I hate this narrative for why Joe didn't run because it's utter bullshit. His family was still grieving over the death of his son and he didn't think it was fair to put them through the grinder of a presidential campaign. That is the only reason he didn't run.
-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
CNN : Biden: Clinton never figured out why she was running
- Thread starter fantomena
- Start date
- Status
I hate this narrative for why Joe didn't run because it's utter bullshit. His family was still grieving over the death of his son and he didn't think it was fair to put them through the grinder of a presidential campaign. That is the only reason he didn't run.
It was fucking obscene how quick they were to start that narrative. "Lets start taking minorities for granted, these bigots are the future of the party."
2016 has been the year the allies myth has been dispelled.
Poor GRIMES
Banned
Honestly rather than infighting even more amongst ourselves, we need to unify against the Trump presidency. Useless speculation and hindsight is not going to get us anywhere post election season. Saying Hillary was a weak candidate is redundant at this point and we should honestly look towards other avenues to better our party
jimmypython
Member
yet the Dem party was still backing her. lol.
it's making more and more sense that they lost.
it's making more and more sense that they lost.
More Fun To Compute
Member
Politicians don't care about people who don't vote around elections. When it isn't around elections they only care about people with fat wads of cash.
NoLongerALurker
Banned
As a Republican, I like Joe Biden. Had he ran and gotten the nomination I probably would have voted for him. He should really be the person to represent the Democratic Party going forward and run in 2020.
Kid Kamikaze10
Member
Can we dispel this one? Clinton got more voters than Obama did. What failed was her strategy and a mish mash of a unifying message. That's it.
It's not, race isn't the only factor, or more than race or some shit. And it damn sure ain't "you can't eat equality".
Clinton failed to do some work in specific areas in specific states. And the DNC's local game has been bad for a long time. That and many, many external factors got her in the end. Period.
EDIT: Ok, she did not. I mixed up when she had more votes than Obama in the Primary, but lost.
But she damn sure got more than Trump.
Point is, this idea that oh, white voters can be converted or some trash should not be the strategy going forward. Stopping things like voter suppression, Gerrymandering, or what happened in NC, should be.
VendettaRed07
Member
Chris Matthews pointed this out at the very beginning.
He was correct that she had a similar problem to Ted Kennedy here, where if you asked her or her staff directly "why are you running for President", you would get this mushy word salad.
But if you asked Bernie or Trump you'd get it in like 10 seconds. They at least had simple short answers to the question.
He was correct that she had a similar problem to Ted Kennedy here, where if you asked her or her staff directly "why are you running for President", you would get this mushy word salad.
But if you asked Bernie or Trump you'd get it in like 10 seconds. They at least had simple short answers to the question.
I remember when she launched her campaign in April or so... kept waiting for 'the pitch'. sure I know why I should vote for her but what about the Joe six packs in the rust belt and such
Months passed... and nothing. Basically just vote for me I'm Hillary. Wouldn't call it a "bad campaign" per se but it's crazy these were the same folks I'm charge of the 2008 and '12 operations
Months passed... and nothing. Basically just vote for me I'm Hillary. Wouldn't call it a "bad campaign" per se but it's crazy these were the same folks I'm charge of the 2008 and '12 operations
That's not what's being said at all.
Clinton (whom I voted for in both Prim and Gen btw) was concentrating so hard on the message of equality, for minorities and Women (which is needed) that she left the economy for middle class workers and the youth nearly completely off.
Heck, she went to Coal country (Ohio) and said She'd "put a lot of coal companies and coal miners out of business.".
Of course it was followed by a proposal to invest in clean energies to replace said jobs, but this is not what people focused on (or the media, or the Trump campaign). She also was concentrating on big donors and fund raising so much that she avoided Unions like the plague, except to ask for their support.
At the end, 80.000 is the number that mattered.
