Democrats/Hillary voters only --- Are you happy with Tim Kaine as the VP choice?

[ALiberalModerate]

The idea that getting 51% of the popular vote within a state deserves getting 100% of that state's electoral votes is ridiculous. Each state's electors should be assigned proportionally like NE does now.

We should just go to a straight popular vote. The idea that states like Iowa can have a ton of influence in a presidential election is ridiculous.

 

[JANFU]

We should just go to a straight popular vote. The idea that states like Iowa can have a ton of influence in a presidential election is ridiculous.

Would that dilute the influence of smaller States?
Do not some States base their electoral votes upon votes received?

 

[Risky Thicket]

I wasn't going to vote at all this election. Last week or so, I was just beginning to creak on it a bit, after a sufficiently large number of my American friends begged me to just vote defensively. I wasn't sold, because god do I hate her, but I was thinking about it.

Now?

No way in hell.

I am not voting for a supposed liberal who picked as veep a Wall Street shill who consistently supports deregulation of same, and has a questionable streak of war profiteering and putting up roadblocks to abortion against women.

Can't do it. She's pushing 70 and I am not taking a chance on that man being president. I'd vomit while I tried to sign the paperwork.

She has probably lost a good part of her base and just about everyone she might have been hoping to sway from the Sanders camp. She's sure as hell lost me.

She should be ashamed of herself, honestly. She's running as basically a Republican circa 1995. Safe, wishy washy, and extremely, incredibly lucrative. She seems to have chosen a veep based on nothing but what will make her the most money without causing too much controversy and endangering the flow of cash once she's in the presidency.

Well, I won't be helping her get there. I'd reckon I'm in good company.

And can I just say how ironic it is that she's spent her entire campaign implying that any woman who doesn't vote for her is a sexist, and now she's picked a running mate who has an incredibly questionable history of respecting women's healthcare? Can I just say how ****ing annoying that is?

If sincerity alone acted as a sort of beacon, she'd be able to see my raised middle finger all the way from London.

Tell it, baby girl.

 

[JANFU]

Tell it, baby girl.

View attachment 67204696

LMAO. But so accurate

 

[FluffyNinja]

We should just go to a straight popular vote. The idea that states like Iowa can have a ton of influence in a presidential election is ridiculous.

I'll up you one. We should go a step further by abolishing the presidential system altogether in favor of a parliamentary government.

 

[Fiddytree]

As he doesn't quite fit the Blue Dog centrist model, he's a bit too liberal for my tastes. But it's enough moderation to make me feel just a bit better about pulling for a liberal like Hillary. If it weren't for Trump, it would have been easier for me to pull the trigger for Rubio, let alone Bush or Kasich.

 

[Fiddytree]

It just strikes me that in Kaine she has chosen a running-mate that appeals to exactly the same demographic and constituency that she most appeals to: moderate, centrist types that approve of the political status quo in Washington. An insider, another member of the Washington club.

It depends on the kind of 'moderate, centrist' type you're exposed to. If being anti-fraking, pro-gun control, anti-charter schools, etc. is so normal that anything to the contrary reeks being a right-winger, then yeah, being those things will still be check marks toward one's moderation. It's like a coastal, urban Democratic centrism as opposed to "flyover" Democratic centrism. But the kind of moderate and centrist types the Democrats have been pushing out over the last decade that I most align with, Kaine isn't really among them, Bill Clinton isn't really among them, and Hillary Clinton absolutely is not. We're much more with Jim Webb, which is why a lot of Republicans view Blue Dogs as the most likely candidates for centrism--because the GOP, when it isn't the investor class's Party is very much a rural & rural working class Party. However, because of the revitalization of McGovernism, Social Democracy, and Democratic Socialism within the Democratic Party, we are once again seeing yet another attempt by the further factions to redefine what it is to be a liberal, shifting former liberal stalwarts to "the center," while the "center" increasingly finds itself being attached to people it once thought were too liberal (or in the GOP, too conservative).

Where I am most with Kaine, however, is his focus on minority and civil rights issues: race, gender, foster care, and disability. Webb wasn't particularly keen on that. Kaine and the Bidens are, however.

 

[Fishking]

I suppose too many of them are either (a) still high or hungover from weekend college parties, (B) too caught up in a new level of an online game, or (C) too busy hanging out at Starbucks solving the world's problems one tweet at a time, to actually get out and vote. :shrug:

Haha...probably more truth to this than what there should be.

 

[Painter]

He has executive experience but should have more experience in foreign affairs.

Really?
Just how much more experience should he have?

Clinton Doubles Down on National Security With Tim Kaine Pick | Foreign Policy

Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, serves on the Senate’s Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees and has emerged as a leading liberal voice on national security. He’s best-known for waging a relentless and at times lonely campaign against the White House’s ability to use military force against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria without explicit congressional authorization.

 

[joG]

Really?
Just how much more experience should he have?

Clinton Doubles Down on National Security With Tim Kaine Pick | Foreign Policy

Thathank you for the link. That is interesting. I knew little about him and looked up his CV. It did not mention the Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees tenures. That is something. Not really enough, but it does make for a reasonable argument.

 

[Harry Guerrilla]

That is exactly why I think its foolish to vote 3rd party this time around. If you are a conservative, then you would be foolish to allow a Democrat to appoint 3 justices. If you are a liberal, then you would be foolish to allow a Republican to appoint 3 justices.

Ideally the court would remain fairly balanced, but that simply is not going to be the case this time.

If you support incredibly unethical behavior, you'd vote for Hillary.
Hopefully they'll be **** canning her in short order and handing it to Bernie.

