Who will be the Democrats' presidential candidate against Trump?

Sanders is clearly the favourite at this point, and I think the DNC better start preparing to manage his candidacy, and to frame their attitude towards him properly

What will happen when they bet it all on an alternative and Sanders storms the primaries as it now looks?

Blue wrote:btw Kaz why is populism bad?

From the dictionary; a political approach that strives to appeal to ordinary people who feel that their concerns are disregarded by established elite groups.

Thought that was the point of democracy.

Also i would not hold it against you if you don't vote for Sanders or Bloomberg(obviously). On principal i do not think anyone is entitled to anyone vote, it is the candidate job to convince them.

"Democracy", as it's understood in the west, is a system of checks and balances to make sure that everyone gets a voice and everyone's rights are respected.

Democracy, as populism understands it, is "the tyranny of the masses" and exactly what the US was set up to avoid. Under a populist democracy the republican institutions (that is lowercase republican btw, not a reference to the party) are gradually deteriorated up to a point where the president can do anything because he was elected by popular vote. Countries fail under weak institutions as corruption runs rampant, the rights of the weak are trampled over (usually the middle class and minorities), and the government actually has an incentive to keep the poor poor so they will keep voting for them. We have already started seeing some of this with Trump's right-wing populism deteriorating various institutions like the separation of powers. Several decades of this and you get, well, Argentina: a country that went from being one of the richest in the world in 1930 to being a middle income country nowadays that keeps becoming poorer every year (more on that for anyone interested).

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">National <a href="https://twitter.com/EmersonPolling?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@EmersonPolling</a> General Election Poll:<br><br>Sanders 51% (+2)<br>Trump 49%<br><br>Trump 51% (+2)<br>Bloomberg 49%<br><br>Trump 51% (+2)<br>Klobuchar 49%<br><br>Trump 51% (+2)<br>Buttigieg 49%<br><br>Trump 52% (+4)<br>Biden 48%</p>— Political Polls (@PpollingNumbers) <a href="https://twitter.com/PpollingNumbers/status/1229958444070862849?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 19, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Among Blacks:
Sanders 31%
Biden 28%
Bloomberg 21%
Warren 7%
Buttigieg 6%
Klobuchar 1%

Among Hispanics:
Sanders 41%
Biden 16%
Bloomberg 13%
Warren 13%
Buttigieg 8%
Klobuchar 0%

Among Whites:
Sanders 24%
Bloomberg 19%
Biden 15%
Buttigieg 15%
Warren 10%
Klobuchar 6% https://t.co/ATGF6RGZns

— Political Polls (@PpollingNumbers) February 19, 2020

What a take

Freeza wrote:

What a take

her 10yo son aint said that shit.

Why is it such a huge trend to lie about what your kids say on social media? I don't get it.

VivaStPauli wrote:Why is it such a huge trend to lie about what your kids say on social media? I don't get it.

OMG its the worst. I hate people with small kids

BarrileteCosmico wrote:

Blue wrote:btw Kaz why is populism bad?

From the dictionary; a political approach that strives to appeal to ordinary people who feel that their concerns are disregarded by established elite groups.

Thought that was the point of democracy.

Also i would not hold it against you if you don't vote for Sanders or Bloomberg(obviously). On principal i do not think anyone is entitled to anyone vote, it is the candidate job to convince them.

"Democracy", as it's understood in the west, is a system of checks and balances to make sure that everyone gets a voice and everyone's rights are respected.

Democracy, as populism understands it, is "the tyranny of the masses" and exactly what the US was set up to avoid. Under a populist democracy the republican institutions (that is lowercase republican btw, not a reference to the party) are gradually deteriorated up to a point where the president can do anything because he was elected by popular vote. Countries fail under weak institutions as corruption runs rampant, the rights of the weak are trampled over (usually the middle class and minorities), and the government actually has an incentive to keep the poor poor so they will keep voting for them. We have already started seeing some of this with Trump's right-wing populism deteriorating various institutions like the separation of powers. Several decades of this and you get, well, Argentina: a country that went from being one of the richest in the world in 1930 to being a middle income country nowadays that keeps becoming poorer every year (more on that for anyone interested).

One just have to look at India for socialism's gone wrong.

No individual rights, if 10 people decide that you have offended them then you will go to jail.

The very essence of U.S is liberty. Which will be compromised in populism. 60% can take away the economic freedom of 40%.

Massive corruption and government tax spent mainly to run loss making public sector companies producing tyre, vegetables what not.

Government interference in market reduced job opportunities.

Bunch of rent seeking institutions will come up over time.

Massive crony capitalism as politicians now determines the market dynamics.

.......

Apart from Public health and basic education absolutely no need of socialistic measurements in any field.

The funny thing is in socialist countries people are tired of its inability to create enough wealth.

While capitalistic countries which became rich thanks to capitalism now wants socialism.

