US Presidential Candidates

Daryl wrote: Thus it seems unlikely to us that they would have a "communist wing". I won't comment on a "socialist wing" as the US has a different definition of socialist than everywhere else.

The Democrats do have a socialist wing. With a 2 party system it's not like socialists have much choice, they're certainly not going to vote Republican.


Generally because of the extreme negative connotations of the words socialist and communist in the USA, those who believe in that type of ideology use other words to describe themselves. Sanders is one of the rare few who openly call themselves a socialist and who openly professes a desire for a socialist utopia. Obama is more typical. He would very much like to have the USA turn become a socialist utopia and would turn it into one if he had a magic wand. However given the political reality that the USA is too conservative for that, he is settling for what he can get. And in common with most USA "socialists" in order to avoid negative connotations he avoids word like socialist preferring instead to use progressive, shared sacrifice etc.

There are still a few communists around. Those who openly espouse those views like to point out that true communism has never been tried and point to the (true) fact that the Soviet Union was not true communism. They conveniently forget that it has been tried small scale and those communities have failed after the first generation. However, like the socialists most who believe in communist type ideologies, prefer to use other words to describe themselves.

Indeed so, Daryl. However, we over here tend to believe we are the center while all you hopelessly socialist lefties are mucking about in the extremes.

To each his or her own. I like things that way. It makes for a better way to test various policies without actually experiencing the mistakes of others directly. Others learn from one's mistakes as well. A fair exchange I think.

Besides, what would forums discuss after they dissected and analyzed to a fare thee well our favorite author's stories as we await his next one?

Daryl wrote:Interesting Imaginos1892?

"Oops - you forgot the socialist/communist wing, and it's a big one. The ones that believe the government can magically solve all our problems if it just takes enough of our money. Unfortunately, "all of it" is still not enough."

Not being a US citizen I'm often caught out from incorrect information, but to us the US Democrats are overall a right wing conservative party that is just not as extreme right wing as the Republicans. Thus it seems unlikely to us that they would have a "communist wing". I won't comment on a "socialist wing" as the US has a different definition of socialist than everywhere else.

I would quibble with your sloppy use of conservative in this context, Biochem. The US has undergone a large degree of change in the recent past. The attack of the 1st Amendment by the politically correct movement has been quite successful. It has led to less tolerance of differing points of view. So the US does change despite what Conservatives do or say.

The lack of success of similar attacks on the 2nd Amendment and the growing Libertarian movement illustrate that the resistance to moving to the left isn't conservatism. That is a political movement to keep the status quo. No, it is a deeper desire to return to the core Constitutional principles. that is seeking change, and big change at that, in a completely different direction.

I bring up the 2nd Amendment because a left leaning libertarian lawyer acquaintance captured the connection best. The movement to ensure the 2nd Amendment is a movement towards taking civic duty more seriously. If one isn't willing to actually own firearms to ensure they can protect their individual sovereignty, they don't value that sovereignty highly and by extension their views are less driven by civic duty as defined by the Constitution. It is that growing belief that many in Washington are being supported by citizens who are less willing to guide their decisions by civic duty that allows Donald Trump to capture his supporters.

Those willing to support Trump are likely to see other supporters as being more civically minded. The Democrats appear to be captured by the self interest of various factions ranging from "Black Lives Matter" to Greenies to socialists. Each has core desires that benefit them or their values often to the exclusion of the rest of society.

Republicans are viewed as the moneyed class. They do not help themselves by supporting many of the same policies that Democrats support. What difference does it make who you vote for? A Washington politician is a Washington politician.

I am sure many will disagree with that individual and me. So what? The bottom line is that the Constitution isn't worth squat if no one is willing to fight and die for the liberties defined by it. Owning a firearm has become a symbol of that willingness.

biochem wrote:

Daryl wrote: Thus it seems unlikely to us that they would have a "communist wing". I won't comment on a "socialist wing" as the US has a different definition of socialist than everywhere else.

The Democrats do have a socialist wing. With a 2 party system it's not like socialists have much choice, they're certainly not going to vote Republican.


Generally because of the extreme negative connotations of the words socialist and communist in the USA, those who believe in that type of ideology use other words to describe themselves. Sanders is one of the rare few who openly call themselves a socialist and who openly professes a desire for a socialist utopia. Obama is more typical. He would very much like to have the USA turn become a socialist utopia and would turn it into one if he had a magic wand. However given the political reality that the USA is too conservative for that, he is settling for what he can get. And in common with most USA "socialists" in order to avoid negative connotations he avoids word like socialist preferring instead to use progressive, shared sacrifice etc.

