should the left re-evaluate it's approach to trump?
again: i'll never endorse him. i'll endorse non-voting. which is passive, but equivalent.
but, the reality is that trump is no less of a potential ally than clinton. it just depends on the issue. maybe. i don't actually believe that clinton is an advocate of anybody: not gay people, not black people - nobody. she works for the banks, and that's it. but, you could make the argument that clinton is better on those kinds of things [you should expect similar supreme court nominees as the ones you got from obama], but trump is better on trade.
the truth is that trump is drawing attention to trade issues on the left in ways that sanders or stein never could. he's raising awareness. call him a useful idiot [even if you have to abuse the language], but if he can mainline opposition to free trade then he's doing the left a massive favour.
so, instead of falling into these divide and conquer lines and kneejerking in conflict? go to the trump rallies. talk to people. empathize on trade. but, then maybe talk a little about health care. a little about taxes. start from that point of agreement and try and build on it.
the smart approach is to try to co-opt this, not to try and shut it down.
"TRUMP: Well, I think if I'm a few short and I have, you know, 1,200 or if I have 1,100 and somebody else is at 300 or 400 or 500, which is very likely going to be the case, uh, and if I'm a little bit short -- and one of the reasons was we had so many candidates. I mean we started off with 17 candidates. And it came down to, you know, finally, it's down to three, frankly. But, you know, there are so many candidates, so it's very hard to get over that number. It's very unfair, in a way. But because of the fact that there's so many candidates and so many candidates are grabbing delegates. Now, here's what I say, because -- and now they're out. And now they're out. So I think I will get over that number. I think I may get over that number fairly easily."
are you taking notes, ted?
do you want this guy (cruz) making tactical decisions?
he can't even figure out a prisoner's dilemma. he'll be challenging putin to an arm wrestling contest.
"no, dmitri and sergei need to stay home. this is mano a mano. no 2 out of 3 bullshit, either. winner gets iran.".
dude shouldn't be running for president, he should be enrolling in a course in introductory game theory.
“If there is a way to structure some kind of constitutional restrictions that take into account the life of the mother and her health, then I am open to that, but I have yet to see the Republicans willing to actually do that, and that would be an area where if they included health, you could see constitutional action."
and, what percentage of his customers does he suppose work in the service industry?
see, i'd be foolish to argue for the tremendous foresight of capital, though. just because it's stupid - from their own perspective - doesn't mean they won't do it. that's how we got into this mess in the first place.
let's be real about the choices. we can maintain the status quo, where people do shitty work for shitty wages while the bosses get rich. or, we can let the ceos destroy the economy through automation, then figure out how to deal with 40% unemployment caused by overwhelming automation. i have an idea about that, too: maybe we could take ownership of the machines in common. then, instead of some boss owning the productive capabilities and handing us out a wage, we could just set the machines in motion and enjoy being unemployed.
i know. that's crazy. what do you think, that it's a fifth of the way through the twenty-first century, or something? we'll have to wait until the future, after the year 2000, for something like that.
i've got a great campaign slogan for hillary. and, get ready for this, because it's what we're about to be subjected to. this is the first truly orwellian election cycle.
VOTE HILLARY - SHE'S BETTER THAN FASCISM*
* note that hillary supports the tpp, global military intervention, mass deportations and strong restrictions on free speech.
if you think that hillary is going to stand up for anybody except her handlers, you are sadly mistaken.
this may be a dark and dangerous place to be, but i really want to push back very hard against the idea that we should be blaming it all on trump. here's the reality: a healthy society would be able to listen to what trump is saying and just shrug it off as a lot of nonsense. the questions we need to be asking ourselves and drawing attention to really have nothing to do with trump at all. they are:
(1) what are the economic factors that have led to this scenario, and who is responsible for them?
(2) what are the educational factors that have led to this scenario, and who is responsible for them?
(3) broadly, what are the cultural factors that have led to this scenario, and who is responsible for them?
when you just mindlessly blame it on trump, you're giving hillary a free pass - and upholding the status quo by avoiding substantive analysis.
that said? this is what we're going to see for the next eight months. the media is going to point at scenario after scenario that has been caused by the economic and social policies that clinton has supported, then suggest she's the antidote to it.
something else i need to point out about trump v hillary, though:
hillary looks frighteningly like my maternal grandmother [i haven't looked into it, but i promise you that hillary has finnish-irish ancestry]. trump looks a lot like my maternal grandfather, which is where my screen name of 'murray' originates from. they were divorced, i believe, before i was born. but, it's like the fight between my maternal grandparents that i never saw. making it sort of creepy.
my nana is far more liberal than hillary, though.
fwiw, i am basically the same age as chelsea. but, my grandmother is only a couple of years older than hillary.
"The longer Kasich stays in the race, the more it benefits Donald Trump," - ted cruz
see, if you had any doubt that this guy is an idiot....
ted. listen. if marco hadn't dropped out, he would have probably beat you in new york. and in new jersey. connecticut, as well. and in many other places, too. there are states on the calendar that you have absolutely no chance of winning.
what kasich does in these states is take trump down from 75% to 50%, or maybe a little lower.
the fact that kasich is splitting the anti-cruz vote is just about the only thing that cruz has going for him at all, at this point. even with that said, i don't really see anywhere where he can split enough of the vote to let cruz win. it's even a stretch in the rust belt (where cruz may very well poll third, and be ranked third by most kasich supporters).
it's bad enough that trump got a 5% bump from rubio dropping. at least kasich should be able to prevent him from clinching.
if kasich drops, at least half of his support will move to trump and trump will sweep the remaining contests. well, maybe cruz can win in wyoming or something, but the outcome will no longer be in doubt.
but, the republican establishment is not very smart. i said this a few days ago. can they win a prisoner's dilemma? cruz is failing over and over again, which is not surprising. he's a dolt. but, i really hope kasich understands the math well enough to know that dropping out is handing it to trump.
they seem to be really cracking down on my foreign policy perspectives. it's really pretty standard chomsky-lite, it's just that i'm....well, they wouldn't be going after me if i wasn't on to something, right?
you hear a lot of nonsense on these topics thrown around. propaganda. disinformation. counter-propaganda. it takes a combination of intelligence and education to get it right.
*this* is what they're actively trying to shut down - what they *actually* don't want you to hear.
claims to be opposed to fascism. votes for tpp-loving, carpet-bomb glorifying, anti-speech crusader hillary clinton.
