Showing posts with label caucus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label caucus. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

Bernie Supporters Trash the Nevada Dem Convention

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Previous Related Posts:
Bernie the Sore Loser
Bernie Brats Need to Stop Dissing South
Desperation in Bernie Land
Susan Sarandon Likes Trump Over Hillary
Bernie Camp Blames Hillary for AZ Loss
Bernie Gives Hillary the Hand of Silence

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Hillary Clinton won the Nevada Caucus so the state convention should have been a simple matter of dividing up delegates between herself and Bernie Sanders.

But nothing in the 2016 election is EVER that simple. In fact, the Nevada Democratic Convention turned ugly due to the sore-loser attitude of his followers.

From Washington Post
Prior to the state convention, some Sanders supporters began an effort to shift the convention rules in a way that they viewed as more favorable to their candidate. One of those changes, the Las Vegas Sun reported, was a process for verifying voice votes; another took issue with the state party chairwoman, Roberta Lange, heading up the convention. Supporters at the event circulated petitions to the same end. The scene was set.

The first report from the credentials committee on Saturday morning indicated that Clinton had a slight edge in delegates. Sanders fans voted against that report, per Jon Ralston, and then demanded a recount – but this was simply a preliminary figure…. That was when the vote to approve the rules as written – Roberta’s Rules versus Robert’s Rules, as some Sanders backers dubbed them – was conducted by voice vote. The motion, seconded by a Sanders supporter, passed – which is when the room, in Ralston’s phrasing, “erupts.”

Jon Ralston had it right - the Bernie delegates "erupted" into anger, shouting, name-calling, and even chair-tossing. Eventually the place had to be shut down and the police were called in to make people leave the venue. Video of the melee is below. None of it bodes well for the Philadelphia Democratic Convention later this summer.

One of the problems was that 64 delegates for Bernie showed up, some of them apparently bused in from California. Obviously they couldn't participate in the Nevada Caucus, but that didn't stop them from shouting and raising a ruckus about how unfair the establishment is.


People behaved so badly, even shouting down Senator Barbara Boxer of California, that the police were called in to clear the building. The next day, Nevada Democratic Headquarters had to be closed due to threats.

From Las Vegas Review Journal
The convention is over, but the wider battle for order continues within the Nevada State Democratic Party. It’s playing out not in the shuttered headquarters, but on social media, where some Sanders backers relentlessly criticize and insult state party Chairwoman Roberta Lange. The outcry turned ugly over the weekend, when Lange’s cellphone number was posted online and she received death threats.
A Metropolitan Police Department spokesman confirmed Monday that the agency is investigating the threats. He declined to comment further, as the investigation continues.
Scores of voicemails and texts left on Lange’s cellphone and provided to the Las Vegas Review-Journal show that some came from out-of-state people.
“I’m a Democrat from Ohio,” one texted her. “What you did yesterday was despicable. Please resign and turn yourself over to authorities.”
Another texted: “Are you scared of us? Of Bernie? Are you that big of a coward?” Yet another texted: “You’re a piece of trash. You are embarrassing to this country. You make Americans look bad and make women look worse. Hillary isnt going to win!”

Scroll down this post for more examples of death threats and insults.



Update: John Oliver on Comedy Central Points Out
That the Whole Caucus System is a Failure



By Monday, outrage from the rest of the Democratic Party reached fever pitch. Everyone has heard enough shouting from the Bernibros, bots, and gals, thank you very much. No one has patience anymore for this crazy-ass takeover of our party by Independent Rand-Paul-Nader Libertarian types, and no one gives a crap about their "Revolution."

The Sanders team put out a statement on Monday, but it was too little, too late:



The Nevada Dems formally lodged a complaint with the DNC:





Chanting "Recount, Recount"

Note:
This video wrongly states that Bernie won Nevada.
Hillary actually won - this is posted for the background.











Senator Barbara Boxer begs crowd for civility
"Bernie is my friend. You want to boo me? You're booing Bernie."
"Keep on booing, and boo yourselves right out of this election."



One man in the crowd yelled at Boxer:
"Who gives a sh*t, b*tch?!!"
Charming.