If 80.000 Dems across Mi, Wi and Pa had gone to vote instead of staying home, the US President would be Clinton.
he's spot on. the elitism he talks about seems to be getting worse. i hope it's just short term frustration at the result. writing all these voters off as just horrible stupid racist neanderthals is such a profoundly nihilistic campaign strategy and one that ends with a second term of the trump presidency & permanent republican majorities for enough time for them to destroy every social program they want and decimate the lives of minorities. the decisive voters in the rust belt bought into obama's message, then they bought into it again despite obama delivering vital but merely incremental change, hillary simply didn't have one for them.
Huh? I was certain Obama got more got votes in 08 and 12.
Edit he did 69.5 million and 65.9 million
Father_Brain
Banned
I agree it's unproductive to fixate on specific counterfactuals about whether Bernie or Biden had won had they been the nominee, but any strategy to beat Trump has to start from a full accounting of the party's failures this cycle. If the party doesn't recognize and internalize exactly why Clinton was a bad candidate, why her campaign was bad, and why the Democrats erred disastrously in clearing the field for her, they'll repeat the same mistakes again and again.
VendettaRed07
Member
If you watched her first ad when she first announced she made a great pitch.
Her first ad was her only good one. It was the only one that actually effectively communicated "I am to make the lives of the middle class and people of all backgrounds better"
Then Bernie got in and, as usual, she completely overreacted and lost track. She didn't keep it simple and felt some bizarre need to create distance between Bernie and herself and she never came back from. After that it was nothing but "Guns, I'm the most qualified, Trump is big bad and scary, won't someone please think of the children", etc.
I've seen that interview before. Biden is wrong. He implies that if we take care of economic issues (e.g. jobs) social issues (e.g. racism) will take care of themselves. That's not how it works and that's never how it's worked in the past.
The other point -- that voters will be far more motivated if they feel a personal connection with a candidate and/or a message -- is well taken and was central to the failure of the Clinton campaign. There he's right.
However, in combining these two things Democrats run a huge risk of overlearning the lesson of this election and simply lurching all the way from putting "identity politics" (or whatever we've chosen to call civil rights now) at the front of their messaging at the expense of all else to doing the same with economic security. It doesn't have to be that way. We can address both at the same time. And more importantly, we can't start soft-pedaling on civil rights because it's hard.
OniBarubary
Banned
How amusing that all this "compromise" and "unity" calls while saying we need to remain civil and take the high road come from them too.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
I brought up Australia referring to the rights Social Progress Index, where Australia is number 10: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Social_Progress_Index < With regards to women, other sexualities, individual human rights and freedoms. I know very well of the aboriginals, but that stain on their society doesn't bar them from the moniker of being a society with social progress in other areas.
I'm telling you that the social justice achieved by other countries is a byproduct of majority who voted self centeredly and in their own best interest, and minorities benefited from that. All of the equality and opportunity we have in Scandinavia is a direct byproduct of a majority who saw they had something to gain. We pay almost 40% of our taxes to fund free schools and health care. The stronger welfare state for minorities, the disabled, the sick, single mothers, a good pension, strong worker and union protection rights. All of that could only go through due to the majority seeing the benefit for their own selfish sake. minorities end up reaping strong benefits as a byproduct.
tricle-down-economics is when you got all welfare systems because you don't want lazy minorities who are not wearing bootstraps to spend your tax dollars. you want to gut the welfare state. its the complete opposite of what we have and what Bernie Sanders stands for.
I am not trying to say that countries with high equality on a scale are less racist. I am saying that people in luxembourg or Sweden are not any less racist than people in the US. It only take a refugee crisis and worsening equality to change the tide. it only take circumstances to give in to fascism. But if you're a minority there still is a lot of opportunity and better odds in some of these countries than in the US.
I know that helping the most vulnerable helps everyone. But that is as fleeting as saying world peace benefits us all. This is the real world and we will never achieve this, so lets look at what actually brings forth equality as seen in other countries. You don't have to convince me, it's everyone else, and they will not be convinced or be less racist until they have close and personal relations with minorities. they don't know any because they are not a factor, and ultimately anyone who is not themselves will not matter when push comes to shove. It's a quagmire.
