia in less than a week.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[PoliTech (998983)]

It would be really interesting if the super delegates do continue to support Clinton despite the popular vote.

If Hillary Clinton were to win the nomination by only the super delegates vote, and have lost the popular Democratic vote, would it be fair then for the opposition (Democratic as well as Republican) to label her the "Selected" rather than "Elected" Nominee?

Will Democratic Party leaders think that the risk of ignoring the popular vote is worth the possible reward of nominating someone who the party leaders think may be the more "electable" candidate in the general election?

Regardless of the above, it looks to be an interesting Democratic Convention coming up.

Re:why is texas a win for her?

[Maxo-Texas (864189)]

I find it fascinating that other libertarians also feel like the democratic party has become closer to libertarianism than the republican party is.

I now view the republican party as the party of corporatism (a flavor of fascism), oligarchy, lost personal freedom to live as I want, irresponsible spending (wildly more so than... say bill clinton was), and foreign intervention.

And I was a reagan republican- brought into voting by him basically.

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[Maxo-Texas (864189)]

I personally was a ron paul supporter, tho I my current preferred vote would be obama->mccain->clinton. I am pretty sure that Clinton is *unelectable* against McCain short of him dying of old age before the election.

A ton of republicans crossed over last night and voted for clinton on Rush Limbaugh's suggestion. They are all crowing about it on the Laura Ingram show this morning. And none of them will vote for clinton in the real election.

It's a very cynical and effective move. It drains both campaigns of cash- keeps both candidates hammering at each other- and may even force a brokered convention (which I view as a good thing).

I agree that working families have to go home- but i also say a lot of republicans didn't stick around for the democratic caucus and it is my opinion that the caucus's are closer to what the popular vote would be without Rush's brilliant, if twisted idea. Voting insincerely undercuts the entire process. In this case, many votes for Clinton were really votes against her and for McCain.

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[Doctor Faustus (127273)]

Serves the Democrats right for crossing over and voting for McCain in Republican primaries. They have no right to complain after they stuck us with one of our weakest possible candidates (the only way it could've been worse would've been if that idiot Ron Paul ended up winning).

Democrats were told to vote for Mitt Romney to drag out the Republican race and hurt the Republican party. Democrats who voted for McCain, like me, did so because we genuinely thought he was the Republican who would make the best president (of those running -- I kinda like Lincoln Chafee and Olympia Snowe).

Now, I had been on the fence about whether to vote for McCain in the Republican primary or Miller (if he looked viable) or Obama in the Democratic primary. But then there really wasn't a Democratic primary in Michigan, so that was easy.

What's wrong with the two parties getting to choose their candidates without interference from outsiders?
It's not fair to independents. It's also not fair to people trying to knock out lunatics like George W. Bush, Rudy Guliani or Hillary Clinton (I don't mind her but I realize many do) at every possible stage. I'll be voting Democratic in November, but this year was the second time I've voted for McCain in for president. In 2000, I might even have voted for him in the general election.

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[Sciros (986030)]

Oh yeah, saying the Hillary supporters are hard-working adults and the Obama supporters are first-time-voter college students with plenty of time on their hands is REALLY OBJECTIVE.

Troll.

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[Chris Burke (6130)]

Obama will likely fare slightly better in the caucus in Texas, only because the core of the Democrat party--the baby boomers who constitute the majority of Hillary supporters--had families to get back to and jobs they had to get up for the next morning. Hillary supporters simply didn't have the ability to "two-step" all the way into the early morning hours, while it apparently is far easier for the young, first time voters who make up Obama's base to spend literally six hours of their time at their local middle school or fire station.

Yeah? Well the church my precinct's caucus was held in was packed to the freaking gills -- standing room only, they had to open up an annex which they also completely filled -- and it took over an hour after the sign-in began for everyone to sign the books for Obama. If you were Clinton supporter, you were done in about two minutes because there simply weren't many people in line in front of you.

And despite your stereotype, these were by and large middle aged working-class adults with families. Many of them had brought their families with them so that they could caucus -- some even had infants in papooses strapped to their chests. You can say whatever crud you want about baby-boomers with families; the ones who cared, the ones who were passionate about their candidate, they made it to the caucus.