Police Action and Shut Down




Berners began to use social media to threaten Nevada Democratic Officials as well as Superdelegates.






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Saturday, April 9, 2016

Desperation in Bernie-Land

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Previous Related Posts:
Susan Sarandon Likes Trump Over Hillary
 Bernie Camp Blames Hillary for AZ Loss
Bernie Gives Hillary the Hand of Silence
Polls and Predictions for Hillary and Bernie on Super Tuesday
Hillary Landslide in South Carolina
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Bernie Sanders has won the last seven consecutive primaries and caucuses, including a big win in Wisconsin last week, and is expected to win the mostly-white Wyoming Caucus today. But the front-runner, Hillary Clinton, will probably beat him in the New York Primary of April 19th in spite of the fact that Bernie being born and raised there.

Of course his rabid followers believe Bernie can win big in New York and pull out wins from now until June, but the reality is he still lags behind in delegates, and even tying or barely beating Hillary will not help. So there is a looming sense of do-or-die for his campaign, especially for his highly-paid team of Tad Devine and Jeff Weaver who need the Bernie fans to keep sending money.

From RealClearPolitics
“With our victory tonight in Wisconsin, we have won seven out of the last eight caucuses and primaries, and we have won almost all of them with overwhelming, landslide numbers,” Sanders said during a victory speech so familiar to his Wyoming supporters that they shouted out lines along with the candidate.
. . . In an email to admirers, Sanders described what remained of April as “the most important three-week stretch of the campaign.”
“We’re going to win this election,” he vowed, “if we can keep our momentum going.”
. . . Clinton’s campaign team predicts that after April 26, when voters in Connecticut, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Washington, D.C., participate and 631 delegates are divvied up, the nominating drama may be mathematically finished for Sanders.

Yet Bernie is his own worst enemy, sounding woefully unprepared for obvious questions in his interviews, such as the methodology of how to "break up the banks" which he mentions in every speech:

From Bernie's Interview with the New York Daily News Board:
Daily News: Well, it does depend on how you do it, I believe. And, I'm a little bit confused because just a few minutes ago you said the U.S. President would have authority to order...

Sanders: No, I did not say we would order. I did not say that we would order. The President is not a dictator.

Daily News: Okay. You would then leave it to JPMorgan Chase or the others to figure out how to break it, themselves up. I'm not quite...

Sanders: You would determine is that, if a bank is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. And then you have the secretary of treasury and some people who know a lot about this, making that determination. If the determination is that Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan Chase is too big to fail, yes, they will be broken up.

Daily News: Okay. You saw, I guess, what happened with Metropolitan Life. There was an attempt to bring them under the financial regulatory scheme, and the court said no. And what does that presage for your program?

Sanders: It's something I have not studied, honestly, the legal implications of that.

Some of Sanders high-profile surrogates are not helping either. Actor Tim Robbins, long-time partner of Bernie supporter Susan Sarandon, introduced the candidate in Wisconsin by weirdly slamming both the island of Guam, which hasn't voted yet, and the state of South Carolina, an early Southern state who went for Hillary. This continues the Sanders pattern of looking at the Southern states who went mostly for Hillary Clinton as some type of "rigged" election that "stacked the deck" against them. Bernie and company don't seem to understand that for Dems in red states, the primary season is the one chance to make their voices heard to the national party. But forget that - Bernie must win! To hell with the Democratic Party base!

Via Washington Post
"After the Southern primaries," he said, "you had called the election" -- apparently referring to the media. "And who's fooling who? Winning South Carolina in the Democratic primary is about as significant as winning Guam. No Democrat is going to win in the general election. Why do these victories have so much significance?"
This is a not-uncommon argument among supporters of Sanders. Yes, Hillary Clinton is winning. But she's winning largely because she ran up big margins in Southern states. That, the argument goes, bodes poorly for the general, since those Southern states usually vote Republican.
This is a bad argument that borders on insulting.









Surrogate Nina Turner, a former state senator from Ohio and one-time Hillary supporter, made a bizarre reference to slavery while debating ex-Senator Barney Frank on the tv machine:

MSNBC's Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell Transcript:
NINA TURNER: There may be many people standing that are part of the elected ministry in the establishment, standing on the side of Secretary Clinton. Some of those folks I have worked with, but the bottom line is this. There are millions of Americans in this country who believe that change needs to come, that the status quo cannot continue, that people are suffering in this country.