La Berlinoise
nope. we vote bernie. bye felicia
jessica +La Berlinoise
this is a setup. we're walking into an orwellian reality, where a fascist system is manufacturing consent of it's fascist policies by working people up against a paper strawman.
trump is an idiot. but, to claim that he is a fascist would suggest that he has an ideology, and that would be giving him too much credit.
the only fascist running in this election is hillary clinton.
the proper activist choice is to avoid co-operation by not voting. if the choice is hillary v trump, and the narrative is to vote for clinton to stop fascism, the only meaningful message you can send is that you refuse to take part in the charade.
and, that's all it is - a charade.
i'm a data analyst, and i want you to understand what i'm about to type. the only thing that bernie can accomplish within the democratic party over the next few months is to generate enough data to prove that the nomination process is rigged. i actually think he's already done this. i do hope that he runs as an independent, but, given the narrative that's developing, i'm not sure the process is going to be any more honest.
all the mental gymnastics about the supreme court nominee are out.
listen. he picked a middle-of-the-road right-leaning democrat because he is a middle-of-the-road right-leaning democrat. he has never at any point claimed to be the progressive that some have. he's on record calling himself a conservative over and over. you can look this up. it's in the public record.
and, he's consistent. this exchange exists, in multiple sources.
media: the right is claiming you're some kind of socialist. obama: that's ridiculous. i'm a conservative.
i'm a conservative.
it's not some kind of conspiracy theory. it's right in front of you. it always has been. you were just blind to it for some inexplicable reason. in fact, it's probably the reason he beat clinton in the nomination. and, considering that he won states like virginia and north carolina, it's also probably the reason he got elected.
but, the media narrative is immutable. it has been for years.
i remember watching a whit house press conference about a year ago where the media was nailing pretty-boy josh (that's meant to be purely descriptive, and as a consequence of not wanting to open a tab to google his last name) about obama being lax on illegal immigration. the entire exchange existed in a total fantasy reality. obama has deported more people than anybody else. if you look into this, you'd be appalled. but, the media has it's set of talking points and no amount of evidence or shift in policy can ever change them. the media is stuck in 1985, and it's unclear what will get them out.
so, just stop with the nonsense, ok? his supreme court nominee is not reflective of some elaborate game plan that will see fruition thirty years from now, or something. it is reflective of obama's political positions.
and, you've got less than a year to get your head around it before he's come and gone without cluing in.
the arizona poll released yesterday introduced a new dynamic: 25% undecided.
i generally tend to interpret undecided voters as undecided voters and rub up against the idea that they will distribute nicely in the end. and, in this circumstance - sanders v. clinton - you'd think that undecided should benefit sanders (although it didn't work out that way in ohio).
on the one hand, these are not good numbers for sanders. on the other hand, they're not catastrophic - because of that large undecided group.
but, this isn't what sanders wants to see. a lack of momentum and a lack of exposure (are there televised debates this week? town halls? i haven't seen any.) make this a different circumstance than last week.
i mean, let's be clear, here: i argued that all the factors leading up to the 15th were going to be in sanders' favour, and they clearly were. he split illinois. a week previous, the polling had him thirty points down. he clearly got a huge bump. and, the truth is that i really should have spoken more carefully. i shouldn't have said he will win; i should have said that if turnout is high then he will win. and, if turnout was higher than he would have won! i got a little carried away by rhetoric. but, the analysis was actually spot on if you can see through that.
none of that holds, here. i don't see any particular reason to think that sanders ought to make up this spread over the next five days.
so, if you look back, you'll see that i initially reacted badly to michigan pre-polling - and then modified my prediction to something closer as more results came in. i am going to need to see some more polling before i post a negative prediction. but, i don't see any reason to suspect that the situation will repeat itself.
there's a lot of reasons to suggest that he can do well in both tuscon and phoenix. but, right now, this looks bad - even while acknowledging that we'll need more data before we should start freaking out.
i'm finally just about caught up. i'm going to be focusing mostly on editing for another day or two, still. but i should be back to my normal schedule tonight around midnight - meaning that normally scheduling should resume tomorrow at midnight.
i'm going to get this out of the way. very preliminary. all analyses are subject to adjustments as a consequence of polling. these are first impressions, really.
mar 22
arizona: arizona, i'd suspect, is the liberal flip side to nevada - roughly similar, but leaning more in his favour due to more progressive bases. tuscon and phoenix are both something like austin, and there isn't really a big base of right-leaning democrats like there is in texas. so, you'd be looking at roughly purple state demographics, with a slight boost for bernie. arizona is a melting pot of sorts - being torn in various directions. so, he can win it, but again you're looking at the factor being turnout - low turnout and it's nevada, big turnout and it's colorado.
idaho: you can't rig a caucus. i don't see any reason to think it would be different than the other western caucus states.
utah: utah is weird. no, it actually is due to the mormon vote. even non-mormons are still living in what is a broadly mormon society. utah is almost like a different country. there's a lot of reasons to think that utah would react very badly to hillary clinton, but it's not clear that they'd react well to bernie sanders. they got over obama being black in 2008. to me, that suggests that they can get over sanders being a jew in 2016. but, utah is also the kind of state that would have done it's homework and actually known that obama was to the right of clinton. i think that sanders being a bit more libertarian, even if he's less conservative, is probably important in utah. some polls would help regarding margins.
he should be aiming to make up at least fifty delegates on mar 22nd.
mar 26th
alaska/hawaii - these are caucuses, but i don't have any reason to suggest that sanders has a real advantage in alaska. clinton actually seems to do better outside of the lower 48, where the politics might be a little distant and the issue may already be the general. i'm going to bristle a little on the assumption that he's favoured in these states.
washington - washington is very, very liberal. it's practically canada. he needs a big win here. 70%+ would be great. it's the kind of bump that could save him. and, if he just squeezes out a tie, it's a death blow. i think he should be the clear favourite here, but some polling would be nice.
assuming that alaska & hawaii roughly split, which is conservative, he needs to aim for at least a 40 delegate gain in washington.
put together, he should be aiming to have made up 100 delegates by march 26th, cutting the lead to about 215 - which is what it was on mar 14th.
apr 5
is wisconsin more like minnesota or more like illinois? let's split the difference. let's say he aims for 55%. again - if he's fighting her to a draw in wisconsin, he's not pulling people out - or she's stuffing to a point that can't be overturned. he should be aiming for more like 60%. but, it's going to roughly split. he needs to win, at least.
apr 9th
wyoming is another one of these caucuses that you can't rig and all evidence does point in his favour - although i again would like some polls.
