US Politics

That's going on my sandwich board ready for my homeless failure stage.
Which will be thankfully cut short by the "starve, burn, dessicate" thing.

It’s tiny in the grand scheme of thing, and a blow to those with disability.

Even bubble tea shop have more right in Vancouver than disabled people.

The Onion going in

https://politics.theonion.com/Stephen Miller Hurt At Being Passed Over For Job Stalking Female Ambassador

So, this is interesting. I've mentioned before my suspicion that the right-wing campaign playbook simply calls for making left-wing politicians 'unlikeable'. Here's Hillary Clinton claiming (falsely) that 'nobody likes Bernie Sanders'. Another ingredient in the toxic brew is the allegation that Sanders' entourage is misogynist.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/21/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-nobody-likes-him-hulu-documentary

All this is very reminiscent of what was done to Corbyn (and, I think, Livingstone and Miliband before him). Firstly, 'liking'. While, obviously, elected politicians ought to be popular, it's about as far from political debate as anything ever gets. Needless to say, there's abundant evidence that Sanders is pretty popular. However, there's also no doubt that he's being targeted on anti-social media as we post. I think this is a good article by John Harris:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/20/trump-election-facebook

It hardly absolves Labour of its serial failures, but this formula was right at the heart of the Tory win in December: towards the end of the election, it was revealed that 88% of Conservative advertisements published on Facebook over a four-day period contained claims deemed to be misleading by Full Fact, a fact-checking organisation used by Facebook itself (the figure for Labour material was 7%).

... and that's only the aspect of the messaging that related to some kind of checkable content. Packaged in with the lies will no doubt have been more or less subtle (depending on the profile they had of the voter revealed by their F******* presence, from illegally-acquired data) messaging on influencing people via their likes and dislikes, culminating in seeding dislike of certain politicians.

Also interesting is the usual strategy of 'accuse someone of what you're guilty of yourself'. In Clinton's case, that's denying another's likeability, a measure on which Clinton scores very low herself, as she simply has very little political charisma, apparently in stark contrast to her husband, as well as claiming that Sanders is a 'career politician', which she very obviously is herself (and there is no doubt whatsoever that Sanders is driven by genuine convictions about public service). Then you have the crucial ingredient of attacking someone who pursues ethical policies like Sanders over alleged discrimination. It doesn't seem to matter too much whether you attack the person directly or people associated with him--it was toxic for Corbyn and will quite probably be toxic for Sanders, too. It's also very reminiscent of Blair's interventions over the last few months. I do hope that Sanders' campaign find effective ways of countering this, or they're in for losing.

Here's another comment piece on this.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/21/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-attacks-netflix

It's interesting how it's been packaged into a neat shorthand--'Bernie's bros', undoubtedly a well-researched handle aimed at targeting certain of Sanders' core support base, probably women. Still, I suspect the writers probably miss the main thrust of the attack, which as far as I can see must be the 'nobody likes Sanders' refrain, to be translated into 'I don't like Sanders' after percolating through anti-social media.

If Bernie gets the nomination Trump's campaign will destroy him... Unless he fights fire with fire, you've gotta go toe to toe with these guys... Corbyn didn't, etc, you can't fight fair with these pricks...

I'd get all the women he's abused in front of a camera doing his ads, get Stormy Daniels in there as well... Show his true face...

They tried the antisemitism smear with Bernie, guess it didn't take that well. Hence the sexist smears.

And what Hilary says is true about his unpopularity, it's just that he's unpopular with her peer group. It's such a lazy, shit smear by Clinton. Bernie basically dropped the knee for her after the DNC shafted him, endorsed her Presidential campaign and did 40 rallies for her.
And now she does this.

In Clinton's case, that's denying another's likeability, a measure on which Clinton scores very low herself, as she simply has very little political charisma

She won the popular vote with 65.8m to Trump's 62.9m votes. The only president to ever gain more votes was Obama. Don't let facts get in the way though.

Where do I say that she lost the popular vote?

How do you evidence your claim that she is unlikeable? She was likeable enough for 65.8m Americans to vote for her.

But you have your world view and evidence to the contrary is unlikely to interfere with it, so I will take the reasonable precaution of putting you on ignore.

The popular vote does not equal likeability, surely that’s obvious?

Likeability (or favourability in the nomenclature) is a polled metric, so if you like facts then those facts are available. For instance, the below data from 2016 which showed that Bernie was viewed more favourably than Hillary by every single age group bar the 75-79 age range, and also that Bernie broadly achieved positive favourability ratings whereas the best Clinton could hope for was that she was equally liked and disliked.

#berniewouldhavewon

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She was likeable enough for 65.8m Americans to vote for her.

... when the alternative was Trump. Or do you seriously think that makes no difference?

If we are splitting hairs, then I will equally argue that 'favorable' is not 'likeable'.

The cult of Bernie is the same magic grandpa delusion as Corbynism.

Lol saying the popular vote isn’t the same as likeability is not splitting hairs. Disputing the fine line between likeability and favourability is (not that I’m even certain there is one. Can you have a favourable view of someone without liking them?)

Don’t let facts get in the way though.

I didn't claim that she is unlikeable.

If we are splitting hairs

'Splitting hairs'?

You talked about facts, and you got facts. "Don't let facts get in the way though." "But you have your world view and evidence to the contrary is unlikely to interfere with it." Ironic, isn't it?

The cult of Bernie is the same magic grandpa delusion as Corbynism.

Based on what exactly? Because you don't like him?

I'd take the reasonable precaution of putting them on ignore.

so I will take the reasonable precaution of putting you on ignore.

Well, that all escalated rather quickly...

"Is this the right room for an argument?"
-SILENCE.

If Bernie gets the nomination Trump's campaign will destroy him... Unless he fights fire with fire, you've gotta go toe to toe with these guys...

I think Sanders would cut through Trump’s bullshit far better than Bloomberg or Biden. Warren (Pocahontas!) would get mauled. Unlike Corbin, Bernie has great message discipline and his message is clear.

He also steals rust-belt voters directly from Trump and stronger than Biden/Trump in key voting groups 18-29 year olds and independents.

His biggest issue will be all the money is now comfortable with the idea of a Trump second term. Expect Never Bernie ‘movement’ stories any day now.

Trumps backers have thrown hundreds of millions of dollars worth of negative press/publicity/etc at Clinton, Sanders has had barely anything - if the lens of the GOP disinformation cannon swung over to focus on Bernie I think things could change for him very rapidly.

Sure but neither has Bloomberg or Biden so far. Because the nomination isn’t made.

Another difference between Corbyn and Sanders is that accusations of his positions being ‘unpatriotic’ (something Corbyn faced) are weak.

You and Oliver are both correct. Voting Democrat and approval of an individual are different. She was under 40% at the end of her 2016 campaign. That’s pretty damning of either her ‘like-ability’, her campaign or both. Trump usually scores pretty low too.

Dem candidates vs Trump favourability with registered voters. Published on the 6th of Jan:

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Sanders will be stiffed by the DNC donor class again this time round, it's why Trump and his backers haven't targeted him. They know this.
I like Bernie a lot but he opposes the true values of the DNC, of people like HRC, Biden, Warren, et al. They'll never let him play at being by the presidential nominee.

Which is a shame as he has the best chance out of all them to beat Trump.