Life quality in The best socialist country is worse than the worst capitalist state .

Not true BC, the Constitution main purpose was to avoid British like monarchy. One can achieve right or left wing populism, as long the populism belief do conflit with what is protected by the US Constitution.

I am not an idealouge when it comes socialism vs captialism. I know there is good, bad, and ugly to both. What I also know some of most happiest countries have a large social net. I also know captalistic endeavors is very important.

Sheesh it is so boring and very intellectually limited when people see the issue very binary.

Blue wrote:Not true BC, the Constitution main purpose was to avoid British like monarchy. One can achieve right or left wing populism, as long the populism belief do conflit with what is protected by the US Constitution.

Not a British-like monarchy, tyranny in general, which they defined as excessive power by the Executive, which is why they designed the system of checks and balances. Populism works by eroding these checks so only the popular vote matters. I didn't say anything untrue.

Hamilton, Madison et al wrote plenty about avoiding demagogues and mob rule. One of the reasons for the electoral college is to have one last layer of defense against a demagogue president.

Not that I believe in Founder worship or anything like that, what they wanted is besides the larger point really.

The countries that Bernie points to as his North star (the scandinavian model) would hardly ever be called Populists and frequently top the libertarian Heritage foundation's most free countries.

We’ve got plenty populism lol.

Populism just means politics that are popular with a majority of the people. There’s nothing negative in it in its essence. It’s mainly used to describe people using popular politics as election fodder and not following up on it once they’re elected.

I don’t endorse Republicans. https://t.co/uQMjLdxHA3

— Joe Biden (Text Join to 30330) (@JoeBiden) February 19, 2020

Damn Biden going for the jugular.

I believe this is where the kids say “takes one to know one”

Freeza wrote:I believe this is where the kids say “takes one to know one”

Biden might be a conservative but comparing him to Bloomberg is unfair. Bloomberg is a literal piece of shit who's trying to buy his way to the presidency.

Good for him to attack Bloomberg, an actual Republican should've no place in the Democratic primaries.

Freeza wrote:We’ve got plenty populism lol.

Populism just means politics that are popular with a majority of the people. There’s nothing negative in it in its essence. It’s mainly used to describe people using popular politics as election fodder and not following up on it once they’re elected.

That's not really how I define populism. that's just a popular platform. Every person elected by popular vote runs on something popular with the majority (unless you live in the US).

I think of populism as prioritizing the short run (usually for political gain) at the expense of the long term. So for instance Andrew Yang promising to pay every on 1k a month while paying for it with a 10% vat, when every economist asked about it said that would at best cover half of the money needed. Or Johnson promising to "take back control" when he knows full well he will end up signing a deal that will give that control away. Simply being popular doesn't make a policy, platform or politician Populist.

BarrileteCosmico wrote:

Freeza wrote:We’ve got plenty populism lol.

Populism just means politics that are popular with a majority of the people. There’s nothing negative in it in its essence. It’s mainly used to describe people using popular politics as election fodder and not following up on it once they’re elected.

That's not really how I define populism. that's just a popular platform. Every person elected by popular vote runs on something popular with the majority (unless you live in the US).

I think of populism as prioritizing the short run (usually for political gain) at the expense of the long term. So for instance Andrew Yang promising to pay every on 1k a month while paying for it with a 10% vat, when every economist asked about it said that would at best cover half of the money needed. Or Johnson promising to "take back control" when he knows full well he will end up signing a deal that will give that control away. Simply being popular doesn't make a policy, platform or politician Populist.

Yeah I agree with that. That's why I said populism is often election fodder.

The term is mostly used negatively. But we have plenty populism in our countries, especially from right wing parties in regards to muslims.

I don't think the word in its definition is bad. But there's often too many checks and balances for it to turn into actual law. And there's so much more check and balances in Scandinavian countries than in the US I'd thunk, since there's so many parties represented, and noone can get along.

Freeza wrote:We’ve got plenty populism lol.

Populism just means politics that are popular with a majority of the people. There’s nothing negative in it in its essence. It’s mainly used to describe people using popular politics as election fodder and not following up on it once they’re elected.

I want to slap you with a dictionary of Terminology of Political Science for your post.
Populism has a proper scientific definition, no matter what you say.
I kinda get what you're driving at, and I agree that it's not inherently bad in a democracy to do what people want, but BC was right when he said that the heart of populism is to ignore the plight of the minorities. People should read more Alexis de Tocqueville.

Bloombergs a motherfucker.

This is nasty

Young Kaz wrote:Bloombergs a motherfucker.

I agree for once.

Thank god Bloomberg is a bad debater and not energetic.

WTF Pete said he was Microsoft Word guy. Seriously what is wrong with this nerd.

Anyone who could possibly support Bloomberg doesn’t deserve to live.

What a terrible human