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[benjipwns]

His response to the health insurance thing though was:

Do I believe in the way the UK has it? Yes, but Obama's way is not the way it should be done.

 

[Makai]

Most people don't follow politics very closely. Have mercy.

 

[Butts-a-plenty]

His response to the health insurance thing though was:

I don't trust democrats, I don't trust republicans, democrats has their chance and IMO I'm sick of them

In my opinion I'm sick of them.

.

 

[Makai]

Here's my Donald Trump smiley. What do you think?

?:^V

 

[Diablos]

Okay yeah I noticed. I was getting the impression that there were a bunch of Bernie people in the thread saying they are now supporting Trump. Does not seem to be the case.

Here's my Donald Trump smiley. What do you think?

?:^V

Beautiful.

 

[Frank the Great]

Here's my Donald Trump smiley. What do you think?

?:^V

That's good. That's damn good.

 

[Diablos]

That smiley is gonna be YUUUGE

 

[Yellowtail]

OMG this is the best "Rubio has no groundgame" article yet. The exposé:

Des Moines, Iowa – Everyone here is mad at Marco Rubio.

In a place where retail politicking remains paramount, conservative and evangelical leaders are complaining that the Florida senator hasn’t given them enough attention since launching his White House campaign.While he has begun to attend their events and engage with their constituents, they say his team has not followed up to deepen relationships or organize additional meetings with them.

Establishment Republicans, meanwhile, have the same concerns about Rubio’s organization, but worry that Rubio is flirting too aggressively with Iowa’s social conservatives. They say that, thanks to Scott Walker’s exit and Jeb Bush’s decline, there exists in Iowa an enormous center-right vacuum that Rubio would be ideally positioned to fill, if only his team beefed up its field operation.

In recent conversations with nearly a dozen unaffiliated Iowa GOP veterans, a consensus has emerged across the party’s ideological spectrum: The state’s caucus-goers are interested in Rubio, but his infrequent appearances and paltry field operation leave lingering doubts as to whether he is interested in them.

“It doesn’t seem like he really wants to win Iowa,” says Craig Robinson, the state party’s former executive director, who is now editor of The Iowa Republican. “Of all the campaigns, he’s probably done the least of getting around the state. There are plenty of people who would love to vote for him. . . . But I hear more excitement on the ground
in Iowa about Chris Christie than I do about Marco Rubio. And it shouldn’t be that way.” On the campaign trail, Marco Rubio is calling for a “new American century.” He’s also running a different type of campaign, one that eschews spending on policy staffers, field operations, and other traditional aspects of a winning bid in favor of television advertising and digital outreach.

The campaign’s light footprint on the ground has increasingly become a source of controversy in Iowa and New Hampshire, where prominent activists and Republican officials believe a robust ground operation is critical to wooing voters who want to interact with their presidential candidates, and who have become accustomed to doing so.

Much of the negative attention has focused on New Hampshire, a state whose moderate electorate could be more receptive to the establishment-friendly Rubio. But behind the scenes in Iowa, criticism of Rubio’s operation has deepened. There are whispers here that prominent Republicans have scolded his campaign in recent days for its failure to organize in the Hawkeye State.

Stories abound of Rubio and his team missing easy opportunities to connect with voters: The time a line of people waited for him after an event, while his field staffers ate pizza backstage; the appearance he canceled at a major evangelical gathering for no apparent reason; the Saturday he spent here recently watching football with his state chairman, Jack Whitver, rather than holding public events.

Iowa Republicans from both wings of the party agree that Rubio is singularly positioned to dominate the right-of-center while winning enough conservative voters to carry Iowa with a winning coalition. The only problem, they say, is that he hasn’t invested in a ground game that identifies, recruits, and retains supporters.

“The Iowa caucuses can only be won by organizational effort. They cannot be won by candidate appeal,” says Jamie Johnson, a longtime Republican national committeeman from Iowa who joined former Texas governor Rick Perry’s ill-fated campaign earlier this year. “There’s an opportunity for Rubio to win Iowa but he has got to pull out all the stops,” Johnson says. “If I were Senator Rubio, I would immediately hire a dozen people full-time in Iowa.”