the goal for after april 9th needs to be that the difference is under 200. whatever the results in wyoming are, that's what needs to be the takeaway for the situation to remain competitive. apr 19
new york. he has to be aiming for fifty delegates in new york. that means his goal in new york is 60%. he split massachusetts. he split illinois. the idea that he can do this is perhaps bordering on the realm of fantasy. some polling would of course help!
of course, if he gets 57% or something then you can start tweaking. and, if he gets 80% in washington (or wins hawaii huge) then he has some extra space. but his goal coming out of new york needs to be a delegate difference that is less than 150. and the percentage he should be aiming for to get him the boost at the end is really 60%. if he fights her to a draw, it's going to be the same lack of enthusiasm that kicked in last night.
apr 26
connecticut & RI : i think the question is whether connecticut is more like massachusetts or more like new york. i don't think it's much like vermont or much like new hampshire. but, if he wins 60%? the reality is that this is less than 20 delegates. whether he gets 55% or 60% is really not important. he can even split them, really. he just can't lose them.
delaware/pennsylvania/maryland: my understanding is that these states almost always vote together, and that they're pretty comprehensively blue. i know that the conventional analyses will argue that maryland should be favoured for clinton due to race, but i think the results up to this point have actually completely debunked this. i would expect maryland to follow the same trends as the states to it's direct north - because it always has before. the racial breakdown has never mattered previously and should not matter now.
so, the key is pennsylvania. pennsylvania is the liberal image to ohio. where ohio is the northern tip of the southeast, pennsylvania is the southern tip of the northeast. that means that you want to give sanders a really strong chance in pennsylvania. but, that you also need to tone it done just a tad.
clinton won ohio with around 55%. i think sanders could win the pennsylvania-maryland-delaware megastate with about 55%. maryland may actually be a little kinder to sanders than pennsylvania because it's a little more liberal. but, when you work it out? if he wins those three states by 55% each, it's only +40 delegates.
combined with connecticut & RI, he wants to be walking out of april 26th with the difference very close to 100. so, he wants to make up around 50 on the 26th. i want to say less than 100. but, then the sky will fall if it's 110. around 100 is good enough.
the schedule actually shifts again in may.
may 3
clinton should be favoured in indiana. he has to hope for a split. if he can come in with it a little under 100, he might walk out with it a little over 100. it's very hard to see how he can win indiana.
may 10
she should be favoured in west virginia as well. thankfully, it's only 37 delegates. he'll be lucky to keep her under 60. but it's only a few delegates, either way - so long as he doesn't get wiped. i frankly couldn't imagine much that could be less likely than a socialist jew winning in west virginia. i hope he brings some serious security with him. so, we want to hope it's under 120 at this point.
may 17
she will likely get around 65% in kentucky and he will likely get around 65% in oregon. oregon's a little bigger, but it's basically a delegate split. we're still looking at a difference of about 100-120 or so - hopefully.
june 5
i skipped guam a little earlier. it's 12 delegates. she'll probably win a few. but, when you combine guam, puerto rico and virgin islands you have 99 delegates. and, i'd have to think she's favoured in all of these places.
unfortunately, that puts us back up to 150 as a targeted delegate difference and gives her momentum going into june 7th.
june 7th
he has to win over a hundred delegates in california, and hobble together the rest.
so, as was stated: it was always about california!
“We realist Democrats understand that collateral damage is an unavoidable by-product of the War on Terror, and me being a mother, grandmother and tireless children’s rights advocate does not mean that I will flinch even one iota in allowing Israel to obliterate every last school-cum-rocket launching pad in Gaza. Those who allow their children to be used as human shields for terrorists deserve to see them buried under one-ton bombs.”
it doesn't change the math. it's rigged. i'm disengaging. zig-zagging, sure. but, is there a contradiction in there anywhere?
it doesn't change the delegate math. it does change the likelihood a little. i mean, if hillary gets arrested tomorrow, things change, right - i'll base whatever i continue to rant out on existing polls. but, projections of future successes need to be made on analyses of past ones. again: ohio was never serious. but, it's hard to see how he gets 60-65% in new york when he got 49% in illinois. yes: he always had to get 60-65% in new york, so what he needs to do hasn't changed. but, that's a big gap in votes over states that ought to vote similarly.
so, there's articles floating around claiming the lead is too big or the math has fundamentally altered - that it's too late, and that's it. that's inaccurate. the race has not meaningfully changed in any way. he still needs to do exactly what he already needed to do. it's just the question of whether it can be done or not that's become a little more in focus, and it's a little deflating.
but, despite my reactions, the truth is that his chances of winning are not different today than they were yesterday, and he still needs you to get out and vote in order for him to win. it's just that you have to do it. will you actually do it?
hey, just a reminder: hillary clinton is not a pro-choice candidate.
she is on record, many times, over many years, as stating that she will put restrictions on access to abortion.
so, you might want to tone down the identity politics a little and take a closer look at what you're actually buying. you may be disappointed in what it actually is.
in fact, most of the reasons you might think you want to vote for her (out of fear) will not hold up to any real scrutiny on your behalf, if you bother to take the time to look into it.
she's not particularly keen on the gay, either, in fact.
nor does she particularly like black people. and i could rant for some time. but, hey. if you don't know this yet, what's the point....
if that's what this is being reduced to - identity politics, culture wars - i would really advise liberals to take a closer look at what they're supporting, whether actively or to stop the boogeyman. because she's actually not on your side of the culture wars. at all.
how about that support for capital punishment, too? geez, what a bleeding heart, huh?
trump wants to ban muslims from entering the country.
hillary wants to carpet bomb them in their own countries, then brag about there not being any military casualties.
you think hillary is less racist, somehow? amazing. you should get some kind of award for that.
she also supports mass deportations of illegal immigrants, btw.
so, it's becoming more clear what the narrative is setting itself up as.
trump is being set up as the villain. you need to vote away your rights to stop trump. the tpp might reduce you to a slave, but you'll vote for it because trump is scary. the security state is expanding, but you'll vote for it because trump said something mean about gay people.
they're ramping this up. and i just don't have time for it. but, if you were paying attention to what clinton did as secretary, this shouldn't be surprising. in fact, this kind of narrative is what you're going to get for the next eight years. it's all about distracting you with something scary to continue the slow enslavement of america. and, you'll be happy in your slavery, too.
the only way out is to not vote. i need to reiterate it. but, you have to see the situation for what it is, first.
trump is playing the role of the villain. clinton is here to save us. you need to make that deal with the devil, that hobbesian bargain, to sell yourself away for your own safety. it's all theatre. and you fall for it at your own peril.
