[Game Thread]Democratic Presidential Debate 2020, July 30 & 31

[Independent voter]

That is all Biden really needs though. He knows what his strengths are, and he doesn't want to rock the boat. What a lot of people who are heavily invested in politics don't seem to realize is that Biden's support really has very little to do with Joe Biden, his base is the people that just really want Obama back. That is why are these attacks on Biden's record isn't really registering in the polls. They don't care, they just want that face in the White House because they are comfortable with that and don't really want anything new or different.

Which hilariously makes Biden's campaign pretty much the polar opposite of what got Obama elected in the first place. Don't underestimate the value of voters who don't care about politics. It is why Yang will lose, he is overestimating voters. Biden isn't, all he needs to do is stay familiar and friendly looking.

I think what Biden's strength is that he's the kind of person we've always elected president. He's stable and will do all the things presidents have always done: play nice with our allies; try to get some common sense laws through congress; work on global trade; etc.

He's "not Trump".

Plus he's been in congress for 44 years. He knows how things work and who to talk to.

[Seiklis]

Yea Biden's campaign is absolutely a "Return to Normalcy" campaign

Against Trump that's not the worst thing to run as seeing how most people would probably admit Trump has been exhausting

Trump's biggest weapon is the whole "vote for me or the economy goes with me," but I don't think that'll work against Biden

The key would be his VP choice since one heartbeat from the Presidency would be a very real concern. Harris has been seen as the obvious choice for awhile but he might believe he has to pick Warren to shore up his left flank and not double down like Hilary did.

I still think Steve Bullock is a sleeper VP for pretty much anyone

[Gestopft]

Yeah that's not gonna work either. The boomers said the same thing on foreign and economic policy, with regards to the Greatest Generation. Then the Boomers decided to become their parents and launch the War on Terror and cause the biggest financial Crisis since the 1930s.

The Boomers grew up in the post-war boom; Millennials not only came of age around the Great Recession, but decades of wage stagnation undermining of workers. Boomers had a 90%+ chance of being better off than their parents. Millennials have closer to a 50% chance.

Yes the definition of what is Liberal or Conservative will change (as it always does) but it seems to me that the formative events of the Millennials' politics make it very hard for the generation to swallow the Reaganomics of their parents.

From a political angle, if the Democratic Party of mid 2030s looks like Elizabeth Warren, then the Republican Party could very well look like Steve Bullock.

That sounds like a vast improvement on the status quo.

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Yea Biden's campaign is absolutely a "Return to Normalcy" campaign

Against Trump that's not the worst thing to run as seeing how most people would probably admit Trump has been exhausting

Seeing as it's "normal" that got us Trump...are you sure?

[Seiklis]

The Boomers grew up in the post-war boom; Millennials not only came of age around the Great Recession, but decades of wage stagnation undermining of workers. Boomers had a 90%+ chance of being better off than their parents. Millennials have closer to a 50% chance.

Yes the definition of what is Liberal or Conservative will change (as it always does) but it seems to me that the formative events of the Millennials' politics make it very hard for the generation to swallow the Reaganomics of their parents.



That sounds like a vast improvement on the status quo.

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Seeing as it's "normal" that got us Trump...are you sure?

Change candidate Trump is not 4 years of this shit Trump

[Felya]

I did not watch the debates. But from what I have read, the highlights and comments from Democratic political strategists, Joe Biden was the winner.

Those people are homers... he trailed off on most questions and by the end forgot his own campaign site name. People saying Biden won, are either hard core democrats or ‘Hillary and Trump are the same’ crowd, that worships Trump after his win.

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Change candidate Trump is not 4 years of this shit Trump

... or according to Biden from last nights debates, 4 or 8 more years. That was one of his many gaffs... visit his campaign site, it’s Joe Biden 303303...

[tyrlaan]

Yea Biden's campaign is absolutely a "Return to Normalcy" campaign

Against Trump that's not the worst thing to run as seeing how most people would probably admit Trump has been exhausting

Trump's biggest weapon is the whole "vote for me or the economy goes with me," but I don't think that'll work against Biden

The key would be his VP choice since one heartbeat from the Presidency would be a very real concern. Harris has been seen as the obvious choice for awhile but he might believe he has to pick Warren to shore up his left flank and not double down like Hilary did.