Not lost on establishment Republicans is the fact that Jeb Bush — once thought to be an electoral steamroller, yet stuck in the single digits in Iowa for the past three months — has a booming field operation, with an army of experienced organizers and full-time staffers. In a display of the exasperation that has taken hold here, three Iowa Republicans offered identical assessments of the Florida senator’s campaign: “If he had Jeb’s organization, he would win Iowa.”

Rubio’s team believes exactly the opposite — that is, that a sprawling operation weighs down a campaign and wastes precious resources that could be spent on TV ads that reach more voters. The senator’s lieutenants have pointed to Bush and Walker — two candidates with beefy operations whose support nevertheless faded quickly — as proof positive that organizational heft is overrated. (And even so, a Rubio official points out that they have representatives in all of Iowa’s 99 counties, and says the campaign will soon roll out a number of state-specific endorsements.)

The nominating process is certainly becoming more nationalized, and Rubio’s team believes television spots, media coverage, and momentum are key. But Eric Woolson, who served as the Iowa state director for Walker’s presidential campaign, says that face time and field work still matter. “There’s certainly more than one way to win Iowa, but for most candidates, the only way is to spend a lot of time here, and I would put Senator Rubio’s campaign squarely in that category.” According to the Des Moines Register’s candidate tracker, Rubio has spent just 27 days this campaign season on the ground in Iowa, hosting a total of 50 events.

Terry Sullivan, Rubio’s campaign manager, gave a window into his team’s air-heavy strategy — and emboldened its Iowa critics — when he told the New York Times this week: “More people in Iowa see Marco on ‘Fox and Friends’ than see Marco when he is in Iowa.”

“That is idiotic,” Robinson says of Sullivan’s remark.

“I had someone from his campaign reach out to me today” to discuss a meeting, Robinson says. “It’s mid-December! This is something they should have done months and months ago. And I think it’s going to catch up with them. He’s always had great potential but he hasn’t been able to spark his candidacy with it. And that’s because not enough time and effort have gone into their relationship-building.”

The Rubio campaign’s attitude is, essentially, that all the outside hand wringing is much ado about nothing — and that massive field operations are no guarantee of success. Bush has an unrivaled ground game in New Hampshire and is still stuck in sixth place in the polls there, according to the latest RealClearPolitics average. Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses in 2012 and 2008, respectively, without any ground game whatsoever. But critics say those two candidates campaigned tirelessly in the months leading up to the caucuses, often straying into far-flung corners of the state and meeting with small audiences on snowy nights. Rubio, by contrast, has rarely left the Des Moines area for campaign events, and Republicans have taken to joking that he is running for mayor of Ankeny, the Des Moines suburb where his state headquarters is located.

With fewer than eight weeks remaining until the caucuses, there is little time for Rubio’s campaign to engineer a dramatic shift in strategy, and doing so would be inconsistent with their theory of the campaign. Which means that in addition to producing a winner, February 1 will validate either Rubio’s strategy or the case his critics are making, with enormous implications for how future presidential campaigns approach Iowa.

http://www.nationalreview.com/artic...ign-organization-iowa-new-hampshire-criticism

 

[RustyNails]

I think it's a right choice to ditch Iowa, in my opinion, and focus entirely on states where you think your candidate can succeed. Iowa is a basket case. It's Santorum and Huck country filled with God fearing corn farmers. Why do you want to waste your time, money and effort there? If I'm Kasich or Christie, I'd pull all my people from there and throw them in NH. If I'm Rubio, I'd focus all my efforts in Florida and Nevada. Let Cruz and Carson battle it out in Iowa and South Carolina.

 

[benjipwns]

Why would you waste money on Iowa's straw poll?

Sullivan is right about the free media getting him enough exposure.

IA and NH big wigs just whining that national political figures aren't coming on their hands and knees ready to do some ballwashing for every podunk county official as much anymore.

 

[Yellowtail]

I think it's a right choice to ditch Iowa, in my opinion, and focus entirely on states where you think your candidate can succeed. Iowa is a basket case. It's Santorum and Huck country filled with God fearing corn farmers. Why do you want to waste your time, money and effort there? If I'm Kasich or Christie, I'd pull all my people from there and throw them in NH. If I'm Rubio, I'd focus all my efforts in Florida and Nevada. Let Cruz and Carson battle it out in Iowa and South Carolina.

This isn't a problem specific to Iowa though. This is Rubio's modus operandi in every state; only last week there was a similar article about his poor ground game in New Hampshire. I don't particularly care about what Rubio does in Iowa. But I think it speaks to a broader philosophy in his campaign that could make a difference in a general election.