--
in your rush to "stop fascism", you're going to elect a woman that all educated people realize is a fascist in waiting. veni, vidi, vici!. and, hey: you can count on her to get the trains to run on time. truly.
we're a little over thirty years late. but there it is. right out of orwell.
i'm voting for hillary clinton to stop fascism.
look at how absurd that statement is.
somebody meme this....
but, like i say: i'm tuning out. you might get the odd wry comment from me. the disinterested, sardonic observer. but, i have no attachment to this.
if i was an american, i would probably weigh things differently. i may not like clinton very much. i might be to her left on 19/20 issues - and consequently disagree with virtually everything she believes in. but, if i lived in a swing state, i'd probably drag myself out and force myself to vote for her.
probably.
i'd be voting against her opponent, not in favour of her.
what i've meant to say is that, as a canadian, whether trump or clinton wins is of little consequence to me. but, trump may be mildly preferable. let me restate my reasons.
1) trump may be less imperialist than clinton. we can state with certainty that clinton is an imperialist, neo-con interventionist. it is less clear where trump stands, but there is reason to think he may believe that it's all a waste of money.
2) trump may be better on trade. hillary is very obviously in support of the tpp [regardless of what she says]. trump may act to tear these agreements up.
maybe i should expand a little on this.
before nafta, there was something called the fta. it was just canada and the united states. then this was expanded to include mexico and that was nafta.
my position on free trade is very similar to that of the canadian liberal party. they supported the idea of free trade with the united states, but opposed the fta; it was the conservatives that put the deal through. i would also support the idea of free trade with mexico, but only under the condition that they pass more strenuous labour laws. see, that's the real problem. it's not that trade exists. it's that companies have a way out of adhering to labour laws - they just need to move to mexico. the currency thing is also a factor, but if the mexican state would catch up on regulations then most of the problems would resolve themselves very quickly. and, why aren't they? because the mexican state is horribly corrupt.
so, i would like to see nafta dissolved until mexico can get it's labour laws up to par. this is the same kind of process that the eu uses around it's member states. and, let the other central american states in, too, if they want.
i would argue, though, that dissolving nafta does not dissolve the fta - even if it needs a little work, too, to be actual free trade and not just investors rights.
so, that means i support free trade between the united states and canada, but oppose nafta [until mexico pulls itself up].
i would have similar views on the tpp - although i would support an open trade agreement between the united states, canada, australia, new zealand and japan. i'd support free trade with europe, and large amounts of south america. it's just a question of whether the labour laws are up to par or not.
clinton may claim she sort of agrees. we all know she doesn't. trump may have different logic, but he gets to the same point as i do. he is to her left on this issue.
3) health care. as a canadian, my prerogative is that you adopt a single-payer health care system. obamacare is of no benefit to the maintenance of my country's system - it is just the continuation of the status quo of a huge corrupt market on the border. i would like to see you abolish the market. the easiest way to do this is universal coverage over single-payer, but it's the abolition of the market that i'm concerned with.
hillary is not in favour of abolishing this market. trump is less clear. but, obamacare is a huge obstacle in abolishing the market, because people have come to accept it as a compromise. so, any step to abolish obamacare is within my best interests, as a canadian liberal that supports single payer and sees the american system as a perpetual threat to it.
4) the dollar. this is a bit sneaky. i think trump may crash the dollar. and, that benefits me in a lot of ways, as well.
so, again: i'm not endorsing trump. i'm not arguing you'd be better off under trump. i'm just pointing out that i need to disengage. as a canadian anti-war leftist, i simply don't think that taking a pro-clinton position is in my self-interest.
--
i should also remind some middle of the road political "moderates" or perhaps people under thirty - that free trade is not a minor concern on the left. it was the central focus of the left throughout the 90s, culminating in major protests in seattle, quebec city and other places. the alter-globalization movement fizzled out after 9/11 under the effects of police state powers passed to "protect us from terrorists". but, the issue has never lost importance to leftists.
it's not just another thing in the list. it's the single, biggest issue - outside of putting an end to the wars created by 9/11.
this might be something bernie doesn't realize. he might want to do some polling; he may be shocked to find out that only a small percentage of his backers have any interest in getting tough on wall street at all.
frankly, the whole wall street spiel is actually pretty much my biggest disagreement with him. i would support reinstating glass-steagall. but, i think a lender of last resort is pretty important. and, i know that the so-called bailouts are actually loans.
but, i'll happily put that nonsense aside to talk about his broader prescriptions. and, the stance on trade is absolutely central. i may be giving away that it's so fundamentally important that i'd consider supporting the republicans over it - if i really believed they'd act to break it up.
the power went out this morning, and it seems to have fried the heater in the living room. this happened some time last summer, and it wasn't a big deal because it was summer. but it's still winter. so, that really can't be allowed to sit.
the last time it happened, you just changed out the electronics. but, i need to ask - is there something about the wiring that could be modified? i mean, that's twice that it knocked out in an electrical storm.
i want to tie what i said about ohio back to the 538 article, because despite coming short on expectations, i think i beat them pretty solidly on the math.
they were claiming - based on demographics and polling - that ohio should be more like michigan, and illinois and missouri should be bigger clinton wins. it was in the form of "more black people, therefore more clinton" and "ohio is white, so it should be more like michigan".
i said - no way. check the voting history. which states are liberal? which are conservative?
and, i think the results solidly debunk all of those arguments. based on those kinds of arguments, the white working class state of ohio should have solidly backed sanders and missouri should have backed clinton by the ten points they claimed.
i made one error - i was off by about ten points all around. i called missouri and illinois for sanders by ten and ohio a functional draw - she won ohio by a little less than ten, and missouri and illinois were a draw.
so, i got the pattern right, at least - i'm just off by ten points. the aggregates and demographic modelling didn't even get the pattern right.
why was i off by ten points? turnout. either in terms of myself exaggerating turnout, in terms of turnout being less than it could have been or in terms of the stuffing counteracting it is not clear. but, it's reduced to an error in projected turnout nonetheless. and, that shifted the results in all three states by about ten points.