To make more whites care about minorities you need to have more minorities exposed to and proper integrated as equals, but you cannot do that when minorities statistically are at the bottom and they will be on the bottom until the state inserts better programs, opportunity and protections to let them bypass some of the racist barriers. more exposure and power for minorities changes the winds.
Everything we have in scandinavia is due to these laws. we have the same angst and the same conservatism. but there is more opportunity because the selfish masses see the benefit and wisdom in helping others because they see it as helping themselves. they take high income tax not for minorities but for themselves. and minorities benefit immensely.
Your Entertainer
Member
Hillary was a bad choice. I think the lack of a clear message and people generally disliking her really hurt her. I would have voted for Biden in a heartbeat over her. I just like him more.
As opposed to continually talk about economic disparity, bringing back infrastructure jobs, etc
I can agree that Clinton should have campaigned more in the rust, but considering all Trump did was effectively blame "others" to say that bias didnt play a big part, if not the main part, is myopic.
Its was all China and immigrants... The Lee Atwater special remixed; shit im not even convinced him cozying up, and being successful with turning intona face from a heel, Russia doesnt have a racial element to it either
Angelus Errare
Banned
2008 was 8 years ago, and even then DNC didn't win majority of white voters. And McCain isn't Trump so I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. Yet again there have been like 3 separate studies that have come out so far that show Obama's support in the midwest plummeted the moment he decided to speak on Trayvon and it never recovered. They saw Obama as a guy who would bridge America and the moment he spoke, they saw him as pulling "the race card" and he lost his support.
Ignoring groups' personal issues to adopt a "one size fits all" issue is pretty messed up, because it's basically saying "well PoC will vote for us anyway! We don't need to speak to them". I honestly pray our demographics flip so much that such an approach starts to fuck DNC hard.
yep that too. Lets you know exactly where you stand
VendettaRed07
Member
I would like everyone to compare this ad to literally every single Hillary ad you saw on TV or whatever that came after it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N708P-A45D0
There is a clear and obvious difference here.
Hillary's problem wasn't necessarily that she was a "Weak" candidate, but that she had literally no confidence in herself. Someone confident in their message and strategy doesn't so viciously overreact to their opponents like she did. And honestly, I can imagine the overreactions, especially early on in the primary could have gotten worse if not for Obama and his team probably cooling her jets.
It was a mistake to drop this sort of messaging thinking Bernie had now occupied this sort of appeal. It was a mistake to not take this sort of approach AT ALL, against Trump, even with Bernie on her side and the primary done with.
Everything from this point on was either about herself, or her opponent. Not the people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N708P-A45D0
There is a clear and obvious difference here.
Hillary's problem wasn't necessarily that she was a "Weak" candidate, but that she had literally no confidence in herself. Someone confident in their message and strategy doesn't so viciously overreact to their opponents like she did. And honestly, I can imagine the overreactions, especially early on in the primary could have gotten worse if not for Obama and his team probably cooling her jets.
It was a mistake to drop this sort of messaging thinking Bernie had now occupied this sort of appeal. It was a mistake to not take this sort of approach AT ALL, against Trump, even with Bernie on her side and the primary done with.
Everything from this point on was either about herself, or her opponent. Not the people.
Wait a fucking minute....have people just been saying that Hillary got more votes than Obama when she actually didn't????
How did I miss this??????
Democrats are the definition of smug elite. This whole campaign was from a smug elite perspective of just being better than the unelectable Donald trump. On this forum you can feel this if you read posts a day or two before the election, and it's not like this forum was the source of it. It was just a general vibe you got from dems overall
Extremely off putting not just to republicans, but democrats that have republican families and friends.
Extremely off putting not just to republicans, but democrats that have republican families and friends.
Father_Brain
Banned
That's giving her too much credit; her "message" was "I'm not Trump," mixed with vague self-congratulatory and feel-good platitudes. If she had been able to organize her campaign around any coherent group of issues, she might have won!
UnemployedVillain
Member
You missed it because no one said that except for that one poster
Elite or hope that people are smart enough to see what "grab her by the pussy", "women that have abortions should go to jail", "Mexicans are rapists", etc really means.
