I am pretty sure that we've tried every way to get the message across except for interpretative dance — which I would have finished if my choreographer hadn't gotten himself deported!

I know, right!? *laughs* :)

Okay, this is just awesome. *mic drop* :)

So do I, but I also know that it will take a lot of work and nail-biting too, 'cause I agree with Nancy Pelosi that we have to win by a lot to shut the other side up and down.

It didn’t matter if Hillary were centrist, far left or even if she ran on the GOP’s platform itself... She was Hillary Clinton — the scary mythical beast that Republicans had been preparing themselves for her presidential bid since the day Bill won the Democratic Primary twenty something years ago. Fortunately, none of the current Democratic nominees are as hated as Hillary was....not by a long shot!

I feel very good at our chances to rid ourselves of Trump and family in 2020. I’ve had Republican friends actually paying attention to what the Democratic candidates are saying — something they have never done in the past. And more than a few have told Devon and I that they regret voting for Trump and are sorry that they didn’t listen to us when we warned them about him. When has that ever happened??? It’s a first for us, but the Donald is just so horrible that they are embarrassed for supporting him.

Thank you for the additional info in [12&13]. I love that DH claims that people on this board fail to say exactly what is wrong with his idea... I am pretty sure that we’ve tried every way to get the message across except for interpretative dance — which I would have finished if my choreographer hadn’t gotten himself deported!

Above link went awry:

Should be:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/11/does-more-campaign-money-actually-buy-more-votes-investigation/355154/

My bad, should always test a copied link!!! :-(

It right on the masthead, if you can find his website.

Politicians and political consultants who massage them would laugh at Harris and his message if they knew he existed. The Atlantic published an article that shows why with four compelling graphs.

3/11/does-more-campaign-money-actually-buy-more-votes-investigation/355154/

(I've changed the order of presentation for clarity). The takeaway:

1) The more you outspend your opponent, the more likely you are to win. Conventional wisdom is right.

2) In close races, that effect was heightened.

3) More money was spent on votes in closer races. As those Emu and Doug commercials say "only spend what you need."

4) Most incumbent losses saw the incumbents outraised.

As evolutionary biologists would put it, Big Money is an evolutionary stable strategy (ESS). Small Money candidates will not win often enough to proliferate and win sustained power. They may win now and then, but not often enough change things. Money flows to power.

Harris assumes the electorate, who are mostly no money donors, are voting against their own best interests. This is naive. The wisdom of the crowd understands that an incumbent politician is much more powerful than a freshman. They sit on more powerful committees and chair more powerful committees. This power can bring good things to a district - just look at what Mitch McConnel has done for KY. Sure, the tide doesn't raise all boats equally, but a raise is better than nothing and much better than a loss.

An incumbent politician can reasonably make the argument: "vote for me, I'm a higher quality representative than my opponent, and you don't even have to pay a dime form my superior services." Given how our constitutional system is structured, it's a winning argument.

Put bluntly, Big Money is effectively written into the Constitution(s - fed. and state) If you want to fix a leak, you have to tighten or replace the right gasket.

If Don Harris doesn't like it:

* He might get an idea of how old his near daily horseshit is.

* He can eat horse shit pie. :)

@don,
Thanks for the warning. But I could tell from the title it would be a skim through article that I skim through just like Michale's bold face comments.

i can't speak for everyone, but i think most people who don't care about an article don't bother commenting on it. if you don't care about the articles, you don't care about the comments, and nobody here is interested in joining you, then why do you bother commenting here at all? it seems like a gigantic waste of your time. i don't mind spending the time because i enjoy reading what cw, michale and everyone else writes.

Despite my complaints aboot horserace articles, you have the right to write aboot what you want to write aboot.

well... most of the time. ok. just for you:

https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-duyor2/images/stencil/550x705/products/1005/4461/IMG_0933__60036.1560809986.jpg?c=2

why you continue to post here isn't a request to get lost (i enjoy your posts too), it's a serious question. but if it's too heavy for the moment, try some pie, it's delicious.

JL

Once again, I’ll ask the questions and see if you will bother to answer them...

1. If you are asking voters to only vote for small donation candidates, that pretty much excludes every candidate running in 2020. AOC has raised just under $2M for her 2020 campaign, with 82.6% coming from small donations under $200. She has the highest percentage of any candidate, but still relies on larger donations to some degree. Bernie Sanders has done the best amongst presidential candidates, but still only 60% of his over $46M raised came from small gift donors. Impressive, but not good enough for One Demand!