--
i want to be clear on that point, as it's not trivial, right.
i looked at the polling and said "ok. but they're underpolling independents. so, i'm going to shift the results."
i did that in michigan, and it got me closer - but it wasn't enough of a shift. tonight, this kind of thinking continued to beat the models, but it was too much of a shift - about 10%. consistently.
so, is the primary fair? how's the cognitive dissonance doing?
well, the night started off pretty poorly - with these huge head starts. "initial state", or whatever it was. i guess that these are absentee ballots, or early voting or whatever. and, we can see that these votes were disproportionately in favour of clinton, and that these leads came down dramatically over the night.
it's all very easy to explain and everything. older voters, and whatnot. but, we have to keep coming back to this thought experiment: if she was going to rig it...
it is what it is, right? you want to play the game, you have to play by the rules. a little irony, but it's life. he knew what he was getting into.
michigan proved that it is possible to overrun the ballot-box stuffing and win with brute force of high turnout, but it's hard to maintain and she can of course adjust.
florida was a little wider than the late polls suggested - albeit not a lot. she supposedly got 75% of the vote in miami-dade. that's a 90,000 vote win. and, so, what's the difference - a delegate?
chicago might seem more important. she probably won by stuffing boxes in chicago (with black people's names - see how this works? it's the democrats, folks. what did you expect?). but, it works out to a few delegates, at the end of it.
the question here was whether it was rigged, and again i think they tried to but they're only stuffing it enough to try and get across a media message - she wins. veni, vidi, vici. well, this is the right mindset with this woman, right.
so, she got enough ballots in illinois and missouri to swing the checkmark. and, she overcompensated in ohio.
but, the cheating is not really altering the race. or, not yet.
the antidote is higher turnout. you can only stuff so many ballot boxes. and, you can overpower any and every attempt to cheat with brute force - if you can get enough people out.
so, is it rigged? sort of. but, don't complain about it. run the limes, instead.
so, i'm going to spin this a little bit. remember: it's about delegates.
i thought he would win missouri and illinois by comfortable margins, lose by equivalent margins in florida and north carolina and split ohio. that's a little different than other people were suggesting. but, had it worked out that way, it basically cancels out and lets him move forward.
the results?
well, he performed about how was expected in florida.
but he did a little better in north carolina than expected, which is good. that said, he did a little worse in ohio than expected. in terms of delegates? that actually cancels out.
the disappointment, then, is that he did not do better in missouri amd illinois. he may end up "winning" both, but he's really splitting both, regardless of who technically wins. he needed to use these states to try and gain delegates, not to break even.
so, where he's going to lose delegates tonight is in underperforming in missouri and illinois - and that likely reduces to turnout.
spring break? maybe.
it makes it a little harder, sure. but it doesn't really change the race. no, really. if you look at it closely, it doesn't. he still needs to get about 60% over the next 9 states up to new york - and he should be able to do that. then, he still needs to win 50+ delegates in new york. from there, the math isn't really substantially different - he'd still have to win the next couple of dates, and he'd still have to win big in california.
so, it would have been a moral victory if he had won thirty or forty more delegates, sure. but it doesn't change the math....
--
no. really.
mo:
71*.6 = 43.
71*.5 = 36
ill:
156*.6 = 94
156*.5 = 78
(43-36) + (94-78) =
7 + 16 =
23.
not a big difference. he can make that up by overperforming in pennsylvania.
i mentioned this in massachusetts: it looks like she stuffed ballots in boston. and he almost overwhelmed it.
i mentioned it in michigan: it looks like she stuffed ballots in detroit. and he did overwhelm it.
that's where she could stuff ballots. and, the urban/rural split is backwards. i mean, did we enter the twilight zone? then, there's something funny going on.
so, she looks at the "expert analysis" for today. and, they say that she could lose ohio. so, she stuffs ohio extra good - to make sure he couldn't possibly overwhelm her.
so, she starts off with a huge lead. 70%. "initial results". then, they call it within a few minutes, right. all according to plan...
now, i didn't think ohio was the state she had to worry about. i thought it was illinois. and, there's a lot of illinois that hasn't come in, yet.
but, whether i was right or wrong, something is curious: he is consistently gaining in ohio. she's fallen, steadily, from 70% to 57%. and, this movement is continuing.
you can see, clearly, that dropping rubio doesn't give anybody enough support to catch trump, anywhere, in the winner-takes-all states. it will, however, give trump a roughly 5 point boost - which helps him in the remaining proportional states.
if the republican party has given up and is embracing trump? well, sure.
if this is meant to help cruz or kasich? fail.
rubio dropping only helps one person: trump.
don't take this too seriously. they're very round numbers. but, it gives you an idea of what could happen tonight.
i just want to draw attention to this because it's exactly the kind of analysis that i think is completely wrong, and exactly what i'm flailing against.
they are claiming that proportion of black voters is predictive; that it's causal. i claim it's not, that it's a proxy for ideology. and, they're running through all of these other irrelevant things that are purely correlative, and at best proxies (but largely, not even). this is the basic error of correlation not implying causality. it doesn't. it never has. no matter how convenient pollsters think it is, it's still wrong. no matter how ubiquitous..
i am calling illinois for bernie because it is a blue, liberal state. i think he will win illinois big, and there is some polling that upholds this. missouri and ohio are purple states and should actually split - although i think bernie will win missouri and ohio is less clear (based on polling). so, ohio is the least likely because it is the most purple. and, frankly, the polling for florida (a blue-to-purple state) isn't making sense to me - but i don't have any valid argument to suggest he has a real chance, other than to question the modelling in the polling (and all that can do, at best, is take the margin down - but i said the same thing about michigan). i have claimed florida will be closer than expected.
we saw the black thing break down a little in michigan, but michigan is purple. illinois will collapse the whole thing altogether and make it clear that race is not the predictive variable, but merely a coincidental one.
but, it won't stop the media. this is what the media does. this is what the country is!
i just woke up from a dream that featured a lengthy political debate with my subconscious, and i want to be clear about where i stood in 2008.
i supported clinton over obama in 2008. the reason was that i - correctly - calculated that clinton was to the left of obama on a couple of things, and interchangeable on the rest.
but, there was one major issue that led me to support clinton over obama, and it was healthcare. obama made it very clear that he opposed single payer (even if he flopped on a public option). at the time, hillary was suggesting that she supported single payer. with all the concern about hilllary's trustworthiness aside, obama was blatantly presenting himself as a market fundamentalist, and hillary just seemed like the better choice to abolish a market-based healthcare system (which is in the self-interest of canada).
that was the single, dominant issue - i thought she would be better on healthcare. and, despite all the flipflopping on hillary's side, obama's health care plan is exactly what i didn't support - meaning she could have only been better, on the issue.
but, i want to be clear that this was also a lesser-evil calculation. i never whole-assedly supported clinton the way i'm supporting sanders. it was always "well, they're both horrible, but she's a little better." - the typical left-liberal approach to democratic party politics.
but, i've identified some other issues in the current election that matter to me, as a canadian. what did i think in 2008?
