Saturday, July 23, 2016

On second thought?

At first I sort of thought the selection of Tim Kaine was very similar to the selection of Mike Pence. He's a noncontroversial solid political insider who would likely not make much splash. In those regards, he is. But the more I thought about it...

Am I the Anti-Pence ?
Mike Pence was a pick that sort of appeased the conservative base of the Republican Party. It was said to be designed to promote some Party unity. There were some on the far right of the Party who were said to have been seen "dancing" at the selection of Mike Pence.

Well there was no such dancing being seen from the liberal coalition of the Democratic Party. They were hoping for someone like Elizabeth Warren or Sherrod Brown. There will also be no dancing from minority coalition of the Democratic Party. They were hoping for someone like Cory Booker or Julian Castro.

No, this was the first move in the traditional general election pivot to the center.
(You didn't really believe Hillary Clinton suddenly became that liberal... did you?)

Hillary is, if nothing else, a traditional candidate will make traditional moves. Right now the Presidential playbook says it's time to pivot. So she picked someone who they must believe would appeal to the typical swing voter. They picked some who:
  • Has backed abortion restrictions (he is Catholic).
  • He's a gun owner, but has spoken in favor of gun control.
  • He oversaw eleven executions of convicts while Governor of Virginia.
  • Bucked the Party on trade agreements. 
  • Supports new spending reductions. 
  • Supported the deregulation of Wall Street banks.
Obviously these are not positions that will be popular with the liberal wing of the Party. Clinton must assume (or at least hope) that she has made her case well enough to those on the far left  (including Bernie Sanders supporters) that they have already been hooked and reeled in. Since she has them securely on the stringer, and now it's time to go fishing for more voters.

This is part of that dusty hard cover textbook called General Election Politics 101. The question is if General Election Politics 101 is either contemporary or comprehensive enough to cover how to run against Donald Trump in the political atmosphere of 2016. Because something tells me that Hillary Clinton is simply not sophisticated enough to think outside that box. 

24 comments:

Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

"We have handed our Party over to a narcissistic, feckless, classless RINO strongman wannabe who is the only candidate that actually gives the horrid Hillary Clinton a chance to win."
--A New Hampshire Republican who probably preferred not to be named.
______

As for Hillary's Veep pick, electoral-vote.com is now up with interesting commentary, including cons as well as pros as to Kaine's candidacy.

Myballs said...

Perhaps James will paste for us all the disdain the Bernies have for Hillary. Some will vote Trump.

Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

No, but being the nice guy I am, I have posted the entire electoral-vote comment on Roger's portion of the thread. It includes a comment on how the Bernie-ites will react.

wphamilton said...

Given Kaine's priorities of protecting the finance industry from oversight and regulation, it's not hard to predict the reaction of Sanders' core.

I wonder how much the payoff is for Clinton. It's got to be the Big Banks' wet dream.

Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

From the article quoted entire on Roger's portion of the blog:

"The choice of Kaine makes clear that, strategically, Clinton and her team feel that moderates and/or Republicans unhappy with Donald Trump are where she needs to be focused, as opposed to her left flank.

"She's probably right about that; most of the supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) appear to have fallen in line, and a fair portion of the remainder never will."
______________

Wp and his ilk are part of smaller "remainder" that "never will."

Coldheartedtruth Teller said...

CH, I think you have this exactly in reverse.

Because he is a Catholic, despite his pro choice position, he will strengthen the already Democratic leaning Catholics.

Because he is a gun owner, don't mean that he can't support reasonable gun laws. I no mo longer own a gun, I support the second amendment, with reasonable gun laws. Just Saint Ronald of the Reagan, I don't think that the second amendment means that we can't ban assault, semi-automatic, large capacity, military weapons. So he will help with the majority of gun owners who support gun regulations.

I'm pro death penalty. A lot of independents will feel better than if she had chosen a progressive, anti death penalty opponent.