With the potential for more damning evidence to come out, that could lead her to actually being indited.
That would be the wise plan.

 

[Cyrylek]

Never ever imagined myself "a Hillary voter" - but we live in "interesting times". Unless Johnson/Weld pull off a miracle, I will be voting for the Robot-Lizard Lady in November...

To the chase: No, I am extremely unhappy with the choice of Kaine. You can't beat something with nothing.

 

[ttwtt78640]

We should just go to a straight popular vote. The idea that states like Iowa can have a ton of influence in a presidential election is ridiculous.

Iowa's "ton of influence" is not because of its electoral might. Like NH it's early primary (caucus?) date gives it undue press attention.

 

[Redress]

I thought it was an odd choice. I thought she was going to choose someone more like Bernie to really lock in those voters. Maybe she felt like they were all going to vote for her anyway, so she went the other way.

If Sanders supporting Clinton, Sanders getting rules and platform concessions, if those where not enough to sway Sanders voters to vote Clinton, a VP pick who has limited power is probably not going to do it either.

To answer your poll question, I fall somewhere between the first two options, It is a good, solid, but not great pick. There no great picks out there, but this one does everything you can ask a VP pick to do.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Iowa's "ton of influence" is not because of its electoral might. Like NH it's early primary (caucus?) date gives it undue press attention.

I don't mean the primaries. I am talking about how a little swing state like Iowa can get tons of money spent on it in the general.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Would that dilute the influence of smaller States?
Do not some States base their electoral votes upon votes received?

Just one state does and yes it would dilute the influence of small states that demographically look nothing like the country as a whole.

If you let state's proportionately award electoral votes, you set up a system with the same kind of gerrymandering potential as we currently have with the House.

 

[haymarket]

Solid choice with the added advantage of being able to replace him with a Dem to hopefully keep control of the Senate next January since Virginia has a Democratic governor. The fluency in spanish is a big plus on the campaign trail in many states.

 

[ttwtt78640]

I don't mean the primaries. I am talking about how a little swing state like Iowa can get tons of money spent on it in the general.

If it were not for so many safe states then there would not be so many swing states. Use of proportional allotment of electors would fix much of the problem without making small (low population) states completely irrelevant.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

If it were not for so many safe states then there would not be so many swing states. Use of proportional allotment of electors would fix much of the problem without making small (low population) states completely irrelevant.

I would imagine that proportional allotment would end up being gerrymandered just like the House is.

 

[ttwtt78640]

I would imagine that proportional allotment would end up being gerrymandered just like the House is.

Gerrymandering, even if done to an extreme (like Texas?), usually has a small effect.

The Lone Star State has some of the craziest looking districts in the country. Those districts are efficient at creating an advantage for conservative politicians in the state. The study says that gerrymandering gives Texas Republicans an extra two seats in the House (and of course this effect adds up at the national level).

This is how efficiently Republicans have gerrymandered Texas congressional districts - Houston Chronicle

Use of gerrymandering in Texas was said to have resuited in a change of 2 out of 36 congresional districts (38 electoral votes) but winner takes all skews the Texas popular vote much more when converted to an electoral republicant landslide of 38 to 0 instead of a typical (proportional) 27 to 11 republicant electoral advantage.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_delegations_from_Texas

 

[Caine]

Never ever imagined myself "a Hillary voter" - but we live in "interesting times". Unless Johnson/Weld pull off a miracle, I will be voting for the Robot-Lizard Lady in November...

To the chase: No, I am extremely unhappy with the choice of Kaine. You can't beat something with nothing.

You realize they can't "pull off a miracle" unless you actually vote for them...... RIGHT??!?!?!?!

Or do you do your voting based on who is winning already? Is that the same mentality you have with football. I bet you are a Alabama Roll Tide fan huh? How about the Denver Broncos? Cavaliers basketball fan? This season you like the Cubs?

 

[Gimmesometruth]

And if you'll note, now that everyone has seen what his policies have really done, Bill Clinton is rather hated by much of the black community.

I wouldn't call 10% or less "much".




https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.n...5w69nd0xq/tabs_OP_Primary_Voters_20160111.pdf

 

[Cyrylek]

You realize they can't "pull off a miracle" unless you actually vote for them...... RIGHT??!?!?!?!

Or do you do your voting based on who is winning already? Is that the same mentality you have with football. I bet you are a Alabama Roll Tide fan huh? How about the Denver Broncos? Cavaliers basketball fan? This season you like the Cubs?

Chill. I have donated as much as I legally could to the Libertarian ticket, and if there's any, any chance of The Governor (Bill Weld was the most admired politician in the long history of our Commonwealth) stealing those electoral votes from the two monstrosities.....But this is not going to happen. I know, and you know - this is how it is. Life sucks. It is either the reincarnation of Juan Peron on American soil or that thing.

I vote for "that thing" - I like American soil a lot, it was good to me.

 

[Marvan Buren]

Would that dilute the influence of smaller States?
Do not some States base their electoral votes upon votes received?

Maine and Nebraska apportion their electoral votes based on Congressional districts with 2 EVs going to the winner. This might make sense if the Congressional districts weren't gerrymandered. All other states are winner take all.

As to the impact on small states, it would be non-existent. The winner-take-all aspect of the electoral college makes large swing states like Ohio and Florida far more important that they should be. A small number of votes in those states (along with Virginia and Colorado) can decide the election. Hence, the candidates don't even bother with the small states.

 

[Casca XV]

Question: Are any of you "Hillary Voters" actually excited about her, or are you just DNC team players?