1) foreign policy is big. it's a huge reason i'm pushing for sanders. in 2008? i decided they were both neo-con interventionists and that they would not differ in any substantial way on foreign policy. i did not fall for the hype on obama; i understood that he was not opposed to the invasion of iraq on principle (like sanders was) but simply because he thought it was a poor tactical decision. i heard him loud and clear when he stated, repeatedly, that he'd have rather blown afghanistan into a crater, if he had the chance. so, i saw them both as imperialist, interventionist, pro-war candidates. i did not see any reason to support obama on this file. and, he went and made her secretary of state, so i hardly think i analyzed this poorly.
2) trade. i saw them as interchangeable on trade, as well. and, what obama has left us with is the tpp - which is exactly what clinton would have left us with.
and, i could run through this list, and you'll see that commonality - what i saw was a two-headed monster with a slightly different health care policy.
that's very different than what i'm seeing today. sanders is a real choice for some change, even if it's not as extreme as some would like to exaggerate it. obama never was - and, if you were fully informed, you knew that the whole time.
my read on this is that they're reading a lot of uncertainty into the american election and pulling back to wait to see what happens - while getting out of the way, so to speak. it's a characteristically shrewd move, designed to minimize conflict.
this will probably be my last polling analysis update. and, it's huge - because it's cementing what i've been saying. sort of.
on the one hand, this is the perfect opportunity to test what i'm saying, which is why i'm doing this. we have long term aggregate modelling in multiple states. we have a single, reliable poll taken within a few days of the vote. which one is more accurate? i claim that reading the single snapshot will be more accurate than the aggregate modelling, and you can throw all that out the window.
on the other hand, i need to bring my cognitive dissonance back in. this poll is suggesting - across the board - that clinton is doing better with self-identified liberals, while sanders is doing better with self-identified conservatives. this is patently ridiculous, and could only be explained in three ways:
1) clinton's attacks (on gun rights, for example) are backfiring & people just aren't listening to bernie at all. do gun rights really overpower health care? this is crazy.
2) this poll is a part of the rigging process, in which case the clinton campaign is trying to lower expectations ahead of a careful grind & halt operation.
3) it's just some kind of weird anomaly.
see, i can't analyze this thing under the assumption that it's a vast, right-wing conspiracy against sanders - even if my gut tells me it is. i need to analyze it on face value. but i can caveat it.
florida
he's actually not doing so badly. she's under 60. the polling seems to be polling women higher than the population, which maybe says something about the sample. if he keeps her under 60, it's a hole he can climb out of - if he wins big in illinois. but, there's reason to think he may be able to keep it under 55, too.
the flip side is turnout amongst old people. but, i have a criticism of the modelling on this point, too: while they are correct to point out that turnout is higher around the age of 65, they fail to model the decline in turnout that sets in as age increases. so, when they model 65-70 year olds as more likely to vote, this is correct - but when they model 85-90 year olds as also more likely to vote, this is wrong. they only gather data in a 65+ age category. they simply don't know how much of the over 65 sample is also over 80.
over the last few years, it has been publicized that polling firms have screwed up predictions by overweighting young people. i believe that there are examples (the last ontario provincial election) where they overcompensated by overweighting old people. you need to watch for that in florida.
but, that doesn't change the reality that a win, here, for sanders is keeping clinton to 60. and a big win is keeping her to 55.
north carolina
they're claiming she has a big lead amongst early voters. again: if hillary was going to rig this, how would she do it? but, still, again: if she's really only pushing 50% on the yet-to-vote, then an optimistic scenario suggests he can keep her under 55, if he can get that turnout up.
what i said about michigan was that you should expect her to win, but that it will be closer than expected. i'm saying the same thing about florida & north carolina. i think there's a higher level of expectation that she win these states. but make of it what you will.
it will be suspicious if north carolina looks like alabama (alabamastan? these are soviet polling numbers...) as the polls don't support that - and, perhaps the polls didn't really support the large margins in these other southern states, either. it will also be suspicious if she wins florida by a large margin, when the polls are steady-to-narrowing.
illinois
all of the factors put together (including overpolling women, again) make it clear: bernie sanders will win illinois. the question is by how much - 55? 60? 65? it's all about turnout. he needs delegates! so, if you're in illinois then get out and vote. how well he does in illinois will likely determine how seriously he's taken after tomorrow.
another thing to watch in illinois: this poll suggests that his support amongst blacks is statistically the same as his support amongst latinos. now, he may lose both. but, the point is that they're the same. that is massive, as it is the first sign of hillary's weird lock on blacks breaking up - and strongly suggestive that this might be about southern, conservative blacks rather than blacks altogether.
it will be suspicious if she wins illinois, by any margin. bernie ought to be favoured, here.
missouri
bernie sanders will also win missouri. and, note that they are again oversampling women. it's almost like they're doing this on purpose. again: get out and vote! it's about turnout.
it will be suspicious if she wins missouri, by any margin. bernie ought to be favoured, here.
ohio
ohio has 12% undecided. how are you undecided on hillary clinton? what that means is that you want to vote for sanders, but can't get past your programming - or don't want to admit it over the phone. advantage: bernie.
they oversampled women, again.
with all of the factors, i also think that bernie ought to be favoured to win ohio, but it will be closer. so, get out and vote! that's going to be the difference: turnout.
=====
so, again, it's not completely clear what this poll is.
either it's the decent, post-michigan poll i was waiting for - and it's confirming my analysis...
....or it's a part of hillary's faltering attempt to fix the nomination, and meant to lower expectations for a run on the polls that she expects will overpower her attempts to stuff ballot boxes.
either way, it's clear that bernie is surging and that his ability to win tomorrow depends on turnout.
i think they basically split the delegates for the day, and move on to the next fight. but, the momentum puts sanders in a stronger position to gain delegates in new york and pennsylvania.
well, the first thing the us would do if it wanted to ban slavery would be to fix the "except as a punishment for crime" part of the thirteenth amendment, which has been used to legally sanction slavery for the last 150 years. there were the jim crow laws for a while; nowadays, we have the supposed drug war. that requires some effort, though. you could ban private prisons, for a start.
and, in fact, this law is likely not disconnected from the growing power of private prisons in the united states. the comments are focusing a lot on nike. but, this is old information: nike has reshored over the last decade, and now mostly produces it's shoes through domestic prison labour, rather than foreign child labour. a ban like this essentially acts as a tariff, giving the prison slave labour industry a competitive advantage.
listen, i didn't build this. i don't even live there. i'm just saying.
the cnn skew on this was outrageous. the way the questions were phrased on the screen, the setups, etc. but, the flip side of that is that they gave him some more space to respond - and that he responded very well. i think that the takeaway from this is going to make cnn look bad, rather than work in taking sanders down. i've never seen somebody manage to take the barrage and actually work it in his favour. and, i'd expect that this performance will give him a bump. he's earning this, and it's paying off.
