Unofficial Academy Awards Discussion Board

Obama tried working with Republicans and look how that ended up. The time for working with a belligerent and petulant Republican party is at an end.

Big Magilla wrote
I think the Democrats can and must win no matter who the nominee is, but I also want to see Trump and the two-faced Repubs lose in a landslide. With anyone but Biden, that might be difficult, but better in the long run if they can keep the House and take back the Senate and metaphorically castrate McConnell starting with increasing the Supreme Court to 15 and appointing all liberal additions.

Biden's not going to do that. He wants to work with Republicans. I don't care about a landslide if we don't capitalize on it.

I think the Democrats can and must win no matter who the nominee is, but I also want to see Trump and the two-faced Repubs lose in a landslide. With anyone but Biden, that might be difficult, but better in the long run if they can keep the House and take back the Senate and metaphorically castrate McConnell starting with increasing the Supreme Court to 15 and appointing all liberal additions.

Big Magilla wrote
Warren has the plans, Harris the tenacity and Buttigieg the smarts but Biden, as of now, is the only one who is virtually certain to beat Trump in most states including Texas. Maybe that will change, but it will be an uphill battle.

Joe Biden's greatest strength is his electability and that scares me. I've said this before but The Democratic Primary is an Ideas Parade. Where are the ideas? He's not going to have anything to talk about for months while his opponents have nothing but ideas. Let's say he gets through that, what happens next? He moves to the center, courting Republicans as well as Democrats. And then he goes to the general where Trump can hit him from the right and the left. He can go after him for the Crime Bill, he can go after him for Anita Hill. The one thing we know is that Joe Biden won't take one iota of true blame for anything. Joe Biden used to be the one Democrat I wanted to see debate Trump more than anyone else. Now, I don't think anyone would do a worse job. Maybe Beto O'Rourke. But let's say Biden survives that and wins the general election...? What then?

The Democratic Party has a remarkable opportunity to prove to the rest of the country what a progressive agenda looks and feels like with policies they can touch and feel. We can't squander that. I don't have confidence that winning with Joe Biden is winning. My favorite thing about him winning is that I'm reasonably sure that we won't plunge into a civil war.

Current keys turned against the incumbent party: Party Mandate, Policy Change, Scandal, Foreign Military Success, Incumbent Charisma.

Nitpicking, but there are several other gaffes that are less easy to overlook.

Biden's support of the Hyde Amendment which bans federal funding for abortion is a tough one to swallow. Even more problematic is his dithering trust that once Trump is gone the Congressional Republicans will come to their senses and play nice with the Democrats when, if he had to go there, it would have made more sense for him to have added "but if they don't, we'll fix the problems by ourselves."

Warren has the plans, Harris the tenacity and Buttigieg the smarts but Biden, as of now, is the only one who is virtually certain to beat Trump in most states including Texas. Maybe that will change, but it will be an uphill battle.

Even after four-score-and-seven years the only thing the Biden campaign has to fear is fear itself.

Joe Biden's climate plan appears to directly copy multiple lines from other organizations — but his campaign says it was a mistake:

https://www.businessinsider.com/joe-bid ... ons-2019-6

criddic3 wrote
We'll have to see how compatible they are in terms of policy.

They don’t have any, so it’s a match made in heaven.

Big Magilla wrote
I wish we were at the point where a younger, more progressive Democrat could sail to victory, but like I keep saying, I don't think we're there yet. Biden, with all his foibles, still seems like the only one who can beat Trump for certain in 2020, but the campaign has hardly begun so we will have to wait and see what happens.

Sabin wrote:I remain agnostic but the media is falling in love with Pete Buttigieg. He's currently third in Iowa.

Big Magilla wrote:It's early, but if we somehow manage to get rid of Trump, Mayor Pete would be the ideal candidate to go up against his nemesis, Pence.

A Biden/Buttigieg ticket would be smart for Democrats to run. A multi-decade Senator/8-year Vice President and a two-term mayor/military veteran would be able to tout governing experience with credibility. We'll have to see how compatible they are in terms of policy.

Anyone for whom the big banks is an issue is already familiar with Warren's position. It's not going to be one of the top issues in the election.

As for Stumpf, he's one of the reasons I retired early from Wells Fargo.

