LITEROTICA PODCAST
LIT CAMS (200 Free Tokens)ADULT TOYSVOD MOVIES

First Democratic presidential debate tonight, 10/13/15

Mentions of the following words ought to be cause for a drink:

Email
Socialist
Trump
Immigration
Inequality

That ought to be enough to get us all snockered in the first ten minutes. :D
 
Clinton tacks to the left ahead of Democratic debate

illary Clinton has veered hard to the left ahead of Tuesday’s first Democratic presidential debate, hoping to inoculate herself from criticism by rival Bernie Sanders and woo the union members and liberal activists who have been slow to embrace her.

But in a Democratic race so far featuring few political attacks or policy clashes, Clinton’s move to protect her left flank on issues like the Asian trade pact and Keystone oil pipeline could open the door during the nationally televised debate to questions about her sincerity and to charges of flip-flopping.

Clinton, the Democratic front-runner, and Sanders, a U.S. senator from Vermont who is her prime challenger, will take part on Tuesday at 8:30 p.m. EDT in the first of six scheduled debates in the race to be the party’s nominee in the November 2016 presidential election.

They will be joined by former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, former Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee and former U.S. Senator James Webb of Virginia. The showdown will give Sanders his first broad national exposure and offer Clinton a chance to ease the concerns some Democrats have about her.
Click to expand...

Pandering to Labor or letting her Inner Progressive out?
 
It might be more interesting than the two GOP debates so far, actually.

For one thing, there are actual, measurable differences between the candidates on the issues. For all the jibes tossed around between Republicans—okay, coming from Donald Trump—there’s actually very little substantive disagreement on the issues between them. The tension all came from carefully staged, personalized conflict over who said what about whose face or whose wife. In contrast, the Democratic debate might break into actual, non-staged conflict as real arguments about real issues break out. Hillary Clinton could confront Bernie Sanders about his vote for federal laws shielding gun manufacturers from lawsuit. Sanders, in turn, could accuse Clinton of being too cozy with Wall Street. There’s potential here to get past the empty posturing that defined the Republican debate and start getting real about the issues.

Then there’s the novelty factor. As lengthy as the Republican debates were, they didn’t teach us anything new about the candidates, who are all lockstep conservative ideologues. (Though Rand Paul periodically makes an empty gesture in the direction of civil liberties.) But there’s a lot about the Democratic candidates that most voters don’t know, including the fact that Martin O’Malley is not, in fact, played by Aiden Gillen.

For instance, a lot of Democratic voters continue to labor under the impression that Clinton is less progressive on economic issues than she actually is. Tonight, she may have a chance to disabuse viewers of that notion, highlighting her progressive policy ideas on Wall Street reform and her opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Likewise, Sanders has struggled to communicate his ideas about racial justice, leading to low polling numbers amongst African-American voters. He might have a real chance tonight to rectify that, showing that he’s actually a lot smarter on these issues than many voters know.

Not that everything dramatic about the debate is going to be about policy and ideas. Even though there’s no Trump around to call women “pigs” and make fun of their looks, there’s a substantial chance that sexism is going to be an issue in a debate where a woman is beating her four male opponents in the polls. Not that there’s any reason to expect that another candidate will take a sexist swipe at Clinton. The are all smarter than that, no doubt. But there’s certainly a double standard in media coverage around Clinton, where she gets more questions about her family, her age, and her personality than her male colleagues do. Should any of that leak out in the debate, say by having the moderators ask Clinton about “likeability” while ignoring that factor for the men, there will be a whole lot of chatter about it. Maybe not on the level of Donald Trump making period jokes about Megyn Kelly, but it will definitely not be boring.

But what really has a chance to make all this fascinating viewing is that the debate has a chance to be a defining moment for progressivism. More Democrats identify now as “liberal” than in the past, but it’s often not entirely clear what that term means, especially compared to the more concretely defined reactionary views of the self-identified “conservatives”. The candidates all have very good reason to cozy up to liberals, but there’s no standard way to do that. Is it more liberal to believe, as Bernie Sanders does, that college should be free to anyone who wants it? Or is it more progressive to agree with Clinton that taxpayers shouldn’t foot the bill so that the children of the wealthy can go to college for free? Should liberal economics be more concerned with Wall Street reform, or should the priority be more on shoring up the social safety net? Should social spending be focused more middle class benefits or anti-poverty spending
Click to expand...
 