--
they weren't easy on her, either. and, it's not like she demonstrated a lack of insight - it's just that i don't agree with her on point after point. the healthcare bit, for example, had me cringing - even as she demonstrated a strong understanding and made her points well (i just can't believe anybody really, actually believes that markets can reduce prices). i will say this: this townhall makes it clear where they stand on the spectrum. it make the choice that much easier. and, i do expect that the bump goes to bernie. but maybe there's some middling centrist patriotism lurking under the surface, too.
also: note that rubio won in dc. that's why you hang on to him.
1) the nbc poll that puts clinton at 51 was taken from the 4th to the 10th. this is a polluted sample. but, i would suspect that sanders takes a huge lead in polling after the 8th. this poll likely overstates support for clinton by integrating data before last tuesday.
i want to be clear about what i'm doing here. i'm doing exactly the opposite of what the aggregates want to do. they want to say that you want to average polls over a longer distance, to "smooth" the data out. that works fine in some circumstances, like measuring responses to advertising (you can buy a sandwich the day of the polls, or the day after, or a month later, even). it's simply awful modelling for politics.
the aggregate sites will point to this poll as more accurate because it was taken over a longer period. but, i'm suggesting the longer period is just polluting the sample.
based on that poll alone, i would suggest a slightly better result than we saw in michigan.
2) there is another poll, with sanders ahead at 48-46 (i guess there's 6% undecided). on the one hand, this is an internet poll - and the predictive abilities of internet polls are widely variable (there is no margin of error!). on the other hand, it was conducted mar 9-10. despite not liking the methodology, this is entirely consistent with everything i'm saying.
---------
i don't have a good poll, but i don't want to just average them out, either. the reality is that the data for illinois actually looks better for sanders than the data for michigan did. plus, illinois is a very blue state. it is actually reasonable to predict a comfortable sanders win, if you consider that this is an open primary, the state is full of liberals and the phone polling is being done with democrats. but, the correct answer is that the data is inconclusive.
something to note, though, is that illinois will likely provide the data that is necessary to permanently throw away the racial theories of support. it's going to split on a left/moderate axis, and that will assert itself across racial lines.
ohio
we're looking at the same breakdown in the two polls - the phone poll is sampling over too long of a period, and over a defining pivot point, while the internet poll is solely after the defining event. and, sanders is doing better in the polling done solely after tuesday. there is again not a perfect poll, here, but there is reason to suggest a very close result [given that they're strictly polling democrats]. but, remember: ohio is completely purple. it doesn't have the liberal base that illinois does, and doesn't consistently lean democrat like michigan does.
florida
clinton is comfortably ahead here, and the event doesn't seem to have registered much. florida is the old folks' home of the nation, and these voters tend to be low-information and driven by routine. bernie needs to try and keep it under 60%. and, this is key - because florida is a very big state.
missouri
literally no polling. it's a purple state. i would expect it to split. north carolina
literally no polling. obama won north carolina in 2008, but obama is a conservative. so, one must expect clinton to win north carolina very comfortably.
--
if he wins big in illinois, he could gain delegates on tuesday.
otherwise, he's going to be struggling to not get further behind.
but, remember: it was always about california.
i lost the last two days hitch-hiking to ann arbor (and back) to see tortoise, but i think i can get some videos up over the next 24 hours.
reviews will come up in time. i didn't take footage because i saw cameras running and assumed some would come up in better quality, so let's hope that's true.
short review: they played a lot of new material, and the new material is simply not written at the same level as the old material.
it should be up to the business owner to decide whether smoking is allowed on their property, and if people don't like the rules then they can go somewhere else.
i've been clear for a few weeks that i think sanders can make up 100 delegates in california. he'd have to get about 65% of the vote in california to do that, and i think he can. we have no meaningful polling at this point, but:
1) the state is liberal. 2) arnie democrats are hillary democrats, and they will bail for trump.
he can win on big turnout. he can win big on trump bleeding democrats out.
i think he can make up 50 in new york, too, for the same reasons. hillary was never really the senator for new york.
he's probably going to lose florida and north carolina. you don't need polls for that. missouri is like michigan. but, i want to see polls for ohio and illinois. i think he could win over 60%, maybe even 65%. i haven't seen polls - don't quote me. it's intuition. there aren't any relevant polls.
what i'm getting at is that he could split on tuesday, or even gain a few. and, then he just needs ten here, five there until he gets the chance to wallop her in california.
but, this is the math he's counting on, here: not just wining california, but winning california with 65-70%.
i'm watching the univision debate as i'm eating lunch.
i like the fact that bernie brought up libya in the right context. i hope that catches on a little. with all of the talk about benghazi and the emails, it's obscuring how poor of a judgment call it was (and how it was a crisis point in the new revival of the anglo-russian conflict). the media is drawing attention to what is empty politics. but, there's a really serious issue lurking underneath. great to see it coming out.
but, i want to take note of this debate on immigration, as it's obviously of importance in the spanish-speaking [and broadly indigenous] vote. the question was phrased something like:
are you actually concerned about working conditions, or are you really just concerned that they steal jobs from white people?
it has to be the worst debate question i've ever heard. it's meant to imply that sanders is some kind of racist. and, from a passive debate perspective, such an approach is likely to have a bigger effect on a white progressive from oregon than a potential voter in arizona - for the reason that people on the ground know how ridiculous the question is.
do you really oppose war because it's violent, or are you just concerned that it kills people?
the concerns are interchangeable, right. the point is that undocumented workers are not protected by labour laws. so, firms can save money by hiring them. if you enforced the labour laws, you'd create jobs for americans.
so, they might hit him on this: you say one thing to white people and another to indigenous people. sure. but, they're consistent: it's the same argument, from differing experiential perspectives.
but, this is what the media does: it tries to divide people over nonsense. and, by skewing the presentation ever so slightly, they can make it seem like bernie is on the side of the tea party, creating an exaggerated choice between good and evil.
if you're informed, you won't fall for this. if you're not - because you live too far away - you might. he's gotta get this across. he'll never do it in a debate, though - it's too complicated.
this topic also allowed hillary to enrage me once again. they talked about the 2007 bill, which sanders voted against because it created systems with poor working conditions (thereby taking away jobs from americans, who would be protected by labour laws). hillary voted for it. she's throwing this line around:
i couldn't imagine the united farm workers supporting a bill that created slave-like working conditions
i just about snapped - because she knows exactly what she's doing. if you're informed on this topic, that should make you extremely angry. it's the worst level of slime. the lowest kind of sleaze. drop the benefit of the doubt on her: that line made it absolutely clear to me that she knows exactly what she's doing.
i can't get into this here. it's too complicated.