Meanwhile the Trump campaign is doing this:

 

[Roland_Gunner]

Why would you waste money on Iowa's straw poll?

Sullivan is right about the free media getting him enough exposure.

IA and NH big wigs just whining that national political figures aren't coming on their hands and knees ready to do some ballwashing for every podunk county official as much anymore.

In the primary season you don't need a huge ground operation everywhere but you do need one somewhere. If Rubio punts IA fine, but that makes it doubly important he wins NH since he's polled well in South Carolina. I just can't see someone dropping the first three states and still getting enough momentum to win the race.

 

[benjipwns]

You don't have to drop out or something, just not expend a lot of money if you're polling above 10%. They're all PR.

And then Super Tuesday comes immediately after, and it's PR too. Even better.

Save your resources for the WTA wave.

 

[B-Dubs]

Here's my Donald Trump smiley. What do you think?

?:^V

It's so classy and luxurious!

 

[WaffleTaco]

So when do yall's think we will see polls that are more recent about Trump's comments?

 

[Makai]

So when do yall's think we will see polls that are more recent about Trump's comments?

No change in the Reuters poll yet. Definitely by next week we'll know.

 

[Yellowtail]

So when do yall's think we will see polls that are more recent about Trump's comments?

I have no idea how legit this is, but here are results from a SurveyUSA poll in California taken 12/8:

Yesterday, Donald Trump called for, quote, "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on." Do you strongly agree with this statement? Somewhat agree? Somewhat disagree? Or strongly disagree?

Republicans:

Strongly Agree 53%
Somewhat Agree 18%
Somewhat Disagree 15%
Strongly Disagree 14%

PPP is polling Iowa this weekend and will no doubt ask similar questions.

 

[Makai]

71% agree. Nice.

 

[PBY]

I have no idea how legit this is, but here are results from a SurveyUSA poll in California taken 12/8:

Yesterday, Donald Trump called for, quote, "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on." Do you strongly agree with this statement? Somewhat agree? Somewhat disagree? Or strongly disagree?

Republicans:

Strongly Agree 53%
Somewhat Agree 18%
Somewhat Disagree 15%
Strongly Disagree 14%

PPP is polling Iowa this weekend and will no doubt ask similar questions.

SurveyUSA seems aightish?

 

[BertramCooper]

I have no idea how legit this is, but here are results from a SurveyUSA poll in California taken 12/8:

Yesterday, Donald Trump called for, quote, "a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on." Do you strongly agree with this statement? Somewhat agree? Somewhat disagree? Or strongly disagree?

Republicans:

Strongly Agree 53%
Somewhat Agree 18%
Somewhat Disagree 15%
Strongly Disagree 14%

PPP is polling Iowa this weekend and will no doubt ask similar questions.

"This is not what our party stands for"

 

[Macho Madness]

"This is not what our party stands for"

That wasn't just republicans.

 

[Veritigo_X]

That wasn't just republicans.

The numbers quoted were republicans only.

Democrats looked like this:

Strongly Agree 29%
Somewhat Agree 8%
Somewhat Disagree 13%
Strongly Disagree 49%

 

[PBY]

The numbers quoted were republicans only.

Democrats looked like this:

Strongly Agree 29%
Somewhat Agree 8%
Somewhat Disagree 13%
Strongly Disagree 49%

Huh.

 

[syllogism]

It's worth noting that was a poll of San Diego DMA, not the whole California

 

[RustyNails]

I don't doubt the Susa poll but daily polling will be a little inaccurate. We should wait till next week to get better results. But anyone who thought Trump's comments are going to backfire hasn't been paying attention.

 

[The Technomancer]

OMG this is the best "Rubio has no groundgame" article yet. The exposé:


http://www.nationalreview.com/artic...ign-organization-iowa-new-hampshire-criticism

I mean, I know they hate Obama, but "Obama won because of his ground game, so we'll win by doing the exact opposite of that" is dumb even for Rubio

 

[benjipwns]

I'm afraid it will reach the point where enough people get sick of it and all the news get shunted in to a Donald Trump |OT| that no one reads.

That would never happen: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=975482

 

[Yellowtail]

The numbers quoted were republicans only.

