Poll: Bernie Sanders would beat Donald Trump

[Ladmo]

http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/30/politics/ ... index.html

...A Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday shows that in a hypothetical general election match-up, Sanders tops Trump 44% to 39%...

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/l ... bush?sc=fb

Latest National Poll Shows Bernie Sanders Beating Scott Walker, Donald Trump, Jeb Bush

A just released CNN poll finds Sanders out-polling all of the GOP's major candidates, though pretty much tied with Jeb Bush. Here's how Sanders stacks up:

SANDERS: 48%
BUSH: 47%

SANDERS: 48%
WALKER: 42%

SANDERS: 59%
TRUMP: 38%

[Mori Chu]

Shouldn't any serious candidate beat Donald Trump?

[Ghost]

Shouldn't any serious candidate beat Donald Trump?

Preferably with tennis rackets

[Nodack]

We are still ages from the election. It's probably a bad thing to be in the lead now. It's like being up by 10 at half time. It doesn't guarantee a win by any stretch. Trump has a huge target on his back along with Hillary.

Trump has been pure entertainment. He has thrown the Republican party into disarray. They don't know what to do with the guy. He appeals to Republicans fed up and distrustful of government and politicians. He was a Democrat, then a Republican, then an Independent, then a Democrat and now a Republican who might run as an Independent again. He invited the Clintons to his wedding and donated money to them in the past. He was pro abortion then anti abortion. He is for Universal Health Care, but anti Obamacare and says he will replace it with something terrific, but doesn't say what. He got a lot of fans by saying he would build a giant fence to stop illegal immigration and says he will get Mexico to pay for it. He insulted all our veterans by claiming McCain wasn't a war hero, but so far seems built proof.

I really think deep down inside that Trump is only doing this for his ego and the thought of actually being President would scare the hell out of him. In the highly unlikely scenario that he actually becomes President I don't think the Tea Party types that want him now would like what he actually does. He has to be the most Liberal of all Republican candidates even though his base is the most anti Liberal.

His popularity is proof that our system is messed up IMO.

[Dan H]

http://thewilderness.me/frontrunner/



A little funny for your Monday morning.

[Ladmo]

This is all funny stuff guys.

Anyone heard the theory that Trump is actually a Democrat trying to sabotage the Republican Party?

I'm really looking forward to the debate Thursday. I doubt it will be as entertaining as the RNC, Clint Eastwood talks to a chair for 15 minutes bizarre episode, but it will still be good.

I sincerely hope that at some point the moderator points out that Trump's challenger's have been hot to present a case that Trump has no real plans to make his campaign promises come true, because I don't think any of them do either. It would be pretty awesome if Trump threw that back in their faces.

[LazarusLong]

Trump is a cheap traveling circus and snake-oil salesman, and A#1 attention whore. Ignore him and he'll eventually go away.

[Dan H]

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-08-0 ... s-are-same

Hmm.

[Mori Chu]

I don't buy the "there's no difference" bit. Wouldn't Jeb want to repeal Roe v. Wade? Wouldn't he push for more guns? Wouldn't he want to raise defense spending more than Hillary? Wouldn't he be less proactive for women's rights, gay/trans rights, the plight of the poor? Wouldn't he want lower taxes? Wouldn't he have less concern for the environment and be more skeptical of climate change? Wouldn't he want to get rid of Obamacare and cut back health care and entitlements in general, much more than Hillary ever would?

Jeb might be "moderate" in terms of not really pushing to do any of the above things. But I'd suspect that he would be in favor of many of them, unlike Hillary. I really don't get it when people say that there's no difference between various candidates; of course there are a ton of differences.

[Dan H]

I guess the question would be how hard would he really push for any of those things. He wasn't exactly a supply-sider when he was the Governor of Florida, so I doubt he would cut spending. Taxes? Maybe, I don't know. I don't see taxes as being as big an issue as over-regulation and spending.

On the other stuff, meh. You can't repeal a Supreme Court decision short of a Constitutional Amendment, so it ain't happening.

Would Hillary be proactive for women's rights? She certainly didn't seem to care much about it when Bill was having his "bimbo eruptions" . . .

To be honest I'll never vote for another Bush even if a gun was held to my head so I haven't looked too closely at his beliefs on gun rights. He's a Northeastern GOP country clubber type like his Daddy so I'm sure he thinks they're icky.

As far as Obamacare goes, the establishment GOP types have already said ObamaCare is here to stay even if the GOP wins the White House. Considering Jeb(!) is their standard bearer I doubt he'd go the other way.