On trade agreements, first it's got little importance. Second, many businesses oppose Trump's plan to impose tariffs. That's the only way you can force manufacturing back into the United States, because we have higher labor costs.

Careful spending reductions are possible, especially if the money is used to improve our education system.

Most business oppose deregulation of Wall Street. I disagree with him on that, but I think Hillary Clinton will try to break up the to big to fail banks. After all, she will be the President, not him.

The fact that he is fluent in Spanish, will solidify the Hispanic support. My wife says that he's very fluent. Plus he went to Honduras to as a teacher.

I think it Wes a wise choice.

And there is the fact, is the crazy loon you support, will motivate the Bernie Sanders voters to keep that unqualified candidate out of the Oval Office, except perhaps, as a guest, begging for a pardon on the Trump University ponzi scam.

caliphate4vr said...

I found my candidates Walken-Busey 2016

C.H. Truth said...

Roger - I don't think you actually "read" my post, did you?

I wasn't making a negative judgement of the pick, I was simply saying that while Trump's pick was a move to help with his base, Hillary's pick was a move designed to move her to the Center.

With the exception of your first line, and a bad argument that speaking Spanish is somehow the same thing as picking a minority candidate... you make the same argument to a large degree. You are also arguing that he shores up people in the middle (including Catholic and Gun owning White Reagan/Clinton Democrats who may be wavering).

KD, Hillary gives gift in picking Cane said...

Bernie has two points that is still alive and doing very well, both of which have been confirmed one by DebbiewasamanSchultz, she confirmed the hacking of the DNC computers, she confirmed that the information taken and released was in fact the data taken from the DNC and she confirmed that Bernie was targeted, just like Bernie said he was.


Point two, Hillary was personally paid $100 of millions of dollars to speak in private with Wall Street Banks , Bernie asked , politely for her to release those speeches, then came the classic dirty Crooked Hillary. First she said "only IF you release yours"

To that Bernie said, sure, because he said he has never made such speeches.

When Bernie asked her again, she went to shrill Hillary and off the reservation, tell him, she would "look into it".

yeah, no one believes her lies, she never looked into it , nor did she release them.

Picking Cane was an deeply stupid unforced Error, DizzyKos and Huffington Post are both posting story after story about how Cane is the wrong pick.

They site his pro-Big Bank stand and votes.

Coldheartedtruth Teller said...

You final line was that Hillary Clinton is simply sophisticated enough to think outside the box.

That's not a negative response to the choice of Kaine, what the hell else are you claiming?

I read the whole thing, of course. You argued that it won't be popular among the real strong progressives. I added, but I had computer problems, that the fact that your candidate is a certifiably insane and unqualified to be President, and that will get the Bernie's out in force. Even if they aren't happy with the way the country is going, the majority of them will support Clinton to keep your insane candidate out of the Oval Office. Except to beg for a pardon on his Trump University Ponzi scam.

I obviously read the whole thing, because most of my post was line by line a look at the issues,

She NEEDS the swing voters,and this will help her in every way.

C.H. Truth said...

You argued that it won't be popular among the real strong progressives

Roger, people are already reporting that there is fallout among the liberal base. I didn't make this up or argue it as something "I" believed. It's absolutely true. Many on the left openly advocated Warren or Booker. I read more than one opinion piece from the left on why this was not the best choice and how it's important the Clinton run an "aggressive progressive" campaign.

And you are simply doubling down on agreeing with me. Now explaining with capital letters why she is "right" to pivot to the center (which is exactly what I explained she is doing).

Nobody knows if pivoting to the Center (which has been the normal playbook) is going to work in a year where a Reality show host and Business Icon is running against someone who most in this country feel should have been indicted for mishandling Top Secret classified information.

How this appears to me, is that Hillary will follow the playbook.

Btw... since it was the FBI Director who said Hillary lacked the sophistication to understand the country's classification system (apparently not even able to figure out that special access program information is classified)... you can expect that I will continue to question her "sophistication".

KD, No new low for Hillary, just Hillary being herself said...