And, Senator Bernie Sanders has a proven track record of having the good judgment and standing up for the least of these when it is not convenient. So, it is unfair. And, congress people like Keith Ellison. I would take his endorsement any day. And, he has endorsed senator Bernie Sanders and that is a big deal. There was a time in this country where the majority of folks thought slavery was OK too.

 O`DONNELL: Barney, go ahead.

 FRANK: That last comment just baffles me. It is going to take me about a
week to figure out what that was supposed to mean. But as far as Keith Ellison is concerned, I admire Keith. I just signed an e-mail for him. But, he is one of 45 members of the congressional black caucus and every other one is for Hillary Clinton.

So, you are talking about the establishment. No, I do not think John Lewis, one of the great moral leaders of my generation who is a strong Hillary Clinton supporter, is the establishment, not in a bad way – Or Luis Gutierrez who is led the fight for immigration. I understand, and
maybe this highlights in.



And things have gone downhill from there, with the Bernie camp desperately throwing everything and the kitchen sink at Hillary and hoping it will keep their momentum going, calling her "unqualified" and so "ambitious" that she is going to "destroy the party." Yeah, right. Women aren't allowed to be ambitious!















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Thursday, March 3, 2016

Election 2016 ~ Super Tuesday

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Previous Related Posts:

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It was a crazy night to say the least! Hillary and Trump won big, but so did Ted Cruz. Bernie Sanders won several states and many delegates, but lost the New England prize of Massachusetts to Hillary. Rubio won the single state of Minnesota on the GOP side, but Kasich lost Maine to Trump. Ben Carson was missing and no one really knows what he was doing, but he dropped out of the race the day after.



So here's how it went:



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Wednesday, February 24, 2016

GOP Stuck with Monster Trump

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Previous Related Posts:
Trump Triumphant So Far
Palin Endorses Trump
Trump Misogyny - the Schlong and Short of It
Trump Jumps the Shark with Facism
Trump Gives Helicopter Rides at Iowa State Fair
Trump's Hair and Other Viral Memes

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The far-right and their Fox Noise Machine created Trump, and now they know they are stuck with him. If he loses, they lose to the Democrats. But if he wins, they still lose because they have to work with him and kiss up to him forever. There is no way to really win.











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Trump Triumphant So Far

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Previous Related Posts:
Palin Endorses Trump
Trump Misogyny - the Schlong and Short of It
Trump Jumps the Shark with Facism
Trump Gives Helicopter Rides at Iowa State Fair
Trump's Hair and Other Viral Memes
First #GOP Primary Debate on Fox
Countdown to Trump Clown Car Debate
Trump Tosses Univision's Jorge Ramos

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Donald Trump can't get over himself, and his followers apparently can't get enough of him either. In spite of hopes from both Dems and Republicans that Trump would get tired of parading around as American's next white hope, he has become the nearly undisputed GOP front runner in the Republican Primary for President of the United States. He won the South Carolina Primary last Tuesday, and easily scooped another win in Nevada.

Meanwhile, little Marco Rubio keeps insisting that his second or third place ties with Ted Cruz are actually wins, and that the longer he stays in the race, the more likely he is to accidentally win something. Or something.

Cruz is just crestfallen that his God has forgotten to anoint him King of Merica yet.

Kasich is hanging on by a slim thread of who-knows-what, and doing embarrassing non-Moderate things like banning funding for Planned Parenthood in Ohio, and saying that women "left the kitchen" to vote for him in SC.

Rebublicans and Fox News are starting to panic at what a train-wreck their Primary Convention is going to be, with low-spending rogue Trump slamming everybody - especially the media - while praising himself to the skies.

No matter how horrible Trump is, they love him. Super Tuesday is looming on March 1st and he's expected to walk away with it. And the world watches in horror.