Is it elitism to expect commonsense and decency?
Actually in 2012 he got 65.4 million, not 65.9. It's much easier to disprove someone's point when you fudge the numbers.
Vicetrailia
Member
Well Trump promised the sun and the moon on the back of racism.
Hillary promised a lot too, at least definitely the sun, but didnt market it well enough. She talked about an economy that works for everyone, as a president that serves everyone, and it just wasn't effective.
I think the main problem was her baggage though. Trump was a horrendous candidate who won on snake oil.
Hillary promised a lot too, at least definitely the sun, but didnt market it well enough. She talked about an economy that works for everyone, as a president that serves everyone, and it just wasn't effective.
I think the main problem was her baggage though. Trump was a horrendous candidate who won on snake oil.
EatinOlives
Member
Politicians is one thing, but I'm seeing a lot of regular people saying the same thing. That's the truly sad part.
Angelus Errare
Banned
I never believed in it. I've always maintained that many people were on the side of minorities to seem hip and progressive, it was a trend for them so they could talk down to their friends on Facebook.
plagiarize
Banned
Yeah. I really believe in equality. I wasn't just saying it to help us win an election. One that we barely lost. For all sorts of historical reasons.
So the people who seem so quick to dump it... how can I look at them in good faith any more?
The poster who pointed out that 'identity politics' are civil rights... that's incredibly on the nose. The right started calling them identity politics to make civil rights sound bad. I don't want to see the left start doing it. It needs to die off and fast.
oneofthose
Banned
At least we don't get to see those obnoxious yas queen or slay queen posts anymore.
Hillary lost because she's goddamn lazy. She barely campaigned compared to the rookie Trump, and Obama called out Hillary's lack of work ethic with his Iowa statements - although to be fair the Democratic party as a whole is garbage especially @ local levels. However there's just no worthwhile excuse for the Clinton camp skipping Wisconsin. Hillary's all-time low ratings and having the FBI on her ass should've disqualified her candidacy before she used the campaign trail as a vacation with the top 0.1%, but good luck with removing her influence lol
As for Biden, the time to eat equality is now. The biggest issues in America are the oligarchy and declining job quality while wealth inequality grows, and I'm a minority ya'll. Instead the banks just got bigger, thanks Obama and Co.
legacyzero
Banned
I love Joe. Really wish he would have run. I understand why he didn't though.
Would have been a WAAAY better candidate.
Hmm.. If I were a family living in PA who's livelyhood was affected by jobs leaving the country at the hands of trade deals, I wouldn't vote for the person who fully supported them in the past, and then suddenly told me she didn't, for political expediency. Especially the TPP, that she supported all the way up until the Primary, conveniently.
Would have been a WAAAY better candidate.
Hmm.. If I were a family living in PA who's livelyhood was affected by jobs leaving the country at the hands of trade deals, I wouldn't vote for the person who fully supported them in the past, and then suddenly told me she didn't, for political expediency. Especially the TPP, that she supported all the way up until the Primary, conveniently.
The 2012 certificate of ascertainment in NY shows 4,159,441 votes for Obama electors across two parties but the FEC report most sources cite shows 4,485,741 Obama votes over the same.
Seems to be the lion's share of the difference. Don't ask me which is right.
You can definitely expect that in an elite way
The elitism came from the simple idea that no one could possibly dislike things about trump, but also like other things about his campaign more than Hillary. Clearly everyone in the world would have to agree and anyone that didn't was scum of the earth. If this describes your friends or family, well then disown them immediately and ride up high here on the cloud that is better than everyone.
But Hillary doesn't appeal to you? You have legitimate issues that she isn't tackling while her campaign focuses on being better than trump? Well then that's because you suck and we didn't want you anyway. Because we are better. On the coastal blue states. With lifestyles and diversity that prevent us from empathizing with anyone else, who have no desire to empathize because well... we are right and not deplorable.
Literally the moment she called half the country deplorables was the moment she lost IMO. People thought trumps grab em by the pussy was the 47% moment, but it was nothing compared to direct insult to a large group of people's viewpoints.