Wells Fargo was a great company to work for when they were "the best bank for Californians." Even after they started acquiring other banks, they were still consumer friendly. It wasn't until around 1998 when Wells was acquired by Norwest Bank out of Minneapolis that things began to change.

Although the name Wells Fargo was retained, it wasn't the same bank. Stumpf, with whom I had a personal run-in when he was head of the bank's Southwest Division (Texas, Arizona, New Mexico), was a smooth-talker but not a particularly bright guy. I don't think he thought up any of the outrageous money-making schemes that caused his downfall, but being a bottom-line guy, he was quick to support them.

This should be Elizabeth Warren's first campaign video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXW5fwgkwQ0

It's early, but if we somehow manage to get rid of Trump, Mayor Pete would be the ideal candidate to go up against his nemesis, Pence.

Big Magilla wrote
I wish we were at the point where a younger, more progressive Democrat could sail to victory, but like I keep saying, I don't think we're there yet. Biden, with all his foibles, still seems like the only one who can beat Trump for certain in 2020, but the campaign has hardly begun so we will have to wait and see what happens.

I remain agnostic but the media is falling in love with Pete Buttigieg. He's currently third in Iowa.

Yesterday, I watched 88-year-old Clint Eastwood play the real-life 90-year-old drug runner in The Mule and within minutes of watching it, I viewed the entire two-minute "I get it" video that 76-year-old Joe Biden posted addressing the issue of the uncomfortable "women and some men."

The first thing I noticed was how frail Biden seemed, as if he were the same age as Eastwood. The second thing I noticed was how alike in character he was to the one Eastwood was playing, making excuses for his behavior. I came away from it thinking that Biden doesn't "get It." It's not that "times have changed" and he must change along with them. It's that people have different levels of sensitivity and always have had. It was never OK to touch and feel absolute strangers in the way he did. Some, maybe most of them, were OK with I,t but clearly not everyone was or could be. What's changed is that people are no longer afraid to talk about their sensitivity. What he has to "get" is that his behavior was always inappropriate.

That said, I still think that bringing this up now was, at least in the first couple of incidents, politically motivated. It was inevitable that more would come forward with their tales of past inappropriate behavior on his part. I don't think, however, that the plot to take him down was a Bernie one. They've started to go after him as well with pot shots at his not releasing his tax terms, something he can easily remedy by releasing them.

I wish we were at the point where a younger, more progressive Democrat could sail to victory, but like I keep saying, I don't think we're there yet. Biden, with all his foibles, still seems like the only one who can beat Trump for certain in 2020, but the campaign has hardly begun so we will have to wait and see what happens.

It would be nice if there was some polling showing what the numbers would be if Trump were to be removed from office and replaced by Pence. Would he be tougher or easier for a more progressive Dem to beat?

Big Magilla wrote
Mister Tee didn't say that, I did.

My mistake. Wrote it in my car. Fixed. Will respond to the rest later.

Sabin wrote:

Mister Tee wrote
We have a minimum age qualification for president, why shouldn't we have a maximum age qualification? I think it should be no more than 62 at time of election, which would mean retirement after a two-year term at 70.

So, you're telling me that in retrospect, Hillary Clinton should have been barred from running in 2016? That in retrospect, we should have nominated Martin O'Malley? I'm sorry but I don't believe you. I think we all have biases and we use them to orient our exceptions. In 2016, you would have said "Yes, 69 is too old but let's give Hillary Clinton a pass." Well, it's 2020, I agree with you that 70 is too old to be the President. I have other deal-breakers, like that a candidate be at least a two term governor or senator, but they don't seem to matter in 2020. I just want to support the candidate who will defeat Trump AND forward a progressive agenda.

Mister Tee didn't say that, I did. And, no, I'm not talking about Hillary, who should have been elected in 2008 with Obama as her V.P., with Biden succeeding her, in which case we wouldn't be having this discussion. But, we live in the real world and have to play with the cards we're dealt.

I don't agree a candidate has to have been a two-term governor or senator. That would disqualify too many good candidates. Beto O'Rourke, for example, has a career trajectory that mirrors that of Abraham Lincoln - both were one-term members of the U.S. House of Representatives who ran for the Senate and lost, then ran for the Presidency and in Lincoln's case, won.