Democrats looked like this:

Strongly Agree 29%
Somewhat Agree 8%
Somewhat Disagree 13%
Strongly Disagree 49%

 

[Deleted member 231381]

I think it's a right choice to ditch Iowa, in my opinion, and focus entirely on states where you think your candidate can succeed. Iowa is a basket case. It's Santorum and Huck country filled with God fearing corn farmers. Why do you want to waste your time, money and effort there? If I'm Kasich or Christie, I'd pull all my people from there and throw them in NH. If I'm Rubio, I'd focus all my efforts in Florida and Nevada. Let Cruz and Carson battle it out in Iowa and South Carolina.

A.k.a. the Giuliani strategy, known for how well it worked.

 

[Coriolanus]

A.k.a. the Giuliani strategy, known for how well it worked.

To be fair, the opposite can be called the Santorum strategy, which..hm.. yeah.

 

[Joe Shlabotnik]

Giuliani didn't duck Iowa. He ducked EVERYTHING except Florida.

 

[Makai]

To be fair, the opposite can be called the Santorum strategy, which..hm.. yeah.

At least he won a bunch of states.

 

[benjipwns]

You could theoretically win every state through Super Tuesday and still not have the most delegates. That's the way this cycle's schedule is setup.

 

[User 406]

Democrats looked like this:

Strongly Agree 29%
Somewhat Agree 8%

The Democratic Party: Not Racist, But #2 With Racists

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Giuliani didn't duck Iowa. He ducked EVERYTHING except Florida.

That's literally what some people have just been proposing - skipping Iowa and NH to focus on Florida and Nevada. I mean, okay, Giuliani skipped Nevada too, but that doesn't make much difference and he would have been dead by Nevada anyway. People are underestimating how critical momentum is. If you're not a presence early on, you're not a presence later.

 

[benjipwns]

I don't consider being on the ballot to be "skipping" a state. Especially with the increasingly nationalized campaigns and immediate news cycle.

You put your resources into the WTA states if you're a 10%+ candidate. You'll make it through Super Tuesday fine with a good murder of delegates.

After NH, there's no stopping this cycle. Every week there's states. No more two-three week or month long gaps where campaigns go to die.

 

[PhoenixDark]

Not taking Iowa seriously isn't a sin. However not taking the ground game seriously will cost Rubio the nomination. I'm amazed that RNC folks aren't expressing concern at this point considering Rubio is probably the establishment's last hope.

But then again the establishment was all aboard Romney's half assed exclusively digital campaign. You cannot rely on television to win, especially not when multiple candidates have money. It's amazing that nearly 8 years after Obama changed the game, republicans still don't get this. Well, Cruz clearly gets it. Trump even gets it to a degree. Everyone else is lost.

 

[Retromelon]

The big detail everyone is overlooking from that piece is that the christie surge has touched down in iowa, baby

 

[Makai]

Shep Smith is pissed at Trump

Spoiler

Breitbart commenters are pissed at Shep

 

[benjipwns]

Advent2016 Twister • 4 hours ago
It's time for all law-abiding, tax-paying AMERICAN CITIZENS to send a message to Fox and the rest of the bootlickers in the media. I cancelled cable months ago and have no regrets--and am enjoying the bundle that I am saving each month!

Good riddance to the garbage in the mainstream media who think they can influence public opinion and control elections and elect government officials.

ggooch19 Twister • 4 hours ago
O'Reilly and Shep have finally pushed me out the door from fauxnews. I have had enough of his stupid me,me,me, propaganda and his "Fair and Balanced" mugwumpery. Go home Bill, take a long walk out across the Atlantic and don't come back. Your gutless nihilism is tiresome.

Fauxnews needs some asolescent blond females with cleavage, wax jobs so their pubic hair doesn't protrude from below their tutus while sitting on their barstools; and junior highschool educations so they can read the 6th grade level teleprompters.

Hannity is being squeezed out like all the other males except the hollow man, O'Reilly, who should be replaced by a 13 year old pubescent female to draw in a younger viewership. The depth and veracity of commenting would likely be as efficacious as O'Reilly's nihilistic claptrap.

Goodbye Fauxnews, Goodbye!