Dated for May of 2016, the email thread begins with Freundlich stating how “digital created a fake craigslist jobs post for women who want to apply to jobs one of Trump’s organizations.”


Hillary's Team having been hacked, their is no bottom to how low she will go to win.

Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

Nate Silver gives Trump a 41% chance to win.
The Upshot gives Trump a 26% chance to win.
Sam Wang gives Trump a 20% chance.

C.H. Truth said...

James -

It's actually at 42.3% right now for the polls only forecast, and the "now-cast" (if the election was held today) is 54.3% to 45.7%

Coldheartedtruth Teller said...

It's a mixed bag, but.

. Sanders supporter and Virginia resident Krystal Ball defended Kaine this week in the Huffington Post. “[T]he consistent knock on him in every election in Virginia has been that he was too liberal!” she wrote, reminding readers that Kaine stood up to the NRA as governor, raised tax revenue and vetoed bills to expand the death penalty. While some in the reproductive rights movement questioned his “personal” opposition to abortion, NARAL quickly praised Kaine’s perfect pro-choice voting record as a senator. And despite the criticism over his “fast track” vote, the anti-TPP AFL-CIO looked past that in its praise for Kaine, saying: “Tim Kaine is the son of an ironworker and a teacher, and is grounded in the values of working people.”

Yet the professional left is chafing in large part because Clinton is not sharing its theory of the electoral case. The PCCC statement released after the announcement argued that the uninspiring pick puts additional pressure on Clinton to run as an unabashed populist: “since Tim Kaine voted to fast track the Trans-Pacific Partnership, Republicans now have a new opening to attack Democrats on this economic populist issue. … it’s now more important than ever that Hillary Clinton run an aggressive campaign on core economic issues… .”

Coldheartedtruth Teller said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

If Ch really, actually thinks this was a poor choice, Ch has got another think coming.

Commonsense said...

Most of the Democrat party thinks Kaine was a poor choice.

That's how far to the left they are.

Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...

See how it plays out. :-)
You will be DEVASTATED.

KD, Cane wrong choice not black enuff said...

CHT and CS are correct, it is not the Republicans/Conservatives that are saying it.


Huffpo has exploded with it.

Anger Over Nominating Process Leaves Dems Divided"

And for those Bernie Fans, Trump is the place to go .

Hillary's wholly owned party smacked down the Bernie Voters by not allowing rule changes on the "Super Delegates" in next election.

They will get a floor vote, let's see how that goes, should be fun to watch .

KD, Cane said...

PHILADELPHIA — The Democratic Party arrived here still divided over the results of its presidential primary season, with anger at the nominating process, the Clinton-Kaine ticket and hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee spilling into the party’s final meetings before the convention begins."

The Hacker has more emails, telling the world that this is just the "beginning" that "more will be released" that has the left worried, what we know from them so far:

1, Hillary will do anything to win legal or not
2, The Press is water carrier, not exactly news
3, Fake stories and faith attacks against Bernie
4, This was all cleared by Debbie Wasamanshultz and hillary

KD said...

Most of the Democrat party thinks Kaine was a poor choice.

That's how far to the left they are. " CS


Not that you need my help clubbing Jane .


Headlines today from the Dizzykos and Huffington Post:

"Leaked Emails Suggest DNC Was Conspiring Against Bernie Sanders

Looks like Sanders supporters weren’t just being paranoid after all."


"Democrats grapple with intraparty divisions two days before convention opens"


Bernie Sanders' faith is at the center of an email sent by a top DNC official. | Getty



"Top DNC staffer apologizes for email on Sanders’ religion


By Kristen East

07/23/16 06:15 PM EDT"


Hillary hates jewish people, she has a long history of it going back to Arkansas days and lost election.



Commonsense said...

I have a blog post about that subject.

wphamilton said...

You can add me as another "strong progressive" who is dismayed by the choice of Kaine. Not that I'd prefer Warren, but the choice moves her in exactly the wrong direction.