I still think Steve Bullock is a sleeper VP for pretty much anyone

While the appeal of just "getting back to normal" may exist for some folks, there are two big problems with betting on that to beat Trump:

1) A lot of people voted for Trump because they wanted change. A lot of former Obama voters flipped to Trump because of this. Why would those people vote for a candidate that represents a return to the thing they rejected in 2016? Banking on this means you need to assume people will swallow their pride, hold their nose, etc. and vote for an establishment candidate.
1a) People that voted Trump in 2016 knew what they were signaling they were okay with, so expecting a mass exodus from Trump support because we've seen him in action for 4 years now is a risky bet at best.

2) You can't go back. Trump is just a symptom. People might like the allure of going "back to normal" but just getting Trump out of office isn't going to fix all of our massive systemic problems that Trump has only exacerbated or the environment that exists that allowed Trump to get voted into office in the first place.


We've seen year on year since Trump has been president that his size of his base has barely changed. Sure, we can find cool stories about converts here and there, but everyone should overall expect him to get about as many votes as he did in 2016. Which means that you need to beat him by getting more people to the polls. And you don't inspire people to vote by saying "I'll give you more of the same", you inspire people to vote by saying "we're going to fix things and improve your life". Instilling a feeling of "things will be less crazy" is far less powerful than "things will be better".

Biden is a bad choice and a good way to get 4 more years of Trump.


Our best bet is probably Warren. Sanders is past his time, imo, (and I was all in on Bernie in 2016) and you get a better overall candidate with Warren but with pretty much all of Sanders' policies. She's smartly avoided the boogeyman word "socialist" (because Americans are stupid), doesn't come across like a cantankerous old dude that just yells all the time, manages to deliver a consistent message without just repeating the same speech every time, and somehow pulls off talking about how shitty things are in our country and then pivoting to a positive.



I'm not really sure what Bullock's selling points are, tbh. Watching him in the debate left me with two takeaways - he's got a good rehearsed smile and he likes to say "false choice" a lot without really backing the claim up. I haven't watched the second night yet, but from the first round I would say Castro is the most likely VP pick from the field.

[Seiklis]

I'm not a Biden backer....I'm just being pragmatic about the fact that he's well in the lead and will probably sweep the South and rust belt in a primary. I simply believe the remaining states will split enough ways it'll probably put him over the top.

I mean I'm voting Bernie like I did in the '16 primary unless Warren has significantly more momentum by the time the Ohio Primary rolls around. (very possible) But that doesn't mean I'm blind to the fact Biden is ahead and more ahead today than he was last week since Harris is less likely to be able to split off parts of the south than she was after the first debate.

But we're still far enough away and plenty of candidates will drop out between now and Iowa that people can recover or they can flop. That said, I don't think Harris is going to be able to reverse herself with southern black voters. Without that, the roads to blocking Biden become far narrower with Booker being the only one who could probably disrupt it

Oh and as far as Bullock is concerned...the VP pick for Biden is going to end up way more important than usual due to his age and the whole "one heartbeat from the Presidency" scenario. In such a case, a VP with a good deal of executive experience is gonna be seen as a big advantage. I just see Bullock as an age counter for Biden as someone who can help him win those people who are going to wonder if Biden can really make it to a second term. Bullock isn't gonna freak out people with the idea of him becoming President. I'm not sure Warren, Harris or especially Castro would do that.

[tyrlaan]

I'm not a Biden backer....I'm just being pragmatic about the fact that he's well in the lead and will probably sweep the South and rust belt in a primary. I simply believe the remaining states will split enough ways it'll probably put him over the top.

I mean I'm voting Bernie like I did in the '16 primary unless Warren has significantly more momentum by the time the Ohio Primary rolls around. (very possible) But that doesn't mean I'm blind to the fact Biden is ahead and more ahead today than he was last week since Harris is less likely to be able to split off parts of the south than she was after the first debate.