RiseLiberty ggooch19 • 3 hours ago
The Factor has become the main pitch tent for all those books O'Reilly doesn't write. Another exposure due to Trump. He is unmasking all these pseudo conservative entities one by one. Jeb, Megan, Ryan, Rubio, GOP Elite, O'Reilly, all of them who wrapped themselves so comfortably in their American flag blanket. Only to have it stripped away by the brutal honesty of Trump. Hannity gets it. So does Mark Levin. The republic is hanging on by a thread, folks. We have endured 8 years of tyranny and lawlessness. Our decision in 2016 will either save us, or sink us.

straight • an hour ago
A homosexual accusing someone of representing “the darkest part of American.”

Too funny.

SPQR_US straight • an hour ago
That's where Shep finds love in another man's darkest and stinkiest parts...

Georgie Thumbs • an hour ago
Trump is a genius. I had no idea how deep the treason ran until he came along and exposed it. Practically our entire media, except for Breitbart and a few others, the entire GOP, of course the Democrats. It's amazing how many cockroaches you see when you turn the lights on.

God. Bless. America.

 

[Poodlestrike]

"It's amazing how many cockroaches you see when you turn the lights on."

Okay, now I'm starting to get worried.

 

[Orbis Tabula]

God. Bless. America.

No joke, I love the way these people use figurative language sometimes.

 

[BertramCooper]

God. Bless. America.

It's just hilarious to see people turn on the right-wing media like this.

I tuned into Rush for the first time in ages yesterday, and even he seems to be walking on eggshells.

 

[RustyNails]

A.k.a. the Giuliani strategy, known for how well it worked.

Well the Giuliani Strategy could have worked, had Giuliani fucking won Florida. Dude was total bomba. No ground game, terrible speaker, even more terribly run campaign. Had he won FL maybe it could have created a spark.

I honestly don't know what Rubio 2016 is thinking. The lack of offices in precincts and failure to register a respectable support in polling is alarming. He should also definitely focus on NH besides FL and NV in order to atleast come second and build momentum. I really don't know wtf is happening. His little backyard bbq talks are not going to save his campaign thats being run out of starbucks shops. He absolutely needs big venues and big speeches.

Either the Rubio team is going to revolutionize the way campaigning is done if he wins or look flat-footed novices if he loses. There is no "you did everything right, it was just not your time" consolation prize.

 

[User1608]

Man, Trump is fucking crazy. I retroactively regret watching the Apprentice before 2011. So many hours could have gone to gaming or something lol. Seeing all the pure, seething hatred from his supporters is certainly something.

 

[benjipwns]

No joke, I love the way these people use figurative language sometimes.

Why need to joke? Political rhetoric and thought is fascinating. Especially from the fringes of views/intelligence/subjects/etc.

GAF has been providing its own amusement with all the "fascist/Nazi/racist" hysteria about Trump.

 

[Makai]

I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite They picked person who is ruining Germany

The frequent Hitler comparisons make this ironic.

 

[Makai]

Why need to joke? Political rhetoric and thought is fascinating. Especially from the fringes of views/intelligence/subjects/etc.

GAF has been providing its own amusement with all the "fascist/Nazi/racist" hysteria about Trump.

Not exactly a fringe view when it's shared by almost the entire media and elected government.

 

[benjipwns]

Man, Trump is fucking crazy. I retroactively regret watching the Apprentice before 2011.

No, you should regret watching it after 2005. The first four seasons, and especially the first two were great. Though Martha Stewart's was better. Not even the Dawn of Ivanka could save Celebrity's descent into Donald's blatant favoritism, I was hoping The Donald would turn it over to her and his sons, since they were endlessly superior and actually interested in the process and tasks.

Alan Sugar's UK version of The Apprentice is/was far superior anyhow. Though just like the U.S. one, the finales are meaningless.

 

[B-Dubs]

Not taking Iowa seriously isn't a sin. However not taking the ground game seriously will cost Rubio the nomination. I'm amazed that RNC folks aren't expressing concern at this point considering Rubio is probably the establishment's last hope.

But then again the establishment was all aboard Romney's half assed exclusively digital campaign. You cannot rely on television to win, especially not when multiple candidates have money. It's amazing that nearly 8 years after Obama changed the game, republicans still don't get this. Well, Cruz clearly gets it. Trump even gets it to a degree. Everyone else is lost.

They have been expressing that concern. There was an article the other week where the NH GOP was in a panic due to Rubio having like no presence and Trump running rampant all over the state with his ground game. They basically begged him, in the interview, to spend some money on a ground game.