I just hope Biden comes in about twenty minutes late. You know like in an action flick when all the heroes are down and then someone appears and saves the fucking day. Ideally accompanied by electric guitar.
 
Sean Renaud said:
I just hope Biden comes in about twenty minutes late. You know like in an action flick when all the heroes are down and then someone appears and saves the fucking day. Ideally accompanied by electric guitar.
Click to expand...
For him, more likely a trombone.
 
When this sort of thing happens in the UK (assuming it does), does it open with "God Save the Queen"?
 
Sanders is off to a good start . . . he's the only one who got applause before he was finished.
 
Sean Renaud said:
I just hope Biden comes in about twenty minutes late. You know like in an action flick when all the heroes are down and then someone appears and saves the fucking day. Ideally accompanied by electric guitar.
Click to expand...

phrodeau said:
For him, more likely a trombone.
Click to expand...

Too funny!

I ate too fast after the Cubs game had ended. I had to get to all of the phone calls I had ignored before the debate started.

And Anderson comes out swinging.
 
Webb is awfully whiny.

Hillary is crushing it. You know she was just waiting to drop the O'Malley endorsed me in '08 line.

I'd like to know where O'Malley came up with the number of lives his policies have saved as being 1000.

Bernie does much better when he slows it down. But, did he just call himself an old man in so many words? :eek:
 
Bernie just handled the email question better than Hillary did. That was not a question for her to try and deflect at all.
 
The debate video is not available in my area. I suppose I'll have to go to Applebee's to watch it.
 
BotanyBoy said:
Yea he did...

Too bad she's going to crush him.....because Clinton.
Click to expand...

Aglaopheme said:
He's finishing much stronger too. I certainly align with him more politically, but yeah Hillary will win the primary.
Click to expand...

Well, you don't really know that. Bernie has already gotten over the "wealth primary" problem and established himself as one of the two front-runners.

Remember the "Reagan Democrats" -- the frustrated white working-class voters, non-ideological, traditionally Democratic, whose support Reagan was able to capture in 1980, and who have been supporting the GOP ever since?

They are now Sanders Republicans. For real. And not Clinton Republicans.
 
Last edited:
Aglaopheme said:
He's finishing much stronger too. I certainly align with him more politically, but yeah Hillary will win the primary.
Click to expand...

Oh yea I think he's better than her on like every level.

She's a wall st. goon and will be nothing more than 4-8 years of the same shit.

KingOrfeo said:
Well, you don't really know that. Bernie has already gotten over the "wealth primary" problem and established himself as one of the two front-runners.

Remember the "Reagan Democrats" -- the frustrated white working-class voters, non-ideological, traditionally Democratic, whose support Reagan was able to capture in 1980, and who have been supporting the GOP ever since?

They are now Sanders Republicans. For real.
Click to expand...

LOL

I wouldn't count on that...because Clinton.
 
Naturally I can't really know that. I will check out five thirty eight, it's been a while. I would say the majority of progressives I know will vote for Bernie in the primary, but the 'Feel the Bern' movement reminds me a lot of the Ron Paul movement. Enthusiasm does not always equal votes. It's really freaking hard to get people that don't vote in primaries to the polls.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

K
Next Pub presidential debate tonight, 10/28/15
3 4 5
Replies
118
Views
4K
BotanyBoy
BotanyBoy
JackLuis
The Empire Strikes Back
Replies
1
Views
177
BotanyBoy
BotanyBoy
K
4th Republican presidential candidates debate tonight 11/10/15
3 4 5
Replies
112
Views
7K
JackLuis
JackLuis
I
American actors/celebrities/musicians/famous people who died in 2019:
Replies
7
Views
1K
Insinkerator
I
U
Trump, Clinton and Soros
Replies
3
Views
704
Ulaven_Demorte
Ulaven_Demorte
Back
Top