Yeah if he gets the nomination, he'll get my vote. He's a shitty candidate, but he's not Trump so it's not like its a tough decision.

But until he gets the nomination, if he gets it, I'm not only not backing Biden, I'll also keep making it abundantly clear why he's a terrible choice.

[Skroe]

I'm not a Biden backer....I'm just being pragmatic about the fact that he's well in the lead and will probably sweep the South and rust belt in a primary. I simply believe the remaining states will split enough ways it'll probably put him over the top.

I mean I'm voting Bernie like I did in the '16 primary unless Warren has significantly more momentum by the time the Ohio Primary rolls around. (very possible) But that doesn't mean I'm blind to the fact Biden is ahead and more ahead today than he was last week since Harris is less likely to be able to split off parts of the south than she was after the first debate.

But we're still far enough away and plenty of candidates will drop out between now and Iowa that people can recover or they can flop. That said, I don't think Harris is going to be able to reverse herself with southern black voters. Without that, the roads to blocking Biden become far narrower with Booker being the only one who could probably disrupt it

I'll just quote myself on this from a couple of months ago:

They've all had ample time to make an impact.

It's going to come down to Bernie, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and Joe Biden. Everyone else is already irrelevant.

Bernie has not built a new foundation of support in nearly two years. He has a minority and a women problem. His support base is smaller this time around because the others, Warren particularly, are offering what he is but with more specifics, which Democratic voters love (but is useless in the General Election).

We have to look at just 2012 and 2016 to see how it will go and extrapolate for two progressive candidates.
->The winner of the Iowa caucuses will walk away with <30%. Only the very bottom rung will drop out. But it will be indecisive enough there is no real "winner" this time, kind of like the 2012 Republican Caucuses (which Rick Santorum won) won't matter. Remember, even Ron Paul won these. In 2016, Hillary won it by 0.3% or something, and it sustain Berniemania. Let's say Warren wins this.

->Then shortly after there is New Hampshire. This will be Elizabeth Warren versus Bernie. Biden will come in 3rd or 4th. In 2016 Bernie blew Hillary out of the water here, thus sustaining the momentum. The question is: do NH voters decide to go with Bernie again, or go with Warren who can say the same kinds of things, but is a newer face. Chances are the winner of Iowa will not be the winner of NH, thus splitting the difference. Let's say Bernie wins this.

At this point the media, which loves the Horse race, will start talking about Biden's viability. You can hear Wolf Blitzer already. Pretty much the script he ran during Hillary in 2016. The insurgent progressive campaigns will talk of momentum.

On February 22nd is the Nevada Democratic caucuses. This one will very likely be Biden's first clear win owing to its large Hispanic population and more centrist Democratic electorate.

A week later on February 29th is the South Carolina primary. The Biden campaign is lining this up to be their second win. It's very unlikely it would go to anyone but him.

Then comes Super Tuesday, March 3rd 2020 when 40% of delegates are up. On that day American Samoa, Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Democrats Abroad, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia. Biden will win most of those. Probably:

Alabama
Arkansas
California
North Carolina
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Virginia

Bernie will take Vermont, Minnesota, maybe Colorado, Oklahoma and Democrats Abroad. Warren will take Massachusetts. If she splits any off, it'll be off Bernie in places like Oklahoma and Colorado (which has VERY blue parts), that work to the benefit of Biden.

This will give Biden a significant and nearly insurmountable lead, and largely contract it to a two person race (Biden and Bernie) depending if Warren peels off an extra state or two from Bernie. If she does, it'll be a 3 man race. But like in 2016, the person who walks away with California, Texas, North Carolina and Virgina - all of which should go to Biden - will be hard to catch up to _IF_ they keep winning everything else they should and have few surprises.

There will then be the Mid-March contests of Louisiana, Maine, Idaho, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, and Washington.

Biden will likely win all of these except Maine and Nebraska. Michigan will be close and will largely depend on if Warren stays in. If she does, it's an easy Biden. If she does not, it'll be very close like it was in 2016, and maybe a Bernie pickup.