Since you have not listed any candidates on your site who qualify to call themselves “One Demand Approved”, do you expect voters to ignore every other issue they deem important and instead write in their own name (in states where that is allowed) on the ballots in protest?

2.It could even become an intervening event that could change people's outlook and make people realize that it is the most important issue of every election because it is the one issue that is never really addressed because of the excuse there are so many important problems that need to be solved first so we can't do it now which of course makes NO SENSE because the main obstacle to solving all the other important problems like climate change, income inequality, health care, etc. is big money corrupting our political process and the other problems can't be solved until we get the big money out of our political process.

Holy run-on-sentence, Batman! Question: If it is never addressed because people do not view it as the most important issue, then how can you claim it is the most important issue? How will small donations only candidates fix anything if none are elected?

3. What, exactly, is One Demand? It isn’t an organization. You don’t do anything, you have no supporters, you aren’t even a well thought out idea! So why are you asking for people’s personal information?

4. You aren’t truly a non-profit organization. You have no board of directors that offer oversight or direction. One Demand seems to exist only as a website. And even though it exists only as a website, it is a website that refers to itself by different names, is filled with mistakes and untrue statements, and is outdated and has clearly been ignored by you....all of which makes one question One Demand’s credibility.

One Demand has you and is only you. Unfortunately for One Demand, you don’t care enough to try to make your website look like it is run by a competent person. If CW did write an article on One Demand, would you expect him to ignore your site?

Believe me, nobody thinks that it will be easy to un-seat Donald Trump from office. People still awaken to night sweats worried about it. 2016 was THAT hard on them.

But polls are polls. In the end, unless he flat out GIVES the Ukraine or nuclear codes to Russia, the numbers will come out within the margin on error, especially on election night.

But one thing is certain right now: the mood of the Democratic electorate is such that leftist-progressive candidates are having a tough time, and most of the marbles are on Biden.

If he should fall ill, or be unable to run any more, however, the race wouldn't go to Bernie or Warren. ANOTHER centrist would rocket up the polls. That's politics. Try as hard as they will, the media (for instance) can't turn the Democrats into the mirror image of the Republicans.

There are precedents. In 1968 and 1972, with the Vietnam was looming, the Democrats went whole hog liberal and had their clocks cleaned. Later attempts at the same in the 1980s had similar results, with snickering.

Republicants, on the other hand have always had their best times when they swerved to the right. Reagan, and now Trump have shown that their right wing is both vicious and formidable.

So what to do? There are presently (of course) two camps in the Democratic party. One says, "Well, Hillary was a centrist, and couldn't beat him, we should go Bold." The other says, "Hillary actually beat Trump by five million votes. We just need a few more in the right districts to beat him at the polls."

I'm in the latter camp. America, like it or not, is a center-right country, and going Bold is a good way to end up getting our clocks cleaned AGAIN. The Biden numbers reflect that. He COULD pick a lefty like Warren as VP, who would then have to explain, over and over, that she doesn't really support his plan for building on Obamacare.

It's a tough path to navigate. What's sure is that it will play out in a polling booth near you, very soon. Once this 'silly season' is over, that is.

When the pollster poses the same question to a Rep/Con, he/she responds quietly n.o.y.f'ing bus - er, I meant to say 'undecided'.

If that were true, then wouldn’t the polls be:

Dems — 48%

Trump — 0%

Undecided — 52% ???

She is a happy campaigner.

https://twitter.com/HawaiiDelilah/status/1163987329486381056

When a pollster asks a Dem/lib "Who you gonna vote for?", he/she jumps up, waves his/her arms, and screams the name of his/her favorite Dem candidate.

When the pollster poses the same question to a Rep/Con, he/she responds quietly n.o.y.f'ing bus - er, I meant to say 'undecided'.

They've got control of election processes in several swing states and they have no compunction about cheating or going as close to outright cheating as they can get away with.

They're willing to let Russia and other countries interfere if it might help Blotus.

They're willing to lie their heads off about Dems, constantly and in unison.

The media, as a collective, bends over backwards to be "fair" to Repubs while putting Dem candidates through entirely different vetting demands; and non-white/female Dem candidates are held to yet higher standards than white-male-Dems.

So Blotus has advantages he doesn't merit.

On the straight basis of sheer merit Blotus is a goner; but with the GOP advantages it's a much closer potential contest.

Hopefull the degree of repugnance Blotus inspires in Dems combined with the efforts being made by people like Stacy Abrams, will be enough to ensure Blotus goes down, assuming he's still in office.

And Blotus himself seems likely to contribute to his own demise through his constant stream of unprecedented awfulness in every direction.

But, like every Dem I know, I take nothing for granted.