===
see, he touched on this, too, in criticizing the monroe doctrine. this is a huge heart-tugger for me. i actually sampled the good neighbour speech in one of my songs. this is one of those "progress" type things that hegelian love so much.
he's not perfect. don't get me wrong, here. but he's pushing a lot of unexpected buttons.
i'd never have thought i'd be sitting here and watching a serious candidate for the presidency criticize the monroe doctrine. obviously, it happened once before. but, that was before we ended history.
in the end, bernie mighty not pass much himself. who might his vp be? not her. that person has to carry things forward. he'll be 75 in november. 79 in four years. life expectancy is 78.
but, if he can bring back history he'll have done something. i've keyed in on this narrative before. i'll key in on it again.
the british empire created conflict to open up markets.
the american empire creates markets by ensuring endless conflict."
remember: none of the polling released up to this point means anything anymore. throw it away. those averages are worthless. last night changed everything.
which, again, doesn't mean that sanders has some magic advantage. it just means that there's currently not any data available. you'll have to wait a few days, for some post-results polling. and, hopefully, some post-debate polling, where it's relevant.
but, preliminary polling suggest that ohio is similar to michigan and her lead in florida is more real.
at the height of the fedora craze, i had a zero tolerance policy. all fedoras were blocked on contact.
i'm adopting the same strategy with this "you're retarded" wave of what i believe are paid trump supporters. insta-block.
i'd encourage you to adopt the same tactic.
this isn't a video that was captured by some random person, and then went viral. this is a video that was put up on the official cnn site with a political motive, flooded with fake comments, etc. it's the system identifying a threat and going into exterminate mode.
if you can't see through this for what it is, you deserve hillary.
--
jogariba jogariba
Why is everyone in this here comment section so ridiculously uneducated and probably 14?
jessica
they all use the same lines - it's centralized. this is a tactic. they seem to have taken over a few months ago, indicating that it's probably the trump campaign. but, there's some possibility that it's deeper than that, too. the only real difference between this new wave of thought police agents is that they seem to have dispensed with the premise that persuasion through discourse is worthwhile, and have resorted entirely to intimidation through name-calling. they're not going to go away.
well, the result was a little better than the numbers. easy to explain. put this to rest?
not quite. you don't prove a negative, right. that's why these conspiracy theories are hard to get rid of.
let's try a thought experiment. if you were going to try and rig michigan, you would stuff ballot boxes in detroit. you probably wouldn't control every polling place. you'd just control the important ones in the urban cores. and, she won huge in detroit.
if you were going to win anyways, despite attempts to rig the votes, you'd have to overpower that by winning big in the areas she doesn't control. and, that's what happened.
it's also consistent with the same kind of head-scratching results in massachusetts. you would think bernie would do better amongst low wage earners - both in detroit and in boston. that's urban core voters. and, it is the urban polling stations that she would rig if she were to rig anything.
so, it might seem on first glance that this dispels this idea. but, in fact, the results are completely consistent with the idea that she tried to rig it, but failed to actually do it.
which doesn't prove it's rigged. it just doesn't disprove it. the results in one state don't make the results in other states disappear, either.
i need more updated polling before i can say anything at all about the fairness of the remaining contests. but please do remain skeptical and please do remain vigilant.
i'll have to wait until the data comes in, but how did he manage to win? i'm not some kind of clairvoyant. i just read the polls, and they suggested something like clinton 52 / sanders 48 (+/-2) - a close result. what factor went wrong?
well, let's look at my logic: she was polling around 55% amongst democrats. there are going to be independents. so, take it down a few points. in math, simplicity actually generally implies a deeper understanding. if she came down even further, it must mean there were even more independents. that is: turnout must have been high, and particularly amongst independents.
ok.
but, you have to add a factor to that: turnout was lower amongst democrats than it could have been, because trump is pulling them. and, whatever the math is on independents, if trump is pulling democrats then he's pulling hillary supporters.
so, let's be clear: i hit the mark by a margin of error. but, it's not just about bernie pulling independents in. it's also about trump pulling democrats out. and, while that might be bad news in the general, and more evidence that hillary is the less electable candidate, it's a positive for bernie.
this is not to take anything away from what's happening. but, if you want to be realistic?
forget about bernie getting republicans to vote for stuff. what are the chances that bernie can get democrats to vote for stuff?
pretty low. they all have super pacs, too. that's reality.
but, bernie knows that, right. if you listen to him, he states that. openly. he's entirely aware that taking the white house is part one, and taking congress is part two.
if you go back in time, you'll find me writing essays about how bernie should have started a third party to take congress, not run for president. and, i'm consequently being consistent. but, the debate is about what happens first: do you take the white house first, or the congress first?
nothing gets done unless he takes both. and he knows it. and he'll be actively working towards it, too.
but, that would be pretty remarkable if it happens.
i'm not saying to give up, though. i'm just questioning the tactic. generally, the congress swings against the presidency, not with it.
fwiw, i think bush dropped too early. he got beat by the size of the field. if bush was still standing? i think he'd look pretty good to a lot of republican voters.
let's say rubio gets 10%. he drops, you can split it something like 3/3/4. then, trump gets over 40% and gets a few more delegates. neither cruz nor kasich benefit in any meaningful way, but trump gets more delegates. and, if you carry that trend forward over another 30 states, you're not doing anything but making it easier for him.
michigan was a state that was friendly to kasich. the surprise is that cruz overperformed at the expense of kasich, no doubt because he's pushing this "only i can beat trump" line. what about california? you think the best way to beat trump in california is a moderate, bilingual hispanic or a rino from ohio?
if they really want to beat trump, they need to coast with all three. they have the field dominated. nobody will win, but you keep trump under 40 and get ready for the convention.