The late March contests of Arizona, Florida, Illinois and Wyoming are four more that should readily go to Biden as well.

We then enter April. The progressives have some pick up opportunities here. While Biden will likely win Alaska and Delaware, Bernie or Warren will likely take Hawaii, Wisconsin, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Maryland. The real fight will be in Pennsylvania. It won't be enough to tip the scales if Bernie wins it, but it would be a kind of moral victory if he does. I'll call this a primary toss-up.

At this point, it's pretty much a formality. Biden will have captured it. What's left?

May: Kansas, Guam, Indiana, Nebraska, West Virginia, Kentucky, Oregon.
June: Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, South Dakota, Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Washington DC.


Over half of these always go to the more centrist Democrat. Winning all of them mathematically doesn't change the equation.

Which means that the situation in 2020 is going to be very much like it was on 2016: if Biden (like Hillary) walks away with an overall victory on Super Tuesday - March 3rd 2020 - it would take a complete collapse of the campaign and getting wiped out everywhere after Super Tuesday in order to not win the nomination. There will be the illusion of competitiveness by whoever comes in 2nd, but like in 2016, they'll always be 4 steps behind.



How did I come to these projections:
(1) For early races when there is a lot of candidates, I looked at the 2016, 2012 and 2008 Republican primary to see how a large number of ideologically similar candidates split the vote. For Iowa, I accepted the Bernie 2020 campaign's projection that there will be nobody who gets above 50% in Iowa.

(2) Starting with Super Tuesday, I looked at the 2004, 2008 and 2016 primary numbers and compared them Biden's standing now, to project if they vote "centrist" or "progressive" and like to surprise. There is no methodology behind this other than eyeballing it, let's be clear. This is not scientific at all.

The BIG takeaway is that the non-Biden face, whoever that is (I said it's Bernie in the above post) has to win Super Tuesday, and win in places progressives normally don't win in the Primary. Any candidate - Clinton, Biden, Candidate X, who wins Super Tuesday and then wins a steady pace the rest of the time, will be the candidate.

In fact, I'll go two steps further:
- Because it's unlikely Texas and Florida go to the progressive candidates, California (Super Tuesday) is must win for any progressive. A progressive who wins California + New York + Pennsylvania, Illinois and Michigan has a good chance of winning the nomination. The unlikely win of Virginia and North Carolina weighs very heavily on them, but wining California + a few more big states should counter the losses of Texas and Florida to some degree in terms of delegate math.

-Because of this, if the "progressive vote" doesn't coalesce around one candidate by Super Tuesday, stopping Biden is almost impossible. And this is the real problem for Democrats because it's very likely Warren or somebody unexpected could eek out a win in Iowa, Bernie wins New Hampshire, then Biden could pick up Nevada and South Carolina. Which means that Super Tuesday aka California decides the nomination day, comes around, and Bernie and Warren BOTH are in, split the vote, and make Biden's win in California easy.

Moral of the story: Bernie Bros won't be able to blame it on Super Delegates this time. They're facing what Republicans faced in in 2008 and 2012 specifically in their primary. If they want the progressive to be the nominee, they have to get it down to one progressive before Super Tuesday. If there are two on super Tuesday, you can blame the other progressives for spoiling the vote far more than Joe Biden and the centrist Democrats.

That bolded part is key. The nightmare situation for progressives is:
-Warren wins Iowa
-Bernie wins New Hampshire
-Biden wins both Nevada and South Carolina
-Neither Bernie or Warren will have any reason to shutter their campaigns and both will claim momentum going into Super Tuesday
-Kamala Harris says she's going to have her big moment on Super Tuesday and stays in too.

-The three progressives split the vote, particularly in big states, and Biden easily walks away with them.