There are still a few communists around. Those who openly espouse those views like to point out that true communism has never been tried and point to the (true) fact that the Soviet Union was not true communism. They conveniently forget that it has been tried small scale and those communities have failed after the first generation. However, like the socialists most who believe in communist type ideologies, prefer to use other words to describe themselves.

biochem wrote:

Daryl wrote: Thus it seems unlikely to us that they would have a "communist wing". I won't comment on a "socialist wing" as the US has a different definition of socialist than everywhere else.

The Democrats do have a socialist wing.

Only using the definition of "socialist" that Americans use. Which they will often apply to essentially anyone who thinks taxes need to go up for any reason whatsoever or who thinks the government can do *anything* better than the free market.

Sanders is the closest thing to an actual socialist in the mix, and he's *not* actually a socialist by anyone's definition but Americans. All he really wants is for the US to act more like, say, Norway. Better government regulation of the markets and maintenance of a more effective social safety net. He doesn't want the government to own all the big banks, he just wants them broken up to end the "too big to fail" ludicrous idiocy that almost destroyed the entire global economy. Etc...

Outside that, no, the Democratic party most certainly does not have a "socialist wing" or a "communist wing". While of course there are actual socialists and even communists in the US, and those people if given a binary choice between the Republicans and Democrats will vote Democratic as (in their view) the lesser of two evils, they do not comprise anywhere near a large enough voting block nor do they wield any real influence in the Democratic Party such that they could be called a "wing" of that party. They are simply not an integrated part of the party on any significant scale, however they may choose to vote in the election.

Imaginos1892 wrote:Oops - you forgot the socialist/communist wing, and it's a big one. The ones that believe the government can magically solve all our problems if it just takes enough of our money. Unfortunately, "all of it" is still not enough.
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Why do so many idiots believe that the way to solve our problems is to keep voting for the same shitheads that caused them in the first place?

The dem´s have as much of a "socialist/communist" wing as the rep´s have a nazi wing. That is, they don´t.

biochem wrote:1. Bush - Moderate, governor from Florida (swing state), establishment wing of the party

The fact that anyone wants to put the brother of the possibly THE worst president USA ever had as a replacement for his replacement, that´s just scary.

biochem wrote:2. Carson - Social conservative, doctor no previous political experience, outsider wing of the party

Delusional technocrat.

He has SOME decent ideas and might be a good caretaker if not allowed to change too much, but he´s a religious halfnut(not completely looney, but lets religion take precedence when it should not, including clouding his view of facts).

Would probably be a very bad idea.

biochem wrote:3. Christie - Liberal for a Republican, governor from New Jersey (Democratic state), left wing of the Republican party

Left wing? That says something about how rightwing skewed the party is, yikes.

Probably one of the saner and/or more realist candidates.
Might be good, might be a disaster, depending on the times and political landscape, ie what he gets to focus on.

biochem wrote:4. Cruz - very conservative, senator from Texas (Republican state, Tea Party wing of the party

Skilled. And an idiot. Extremeist and fanatically stupid.

Dangerous and should not be in charge of anything.

biochem wrote:5. Fiona - moderate, CEO of HP no political experience, big business wing of the party

Fiorina. Carly Fiorina.

Can make things happen, but you probably wont like HOW she does it.

A true republican. Often ideologically blinded. But smart.

She might make for a decent president. I mean if the world could survive Bush jr, I´m sure we can survive her attempts at starting world war III as well, at least she has brains.

But i doubt US people will like her corporatism in the long run.

And i quite well recall what a HP employee said about her on another forum at the time.
Let´s just say he was generally quite colorful in his descriptions of her.

biochem wrote:6. Gilmore - moderate, governor of Virginia (swing state), moderate wing of the party

Anyone capable of improving the US education system SHOULD be looked at very firmly and with major interest by voters.

Intelligent and reasonably realistic, which of course means he´s unlikely to get any nominations, as this makes him anathema to most of the raving loonies.

biochem wrote:7. Graham - military conservative, senator of South Carolina (republican state), Hawk (pro-military) wing of the party

A great chickenhawk. Interventionist of the dangerous kind. Probably slightly worse than Reagan before his "oh my god we almost started WWIII by accident!" scare in the early 80s.

He´s an ideological idiot. Wants to lord over the world and foolishly expects the world to accept it.

Hopefully someone builds a drone to bomb him with, suitably ironical to his own statement about doing so to others.

biochem wrote:8. Huckabee - social conservative, governor from Arkansas (swing state), religious right wing of the party

A religiously hardcored fool. A fairly nice fool, but a fool nevertheless.

Might make an ok president if he manages to get a good staff, he wants a lot of nice things, but he´s not going to ever get most of them with the policies he wants.