However, let's remember that this is the Primary Season, and in order to win Trump has had to be vicious towards minorities, immigrants and women (not that he minds) and has even attacked the Pope, and they still vote for him. But the fact is, once we pivot to a contest between Trump and Hillary, he just can't win anymore. He will never get the vote from minority groups, LGBT, women, and mainstream liberals. Oh, some ex-Bernie Libertarians may join him since they have vowed to never vote for Hillary, but the rest of us will just need to show up and vote against him, end of story.





















































































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Thursday, August 20, 2015

Trump Gives Helicopter Rides at Iowa State Fair

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Previous Related Posts:
Trump's Hair and Other Viral Memes
First #GOP Primary Debate on Fox
Countdown to Trump Clown Car Debate
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Officials with the Iowa State Fair originally said they wouldn't allow Donald Trump to (a) bring his helicopter to the fair or (b) give helicopter rides to children of voters.
Sadly for Trump, and the many cable television producers looking forward to video of him being mobbed by hordes of helicopter-crazed children, state fair officials say a Trump touchdown “will not be happening” at the fair. “Trump did not ask for permission to do so, nor would he be granted permission if he does indeed seek it,” according to the Des Moines Register.

Then they caved, of course, The Donald arrived in his fancy hopped-up helicopter, and took unsuspecting kids up in the air like a latter-day Pied Piper, or perhaps the Child-Snatcher from Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang. And once in the air, Trump told a little boy that he is Batman. Yes, Batman.





So, happy children got to ride for free in a $7 million Sikorsky S-76 helicopter – N76DT, by numeral – from which they, too, could look down on senators, former senators, former governors, one former First Lady-senator-Secretary-of-State, and a whole mob of people eating Ultimate Bacon Brisket Bombs. And that's your metaphor. Trump is smart. So are you. So are your kids. You can look down on all the other "stupid" people.​
~ Charles P. Pierce on Esquire

From CNN
The pilot cut the engines. A man got out of the helicopter. He wore white shoes and white khakis with sharp creases and a red baseball cap that said MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN. He strolled across the searing asphalt and stood at the edge of a field, where nearly 100 people waited to find out what he would do or say next.
"We have quite a few children gonna take rides today," said Donald Trump, billionaire, celebrity, entertainer and Republican candidate for president. "Where are the children? Get them over here."
. . . Into the helicopter went William, 9; Sean, 6; Brendan, 5; and Henry, who just turned 3. Their mother went with them. Henry got scared just before takeoff and left the aircraft to be with his father. The other boys remained. William brought a GoPro camera to capture the experience; a clip later wound up on Facebook.
"Mr. Trump," he said, aiming the camera at his benefactor.
"Yes," Trump said, pulling on the lapels of his jacket.
"Are you Batman?" the boy asked.
"I am Batman," Trump said.














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Friday, March 20, 2015

Scott Walker Strategist Speaks Truth About Iowa - Gets Fired

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Presidential hopeful Scott Walker has fired strategist Liz Mair for being much, much too honest and outspoken about Iowa. Apparently she doesn't like the place, the politicians, or Iowa's historical role as one of the earliest primaries. She doesn't like the fact that while in Iowa groveling for the Presidency, you have to kiss the butt of Rep. Steve King.

From Huffington Post
Liz Mair, a veteran Republican strategist, announced on Tuesday her resignation from Walker's nascent campaign after a conservative furor over a series of tweets in which she criticized Iowa's caucus system -- and its ethanol politics -- for having undue influence over the nominating process. The backlash snowballed Tuesday night, when Iowa GOP Chair Jeff Kaufmann called for Mair's firing over the "naive" and "juvenile" comments.

Her downfall took about 24 hours - Hired on Monday, Forced to Resign on Tuesday

On Tuesday, shortly before 5 p.m., the New York Times ran a story quoting Iowa state Republican Chairman Jeff Kauffman, who said Mair “doesn’t have a clue what Iowa’s all about” and that Walker should fire her. That same story also quoted the co-chairman of a county Republican Party and the co-chairman of the state party saying similar things.
At 12:03 a.m. Wednesday, the AP reported that Mair was no longer a member of Walker’s campaign.
“The tone of some of my tweets concerning Iowa was at odds with that which Gov. Walker has always encouraged in political discourse,” she said in a statement. “I wish Gov. Walker and his team all the best.”