Or to unspool this a bit, the only way to stop Biden is to get either Warren or Bernie to drop out, and get Kamala to drop out, and have them all choose one to support who will go against Biden. But there is no reason for any of the campaigns to do that until AFTER Super Tuesday. If Bernie loses both Iowa and New Hampshire, he still won't quite. If Warren loses both, I doubt she does too, until after Super Tuesday.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

What I walked away from it with is in the first debate before these 2 the person that called people out got noticed.. so this was the follower follow up were people were like.. hey.. I can call people out too! So it was mostly a waste of time. I feel all these things will be a waste of time until it gets down to 3-4 people so they can have more than 20-30 seconds at a time to actually discuss things and debate each other. Right now it is just the "LOOK AT ME" show.

[Seiklis]

I'll just quote myself on this from a couple of months ago:





That bolded part is key. The nightmare situation for progressives is:
-Warren wins Iowa
-Bernie wins New Hampshire
-Biden wins both Nevada and South Carolina
-Neither Bernie or Warren will have any reason to shutter their campaigns and both will claim momentum going into Super Tuesday
-Kamala Harris says she's going to have her big moment on Super Tuesday and stays in too.

-The three progressives split the vote, particularly in big states, and Biden easily walks away with them.

Or to unspool this a bit, the only way to stop Biden is to get either Warren or Bernie to drop out, and get Kamala to drop out, and have them all choose one to support who will go against Biden. But there is no reason for any of the campaigns to do that until AFTER Super Tuesday. If Bernie loses both Iowa and New Hampshire, he still won't quite. If Warren loses both, I doubt she does too, until after Super Tuesday.

I don't think by the time Iowa rolls around Harris is gonna be in the progressive camp so it'll be Bernie and Warren splitting the vote between themselves.

Harris could end up being the Kasich here and only be a top player in Nevada and California

[tyrlaan]

I'll just quote myself on this from a couple of months ago:





That bolded part is key. The nightmare situation for progressives is:
-Warren wins Iowa
-Bernie wins New Hampshire
-Biden wins both Nevada and South Carolina
-Neither Bernie or Warren will have any reason to shutter their campaigns and both will claim momentum going into Super Tuesday
-Kamala Harris says she's going to have her big moment on Super Tuesday and stays in too.

-The three progressives split the vote, particularly in big states, and Biden easily walks away with them.

Or to unspool this a bit, the only way to stop Biden is to get either Warren or Bernie to drop out, and get Kamala to drop out, and have them all choose one to support who will go against Biden. But there is no reason for any of the campaigns to do that until AFTER Super Tuesday. If Bernie loses both Iowa and New Hampshire, he still won't quite. If Warren loses both, I doubt she does too, until after Super Tuesday.

Except for the fact that you're assuming what you have surmised here is unique and certainly not something that is being or will be considered by these candidates or people that work for them.

If your brain can play out a scenario like this, so can other brains.

[Skroe]

I don't think by the time Iowa rolls around Harris is gonna be in the progressive camp so it'll be Bernie and Warren splitting the vote between themselves.

Harris could end up being the Kasich here and only be a top player in Nevada and California

For sure. I think that's likely. But even splitting it two ways dooms them both.

The existential problem for progressives is, either Warren must bend the kneed to Sanders, or vice verca, and they have to do it before Super Tuesday. But there is very little reason for either to do so UNTIL AFTER Super Tuesday.

If you want a good example of what this sort of looks like, see the 2012 Republican Primary. Mitt Romney fraudulently played someone far more conservative than he ever actually was. But capitalized on Ron Paul, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich splitting the vote until early April.

[Independent voter]

For sure. I think that's likely. But even splitting it two ways dooms them both.

The existential problem for progressives is, either Warren must bend the kneed to Sanders, or vice verca, and they have to do it before Super Tuesday. But there is very little reason for either to do so UNTIL AFTER Super Tuesday.

If you want a good example of what this sort of looks like, see the 2012 Republican Primary. Mitt Romney fraudulently played someone far more conservative than he ever actually was. But capitalized on Ron Paul, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich splitting the vote until early April.

Trump would rather run against the socialists than Biden.

Both Warren and Bernie plan on making job funded health insurance illegal, something voters don't want.

[Skroe]

Except for the fact that you're assuming what you have surmised here is unique and certainly not something that is being or will be considered by these candidates or people that work for them.