Since irrational Obama supporters apparently run the internets, I fully expect this post to be modded "Troll" or something, because it doesn't contain the requisite amount of Obama bias and instead offers a firsthand account of what went down in Texas last night, and posits a reasonable theory for the disparity between primary and caucus votes. How scandalous. Do your candidate of choice proud, and suppress any relatively objective post you see.

Of course, objectively made-up stereotypes. And here's a reasonable theory for the disparity between primary and caucus votes:

Texas has an open primary. With the Republican nomination essentially decided, there was no point for a Republican to vote in their party's primary, meaning they were free to vote in the Democratic primary. A strategic vote for the candidate most likely to lose the general election is a way to strengthen their own candidate. However it wasn't worth going to the trouble to caucus just for the sake of a strategic vote. This is the supposed advantage of the caucus -- that it attracts only those who are truly passionate about their candidates. Nobody's going to crowd into a packed church and stand for hours as the heat rises from all the bodies just to cast a "strategic" vote. But as they finish up their shopping at Randals? Sure, why not sabotage the other party.

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[dougmc (70836)]

Obama will likely fare slightly better in the caucus in Texas, only because the core of the Democrat party--the baby boomers who constitute the majority of Hillary supporters--had families to get back to and jobs they had to get up for the next morning.

Actually, at the caucus I went to, the Clinton mob was 80% women (yes, I counted) and mostly middle aged to elderly, with only a few younger people. The Obama mob was twice as big, roughly 50/50 men/women, with a much larger range in ages (they weren't all young, but the average age was certainly less.) And many people brought their kids.

The people who showed up for the Clinton caucus were mostly old enough that they probably didn't have young children at home. The Obama supporters had a lot of people who were the right age to have kids at home (including myself.)

If the problem is that the Clinton supporters all had families to take care of, it's funny that the Obama supporters did too -- and yet they made it out anyways. I saw _zero_ children in the Clinton camp, but perhaps 15 in the Obama camp.

To be fair, I live in Travis county, which is traditionally an island of blue in a state of red, and Travis county voted for Obama vs Clinton by a large margin. But if I recall correctly, the number of delegates per area is based on the voter turnout in the last election -- and the urban areas (and Travis especially) voted in very large numbers, so they'll get more delegates. And the urban areas are generally supporting Obama.

Ultimately, it looks like even if Clinton wins the popular vote in Texas (well, not if -- she has), it appears that she will not get more delegates. Which is pretty weird if you ask me, but it's the way it is. So, both Clinton and Obama will declare victory in Texas ...

Re:Texas voter here: This is simply untrue.

[ArcherB (796902)]

I also voted twice in this primary. The poster you keep disagreeing with was right on. My wife and I showed up at 7:00pm. We were the first group to go through and some of the first in our group and we didn't get out of there until 10:45pm.

We are young, employed, new parents, and my wife goes to school. We had a sick child at home (stuffy nose, nothing major... thanx for your concern). We would not have been able to attend had it not been for my mother-in-law being in town to watch her.

Many people there had their kids with them. Someone brought up a motion that those with kids should be allowed to go first. It was denied.

There were not enough sheets for everyone to fill out their votes on. (ballots, if you will, but this is not a private vote. Everyone filled out the same sheets, 12 per page).

There was a lot of screeching from the two sides (Clinton and Obama) claiming the other may have an advantage. "There are too many Obama supporters running this. We need a Clinton supporter to observe..." and so on.

I kept thinking to myself. "These people can not run a local, one party caucus in a small town. What makes them think they can run the country?"

Who runs the primary caucus for the democrats?

The local Democratic parties.

Something could have been done about the situation. Oh and that blurb was headlines on CNN

Not once it started. That's when the bickering began.

Oh, my apologies. You're just a troll.

Re-read your post.

No, he was right. You were being a troll.

Besides, I'm sorry if you disapprove us having children, jobs, and going to school to better ourselves. We bust our asses to make ends meet and make sure we have a table, are able to put food on it and have a roof to cover it all. It was a pain in the ass for us to be there so late and disarray of the whole thing made it worse. So don't give me, the OP, or anyone else any shit if they had more important things to do than to vote in the primary. Not all of us can simply tell our mom we are going to vote and close the door to the basement. Some of us have obligations that take precedence over politics.