Wow. Basically just made the same argument in the Bernie thread.
Guess there are some within the party that see it the same way...
Garrett Hawke
Member
I think only one of those things was an issue (the campaign).
Literally the wrong takeaway from this is for the dems to ditch "equality", especially when they are the only one of two parties that actually gives a shit about minority lives.
Also tbh your assessment of Clinton is completely off, but whatever. Both her and Trump returned to their homes every night so it's not like he was this standout sleeping on the bus campaigner and she wasn't.
I wouldn't call it lazy, just overconfident. Conventional wisdom says that if you have more money than they other guy, you win and she definitely raised more money than Trump. Most of those stops in NY and DC were fundraising events. So I think she just assumed she would win because of her advantage money wise. She just didn't realize how bad she was doing in those states until it was too late. Whoever decided not to poll Michigan for a month really screwed up.
Psychoward
Banned
Jesus christ lol
Xist2inspire
Member
Personally, I'd rather white Dems/liberals spend less time caping for us minorites (which usally comes after some tragedy occurs) and more time figuring out how to connect with the "diet racists." I understand writing off the real loonies, but it's baffling to me how white Dems/liberals will choose to revel in the moral high ground over actually putting in work to figure how to appeal to the white average Joe/Jane, even if he/she doesn't care as much about minority issues at the moment as they feel he/she should. The real threat isn't the wackjobs explicitly out to get minorites, it's the people who turn a blind eye to them in favor of their own daily lives. Are they selfish? Yes. Bigots? That may be a step too far. Hell, I'll admit that my first reaction to the despair felt from some of the LGBTQ community over this was "Who cares? You're still white." Selfish? Yes. But would you call me bigoted as well?
If one part of of white America refuses to attempt to find common ground with the other part (again, I'm not including the extremists here), then we're all screwed, because who else can help change their minds? Who else will they listen to? Is it really that hard to give economic and ethnic concerns equal time, especially when one is more likely to be solved faster than the other (hint: it's the one that has very little to do with basic human nature)?
There is some truth to this, but she also didn't campaign very much. Obama and Bill both criticized her for not being more visible in rural areas in key states.
But I concede that the 'whomever raises more money, wins the election!' mantra is probably dead now. I sincerely hope that the party learns from this.
Are you denying that Clinton fights dirty? Because I remember her asking if we could trust Obama at 3AM, race-baiting by claiming she was the candidate of "working, hard-working Americans, white Americans" in 08, and ironically later insinuating that Bernie was a racist through surrogates and supporters in 2016.
Obama and Bernies support held up through that because many people can see that Hillary fights dirty to win and that those criticisms don't hold up.
It's One of many factors.in why she never had the enthusiasm that Obama had and people, including many Democrats, don't particularly like her. I, of course, voted for her because of the great orange Satan, but people here act like she's this saintly nice grandmother who never fights dirty.
Looks like NYSBOE amended their certified results in Feb/March/June 2013 to get up to the number the FEC is using:
https://www.elections.ny.gov/NYSBOE/elections/2012/General/President_07292013.pdf
Which is a little weird? Not sure what's going on there.
It says the last update is Kings Co (Brooklyn) so maybe something odd was afoot there.
Bolivar687
Banned
I'm sure Joe has had plenty of sleepless night since the election, wishing he hadn't buckled under Obama's pressure to not run.
The rookie Trump still dominated the veteran Hillary when it came to both campaign rallies and media presence. And don't take my words for it - look up Obama's Iowa statement for his criticism on Clinton and her camp's lazy work ethic.
Hillary's lazy/arrogrant schedule was basically unprecedented and goes against politics 101/conventional wisdom - there's just no worthwhile excuse for letting your rival outwork you on the campaign trail. But I especially agree that Michigan should've been the slap in the face that the Clinton camp needed particularly after the primaries.
FriedConsole
Banned
I don't think you will get smug people to understand how smugness turns people off. Kaine was the worst offender of embaressing cringe inducing smugness.
- Status