If your brain can play out a scenario like this, so can other brains.

Except there is a key difference: I don't work for any of their campaigns and I also don't really give a fig which one of them drops out first. Meanwhile every top-tier candidate and their staff there thinks they have a legitimate, no bullshit, shot at pulling this off. They have no plan here. That would be to plan for defeat before they've really even gotten started.

It's really as simple as "how do you convince Warren to bend the knee to Sanders or vice versa before Super Tuesday", because after Super Tuesday is too late. And before there is no reason to.

That's why Biden is going to walk away with this, just like Romney did, when he faced more doctrinaire challengers.

[tyrlaan]

Except there is a key difference: I don't work for any of their campaigns and I also don't really give a fig which one of them drops out first. Meanwhile every top-tier candidate and their staff there thinks they have a legitimate, no bullshit, shot at pulling this off. They have no plan here. That would be to plan for defeat before they've really even gotten started.

It's really as simple as "how do you convince Warren to bend the knee to Sanders or vice versa before Super Tuesday", because after Super Tuesday is too late. And before there is no reason to.

That's why Biden is going to walk away with this, just like Romney did, when he faced more doctrinaire challengers.

Well, we'll see. Sanders and Warren are close enough and the stakes are high enough that I'm not convinced its off the table. And of course there's a reason for one of them to drop out before Super Tuesday - you literally just spelled it out. And again, I'm confident you aren't the only person to think of this. Hell, the two of them have probably talked about this scenario a few times since as early as when they both decided to run.

[Gestopft]

For sure. I think that's likely. But even splitting it two ways dooms them both.

The existential problem for progressives is, either Warren must bend the kneed to Sanders, or vice verca, and they have to do it before Super Tuesday. But there is very little reason for either to do so UNTIL AFTER Super Tuesday.

If you want a good example of what this sort of looks like, see the 2012 Republican Primary. Mitt Romney fraudulently played someone far more conservative than he ever actually was. But capitalized on Ron Paul, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich splitting the vote until early April.

The irony here is that the pro-Bernie media assumed that this would be Biden's problem, not Sanders or Warren's. There was (at this point at least) either a complete underestimation of how much support Biden would get out of the gate or a vast overestimation of the ability of some of the other candidates to split the moderate vote with him.

[kaelleria]

The irony here is that the pro-Bernie media assumed that this would be Biden's problem, not Sanders or Warren's. There was (at this point at least) either a complete underestimation of how much support Biden would get out of the gate or a vast overestimation of the ability of some of the other candidates to split the moderate vote with him.

And this is why you look at polling rather than pundits...

[Blur4stuff]

Biden certainly isn't my first or even 5th choice for president, but I couldn't bitch too much if he ended up getting it. If you managed to escape a burning building you probably shouldn't be too upset that your clothes are singed. He would beat Trump and the country/world would be significantly better off for it.

But I still don't think he'll get it. Warren/Sanders are smart people. I expect they'll do the right thing before it's too late.

[Deletedaccount1]

Except there is a key difference: I don't work for any of their campaigns and I also don't really give a fig which one of them drops out first. Meanwhile every top-tier candidate and their staff there thinks they have a legitimate, no bullshit, shot at pulling this off. They have no plan here. That would be to plan for defeat before they've really even gotten started.

It's really as simple as "how do you convince Warren to bend the knee to Sanders or vice versa before Super Tuesday", because after Super Tuesday is too late. And before there is no reason to.

That's why Biden is going to walk away with this, just like Romney did, when he faced more doctrinaire challengers.

It's like how Rubio, Cruz, and Kasich ate each other which let Trump pick up a bunch of states he might have lost if he was against one clear opponent.

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The irony here is that the pro-Bernie media assumed that this would be Biden's problem, not Sanders or Warren's. There was (at this point at least) either a complete underestimation of how much support Biden would get out of the gate or a vast overestimation of the ability of some of the other candidates to split the moderate vote with him.

The payment controversy in Bernie's campaign isn't helping things either.