Re:Damn

[aredubya74 (266988)]

Indeed, not counting the Texas caucus results (which are likely to favor Obama), Clinton's likely to come out of last night's victories net'ing less than 10 delegates, and possibly even losing ground if the caucus goes particularly well (60-40 or better) for Obama.

I'm not a registered Democrat, though I do vote for their candidates more often than not. The inconsistencies of the state party mechanisms, plus the proportional voting, does seem highly illogical. In the general, it's winner-take-all, and there's no superdelegates (unless you count the Supreme Court - 2000 election says hi). I hope the party recognizes this flaw in the system, which only stands to keep them stigmatized as the party of political procedure and not of coherent action.

That all said, if John McCain makes it through to Election Day without a single health scare, I would be very surprised. He's 72, and has a relatively poor health history. I certainly wouldn't wish ill health on him, but I do think there's a strong likelihood of at least one incident on the road.

Re:Damn

[MLCT (1148749)]

The super delegates will decide it all - the actual raw numbers don't make much difference. Winning Ohio and Texas wasn't important to Clinton due to the number of delegates she would win, but rather has very strongly reinforced the stall she is going to set out to the supers, namely "I win in the "big" states, Obama wins in the "little" states". A piece in the NYT laid it all out yesterday, pointing out that if she lost both Texas & Ohio it wouldn't make a vast difference to the numbers - due to PR - but it would leave her with virtually no storyline to present to the supers. Since she won them she has now quite a potent storyline to present - and it may end up handing her the title.

Re:Damn

[elrous0 (869638)]

There is no "thankfully" to it. This pretty much ensures an ugly floor fight which will fracture and humiliate the Democratic party and put John McCain in the White House. It's truly amazing just how far Democrats will go to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Even in the face of the most unpopular war since Vietnam and the most hated Republican president since Nixon, the Democrats still can't pull it together for a win. And even when they do win (as they did in 1992, 1996, and 2006) they immediately fracture, cave-in, sell-out, and generally squander any potential for any real improvement thanks to their laughably weak party discipline.

Frankly, I wish they would just go the way of the Whigs (and take the Republicans with them while they're at it). This country desperately needs a REAL party for liberals, libertarians, and progressives. And God knows neither the undisciplined, spineless Democrat party nor the bible-thumping, war-mongering Republican party are truly serving the people.

Wanted: Liberal party and Conservative party

[JonTurner (178845)]

>>This country desperately needs a REAL party for liberals, libertarians, and progressives.

It could use a party for real conservatives, too since this latest batch of Republicans is a spend-happy, big-government social-engineering disgrace. But even that would be a short-term solution as the real problem is that our Federal government is no longer bound by the limits of the Constitution, specifically the 10th Amendment. The Federals are supposed to just run the Navy, print the money, and mostly stay the hell out of our lives. Instead, well, we have our current situation of Bread & Circus.

10th Amendment to the Constitution reads: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." IOW, if the Constitution doesn't explicitly grant an authority, the Federals can't do it. What a quaint notion.

Re:In the end, does it reallyl make a difference?

[m0llusk (789903)]

Is this the best we can do?

Referring to centrists like Hillary and Obama as Socialists indicates an intense and pervasive ignorance of all matters social and political. Socialism does not encourage private property or corporate participation, just for starters. You really should visit some places that embrace Socialism before you make pronouncements like that, but like most Americans staying fearfully within your own borders is as much as you can handle. With ignorance on this scale being commonplace it is amazing that we can do this well.

Re:Democrats

[thegnu (557446)]

Dude, the problem with the nomenclature "African American" is that not all black people are a)Africans or b)Americans. So calling them black is ok. Negro is out (though it too means black), and "colored people" sounds a little too much like "little people." And calling someone "a colored" seems insulting, as well. Black is directly analogous to white, and is the least presumptive about someone's ethnic heritage, which I think is important.

I grew up in Mexico, and often refer to Hispanics. My girlfriend at the time gave me crap because some group of them (I'm assuming it was The Council of the Wise) decided that Hispanic reminded them of the Spanish conquest, and they preferred Latino. Which I think is ridiculous, because when I say Hispanic, I mean a Spanish-speaker (which excludes Brazilians), and when I say Latino, I mean a Latin American (which excludes Spaniards).