One palpable difference is that Hillary is under FBI investigation, so there's that.

[Mori Chu]

Would Hillary be proactive for women's rights? She certainly didn't seem to care much about it when Bill was having his "bimbo eruptions" . . .

What does being / not being proactive about women's rights have to do with a couple's marital infidelity?

[Dan H]

She has basically aided and abetted his misogynistic treatment of multiple women. There are plenty of feminists who have come out against her for those reasons.

http://www.salon.com/2015/07/28/camille ... ill_cosby/

[Nodack]

My publicly stated opinion at the time was that I don’t care what public figures do in their private life. It’s a very sophisticated style among the French, and generally in Europe, where the heads of state tend to have mistresses on the side. So what? That doesn’t bother me at all! But the point is, they are sophisticated affairs that the European politicians have, while the Clinton episode was a disgrace.

She's good with affairs as long as they are European politicians because they are more sophisticated than us and somehow that makes it OK.

[Dan H]

I'm not a big follower of Euro politics, but is it common for European pols to have affairs with interns or people they can impress with their position, or do they sleep around in the same class?

I would guess it's the latter, and most likely what she's trying to say. Lewinsky in particular was a disgrace because it's textbook sexual harassment.

[Nodack]

I have read and watched Monica's take on the whole thing and sexual harassment wasn't part of it. She wasn't threatened in any way by Bill which is what sexual harassment means to me. Go down on me or lose your job. That's sexual harassment. It was a mutual consent, which is not sexual harassment. Enemies of Bill and Hillary can speculate and make up all they want.

In my book cheating on your wife is the same in any language, sophisticated or not. In the end sex is the same in any language. From what I have read about 50% of the population does it. Just as many women cheat on their husbands. I don't think it has anything to do with what party you belong to. What to make from that? Sometimes people cheat. I don't consider it a woman's rights issue.

What Bill Clinton did was embarrassing to his family and the U.S. Condemning Hillary for it because she didn't divorce him is a stretch to me. To me it's just the Republican Party trying to destroy Hillary and it's just another angle for them to use. Lots of people including Europeans forgive their spouses and move on. That's none of our business IMO.

[Mori Chu]

I agree. It is sad that Bill did that to Hillary, but I don't understand what right we have to dictate exactly how she responds to it. That's between her and Bill. Trying to work it out with him doesn't mean she is a bad wife or person or that she isn't a feminist or would make a bad President.

[Dan H]

I have read and watched Monica's take on the whole thing and sexual harassment wasn't part of it. She wasn't threatened in any way by Bill which is what sexual harassment means to me. Go down on me or lose your job. That's sexual harassment. It was a mutual consent, which is not sexual harassment. Enemies of Bill and Hillary can speculate and make up all they want.

Sure it was, particularly when he was trying to cover it up later.

Sorry, Nodack, it was textbook quid pro quo harassment. I've sat through enough annual HR classes over the last 20 years to know that. He was her direct supervisor, and even without implicit threats it crosses the line into harassment. If he'd been, say, a sales manager he would have lost his job and opened the company to liability.

[Ghost]

Sure it was, particularly when he was trying to cover it up later.

Sorry, Nodack, it was textbook quid pro quo harassment. I've sat through enough annual HR classes over the last 20 years to know that. He was her direct supervisor, and even without implicit threats it crosses the line into harassment. If he'd been, say, a sales manager he would have lost his job and opened the company to liability.

I actually design those trainings, and have written dozens of them for dozens of companies over 15 years. And this was not, from any account I ever heard, serial harassment. And quid pro quo? What was she getting back? He didn't offer her a raise or promotion. It was something they both just wanted to do. The cover up certainly can't be construed as serial harassment.

The sales manager in your example may be subject to whatever penalties your company has for intra-office relationships between supervisor and subordinate employees, but without something else going on, this would not qualify as harassment. That doesn't mean it's smart, but it's not illegal.


Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

[Dan H]

Seriously? He was giving her gifts, attention, etc. Even if he were single the relationship would not have been professionally acceptable. At the end of the day it was an older guy in a position of authority and power taking advantage of a younger, less mature, and less experienced woman.

Anyway, we've kind of been derailed here. Yesterday, Bernie said:

http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/inde ... ernie.html

... the number of people who have stopped looking for work or are working part-time. He says real unemployment is more than 10 percent, when those groups are taken into account.

No word on if Obama is aware of this. Recovery summer, baby!

[Mori Chu]

Is Sarah Palin going to run for President this time? Drill baby drill!