Of course many of us in the rest of America totally agree with her. But in today's GOP which is based on "purity" of thought and tweet, you just can't be this honest and practical. There's no room in the Grand Old Party for new ideas or reformation. It's sad but true.

Of course, she is still a Republican, and even while ranting about her situation - caused by conservatives - she blamed the Democrats for "digging up her tweets."



Of course it's the Right Wing Nut Jobs in Iowa who are attacking her - not the Dems!







That's a plus for the GOP, but . . .



Sorry, now they have to hate you! Because God!

A few conservative pundits have come to Mair's defense - strange bedfellows, if you ask me! And why is pundit Erick Erickson of Red State telling his own party members to "DIAF" or "Die in a Fire"? I guess because he is more of a Libertarian these days - so to hell with everyone else, right?

From Erickson of Red State
UPDATE: I see from the Associated Press that Liz Mair has resigned from Governor Walker’s campaign. Given Liz’s work history, I will put it to you this way — Team Walker has botched this. There’s just no way Liz Mair resigned with it being her idea. I haven’t talked to her yet, but there’s just no way. So instead of Walker owning this, he’s passed the ball and made a staffer off herself. That’s unfortunate and plays into the “not ready for prime time” theme already developing around Team Walker. At least it is early.
But the voices who decided to stir this pot need to DIAF as far as I’m concerned.



But Erickson is a Sinner with a Dirty Mind:


Jonah Goldberg on National Review
Walker talks a big game about standing up to labor unions and the left — and rightly so. His record as governor is nothing short of heroic. He even suggested that his record of standing up to the left at home suggests the kind of leadership he’d show in the fight against ISIS. He phrased it poorly, but the point he was trying to make was that he can’t be intimidated. Well, maybe. I don’t know Mair very well. But if Erickson is right, and I’d bet he is, then Mair was asked to fall on her sword. Even if she wasn’t asked but volunteered, the point remains that Walker accepted her resignation because a bunch of party apparatchiks in Iowa are terrified of any dissent over their gravy train.


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Liz Mair's Original Problem Tweets
That Drove Iowa Crazy:







Post-Firing Tweets:

























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Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Ted Cruz Hunts the Presidency in Iowa

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On the hunt itself, at which several reporters trailed Cruz with cameras, he seemed only to chat with his fellow hunters briefly and in hushed tones, at one point discussing a former clerk to Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia as "a principled conservative." Cruz and King discussed loyalty in electoral politics as they pushed through the underbrush, both agreeing that "you never forget who was in the first foxhole with you."
. . . Cruz used his own shotgun -- flown up from Texas as checked baggage on his United flight. He hit two pheasants himself and cheered others along the way.
"Someone make a pillow!" Cruz said when one bird fell from the sky in a hail of feathers. "Or just turn it straight into McNuggets."
~ NBC News

Chris Matthews on Hardball, Oct. 28, 2013
The Wacko-Birds go pheasant hunting. Let's play Hardball.
Halloween is about pretend goblins - we can laugh at what we're afraid of. Death, zombies, ghosts, monsters. Tea Partiers. But Ted Cruz is for real and he's not just a nightmare and he was out there this weekend in the broad scary daylight of Iowa. . . . Senator Cruz is the right wing zealot of the season. His shutdown killed public confidence in government, and his attacks relentless and righteous have stirred resistance to the President's health care program. His tactics of shutdowns and threats to default have hurt economic growth even as he campaigns on a promise of, guess what? Economic growth. He reminds me of the kid who kills his parents then begs the judge's mercy on the ground that he's an orphan. A perfect candidate for Halloween Week.

From Buzzfeed
Friday night at the Iowa Events Center, conservative Christian activist Steve Scheffler came to the podium to give thanks to God for the Tea Party savior — and plead for more principled conservative leaders like him willing to “be crucified for their belief system.”
The ballroom full of amens that followed went a long way toward explaining why Cruz — fresh off a failed crusade to dismantle Obamacare that resulted in a 16-day government shutdown and a political disaster for his party — has been greeted with such adoration by Tea Party crowds in recent days.
. . . “Every time one of these guys attacks him, it’s good for him,” said one Iowa Republican operative. “He’s like a superhero. The more bullets that get shot at him, the bigger and stronger he gets.”

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