Also, Iranians are caucasians, so calling white people caucasians is stupid. So hey everybody, let's just stop being insulted by things that aren't insulting, and stop bowing to unfounded, ridiculous reactionary pressure. And if you find out that one person prefers Latino over Hispanic, use the word they prefer when referring to them. It's super easy.

(I think it was a turban)

Close enough for the popular opnion.

Re:Democrats

[at_slashdot (674436)]

I'm tired of this American crap when people who have a drop of black blood they are considered black, he's half black and half white. But that's irrelevant, he's grey... whatever... what about judging him for what he does and what he says not for his color?

Re:Democrats

[InvisblePinkUnicorn (1126837)]

"He is black, call him black."

What the hell? I am so sick of these nebulous terms. Let's get it right. He is #935C33, I am #FEE497.

Re:Democrats

[jdgeorge (18767)]

(excuse the wording)? What the hell? This is what is wrong with America. I swear to God I am so sick of this political correct cry baby crap. He is black, call him black. I am white, why the hell is it perfectly acceptable to call me white instead of "Irish-American" or some other hypenated nonsense, but its a big deal to call a black guy black. Why the hell would you need to be excused for calling him black?

Hogwash. He is white. You say Barak Obama is "black" because his father was "black". I say he is "white" because his mother was "white".

Someone who is truly cutting through the "political correct cry baby crap" would say he is "multiracial".

Re:Meanwhile...

[dasunt (249686)]

How do you come to that conclusion? Have you seen the same ads I have? "I am my brother's keeper, I am my sister's keeper" - "Healthcare for everyone". This can only translate into more of my labor going towards strangers.

As opposed to the current system where the ER is often the first, last and only choice for the poor, resulting in increased medical bills that are unpaid and passed onto wealthier hospital patrons who do have insurance?

There are places that capitalism fails. Healthcare looks like it is one of them. Even if doctors could refuse treatment until after they were paid (what a dystopic thought!), the lack of access to healthcare would decrease the total health of the population, resulting in a population that is more prone to infectious diseases and epidemics.

PS: We have the ability to wipe out polio from the world relatively easily. That's due to government, not private practice footing the bill. We also have the ability to eradicate the MMR trio if we are willing to push for an international campaign to do so.

Re:Meanwhile...

[Spad (470073)]

The US spends more than twice as much per capita on healthcare than the UK.

Re:Meanwhile...

[electroniceric (468976)]

When people learn that the government should keep its claws out of money altogether, we'll stop getting these idiotic solutions that are only proposed in order to stir up support from voters, but end up having devastating effects that last well beyond the candidate's political career.

Ah yes, your rights to have everything you want. I take it you won't drive on any bridges, flush your toilet into any sewers, or rely on any police to keep you safe, because the government shouldn't be "clawing away" your money. And definitely you wouldn't want to put that money into a bank insured by the FDIC, or take a mortgage backed by the same federal guarantees (explicit and implicit), or participate in a stock market where liars and thieves are kept (somewhat) at bay by the SEC. Nor do you want any assurance that your medicines are not contaminated, your foodstuffs safe, and your children's teachers are not psychopaths.

The "market will solve everything if you only you set it free" meme was new (and woefully simplistic) in 1971. Now it's tired, overused and foolishly simplistic. Your whole lifestyle is made possible by a profound set of government-run or backed institutions. If they're broken, the answer is to fix them and work for fair, well-regulated markers, not scrap everything we've learned and go back to the 1860s (as appealing as them sometimes seems from within a fluorescent-lit cube). I'm all for leaner and more effective government (as, in fact, are almost all of us who think government has a key role in society), but the nonsense about greedy government taking all your tax dollars sounds increasingly petulant when bridges are falling down, tainted food and drugs are being allowed into our stores, and people are losing their homes in droves, and the top marginal tax rate is the lowest its been in decades.

Government regulation of healthcare is indeed a gigantic mess, and the Blues are a great example of that mess. And yes, government intervention in a market can indeed make a problem worse. But it takes two to tango, so let's recall Gingrich-led cuts to Medicare in the 90s, and permanent resistance to Medicaid's existence (because after all, that's just more poor - read "lazy" - people clawing your government-backed money away) and general conservative opposition to every government program that doesn't involve fat contracts for their buddies don't really to much to promote fair, orderly and efficient markets either.

Sure, comparison shopping for healthcare would improve the system and make the market for healthcare more efficient, if there were choices real humans could afford. Have you ever priced non-employer sponsored "insurance" (the quotes are because health coverage is much more a bundled service agreement that it is insurance against unlikely adverse events)? The prospect of paying $10,000-$15,000 per year sounds like great set of choices, huh? I've learned a fair bit about the dysfunction of the medical reimbursement system in my current job, and I'm not sure a government-run healthcare program is all peaches and cream, primarily because the current incarnations sidestep the hard questions we need to debate about how much care should really cost and who should pay for what. There is a cost control element to healthcare that's deeply difficult to answer once your parent gets cancer or your sibling gets a debilitating disease. But that's a debate about how to structure things well within government and the private sector, not a worn-out screed about drowning government in the bathtub.

Re:Meanwhile...

[AgentPaper (968688)]

-1, Completely False.

A system of healthcare exactly like what you described existed in the developed world from antiquity up until 1930 or so. There was no insurance, no regulation, no licensure, no anything; healthcare was exactly like any other trade, and those who would provide healthcare competed solely on the basis of price and advertising. The result was nothing short of miserable. Those who could afford it had the best medical and surgical treatment they could buy, although that generally wasn't much (no training requirements, remember?) Those who couldn't relied on folk remedies (what we now call "alternative medicine") and their own physiological reserves, and if they became seriously ill or injured, too bad. Oh, and the average lifespan was about 35 years give or take, and the sick were left to rot on the public streets - or, if they were very, very lucky, they were taken in by charitable groups and largely treated with benign neglect. I sincerely hope that you can figure out why we abandoned that model of healthcare.

In public health, it has been proven hundreds of times that when you have large numbers of sick people in circulation, the general health of the population tends to decline, and the diseases they suffer tend to increase in severity. In short, sick people make the people around them sick as well. If nothing is done about the sick (i.e. they're left to die), the population's health rapidly becomes so severely compromised that any suitable crisis - a plague, a famine, a drought, whatever - can kill off the entire population in one shot. Luckily, though, the reverse is also true: when a population is maintained at a certain level of health, the illnesses suffered by each individual tend to be less severe than they would be otherwise, and the lifespan, working capacity and general health of that population tends to increase. Thus, from a pure cost-benefit standpoint, you'd actually be smarter to provide a certain, basic level of healthcare to each individual out of the common treasury, since it costs far, far less to treat the minor illnesses than the severe illnesses, and it also results in massive net gains in productivity when everyone is healthy enough to work. Everything else, of course, the individual can pay for, but providing basic care - an annual physical, immunizations, emergency care when necessary, etc - ought to be a no-brainer.

Our current system is far from perfect - anyone will tell you that. However, throwing it out the window for some mythical "free-market" solution is just as foolish and ultimately even more harmful than single-payer care could hope to be. It is true that people in good health, who can be expected not to incur any particularly egregious health expenditures in their lifetimes, would pay less for their care at first. However, people in poor health, who not only cost more to care for but generally aren't physically capable of working hard enough or long enough to earn the required amount of money to pay for their healthcare and all their other expenses, will be in even worse straits. Meanwhile, thanks to the masses of sick people in circulation, now all of a sudden the healthy people are getting sick more often and more severely, which throws your putative cost savings right out the window. You're right back to the Middle Ages - either the sick would be rotting on the streets, or you'd be asking physicians, nurses and allied health providers to shoulder those patients' costs through charity care. How is that fair to me and my colleagues, for us to subsidize a tax break for you? Are we not entitled to the fruits of our labors?

I find it amusing how you and your ilk tout the wonders of the free market, without ever realizing that what you propose is neither free nor market-driven. You're just demanding that someone else pay the bill for you, whether through taxes or charity. Funny how that's so often true - the people who yell the loudest about free markets are also the ones who demand the biggest handouts, breaks and subsidies from said markets.

I'll thank you to take your trolling elsewhere, and good day to you, sir.

(Full disclosure: The author is a healthcare professional.)

Re:crank crank crank

[The One and Only (691315)]

John McCain has suffered multiple plane crashes, imprisonment in a Vietnamese POW camp, and several bouts of malignant cancer. My theory is, he's immoral.

Freudian slip?

[interactive_civilian (205158)]

or dig at Republicans?

My theory is, he's immoral.

Well, in my cynical view, he's a politician, so of course he's immoral. ;p