And he actually wants to go back to Reagan-times military spending. Which is quite, quite on the insane side.

biochem wrote:9. Jindal - conservative, governor from Louisiana (democratic state), conservative wing of the party

He has a few good ideas, but overall he´s a BIG IDIOT.

An almost classic southie boy that should just get kicked out of anywhere important.

Most likely a disaster in waiting as a president.

biochem wrote:10. Kasich - moderate, governor from Ohio (swing state), moderate wing of the pary

This one´s mixed. Seems to be a good administrator and/or organiser, has some decent ideas, but at the same time runs off and signs up on some outright stupid ideologicals only crap.

Could be seriously dangerous for USA itself due to how he likes to meddle with people. And might make a nice little cozy pseudo-dictator.

Bit of a flipflop.

biochem wrote:11. Pataki - Liberal for a Republican, governor from New York (Democratic state), left wing of the Republican party

Left wing? A guy trying to privatize public assets? And cuts public spending to healthcare and education? Biggest tax-cutter NY ever had? Seriously?

Not sure what to say about him. At least he seems to learn from his mistakes, or try.
Just a pity he seems to make a lot of mistakes in the first place.

biochem wrote:12. Paul - libertarian, senator from Kentucky (swing state), libertarian wing of the pary

He has a surprising number of sane or even good ideas, but his core ideology is utterly rotten fanaticism.

If he can be forced to act on logic(he has clearly shown that he CAN be objective beyond his own opinions), he might make a good president, but more likely he will go on an ideological spree and be an utter disaster.

biochem wrote:14. Rubio - conservative, senator from Florida (swing state), conservative wing of the party

Powerplayer. Wouldn´t trust him as far as i can throw him while he´s wearing concrete shoes.

Christian nutjob.

biochem wrote:15. Santorum - social conservative, senator from Pennsylvania, religious right wing of the party

Bigot that occasionally forgets his prejudices and thinks for a while.
Flipflops based on political winds at the moment.

Bad idea for a president.

biochem wrote:16. Trump - ???? (makes wild tea party like statements but he tends to make outrageous statements just to get attention, true beliefs unknown), businessman/reality TV star, outsider wing of the party

A joke. A BAD joke.

If anyone actually tries to vote for him, they should probably be given the Garfield treatment for epic stupidity.

biochem wrote:The same thing usually happens with the Democrats

Not remotely to the same level. While the dem´s have their own loony groupings, they don´t have a fraction of the same kind of influence as the ones you find within the republicans.

biochem wrote:Hilary just seems to have used her backroom connections to short circuit the process somehow. Not sure why the rest of you are letting her get away with it.

Look at it logically. I think it´s more a matter of people remembering Clinton as the last "ok" president in many ways, not to mention how Clinton was the last president to manage constistent federal budget surplus and to do so without making a big mess, while at the same time achieving a decent enough foreign policy.

And they expect Hilary to be "not too far from good ol' Billy".

biochem wrote:but the key is to do that without sounding like a raving lunatic.

Something many, especially republican candidates, fail amazingly with.

I still remember hearing Bush jr talk before he became the rep candidate. That´s when i went and placed a bet that if he won, he would start at least one war during his presidency.

I made BIG win on that bet as he wasn´t even the candidate yet.

Bets on who drops out next?

Spacekiwi wrote:Bets on who drops out next?

Impossible to say most likely. There are still no clearcut "main candidates".
And the US primaries sometimes end up with results few or none guessed, especially the republican ones nowadays that they´ve added even more hardcore extremeists factions.

Understand me, I'm certainly no conservative, and as a foreigner I don't have any direct interest in who becomes the next POTUS. however, as America is still rightly regarded as the leader of the free world, we foreigners do have an indirect interest.

The thing is, from a foreigner's perspective, the GOP really has only one candidate who stands a chance of winning against whoever the Dems put forward. Almost the entire slate of candidates are vying so hard for the GOP's hard line conservative base that they're slowly but surely painting themselves into a corner from which it will be hard - maybe even impossible - to contend against the eventual Dem candidate for the decisive moderate block of voters. Trump currently holds a huge lead among GOP candidates, but he has managed to alienate several important groups of voters, who are generally inclined to vote Dem in any way. How he plans to tempt Latinos, African-Americans and women to vote for him against a savvy politico like Clinton is something I'm looking forward to. It promises to be entertaining, at least. Theonly viable candidate in my opinion is Fiorina. She's more or less a moderate, and even better, she seems to have ideas and she is not wed to the notion of confrontation without compromise which is so much a part of the GOP political environment these days. However, to become the GOP candidate for POTUS, she first need to win the GOP state primaries, but she's a woman and too many of those primaries are dominated by hard line conservative voters - a group that seems to still hold fast to the idea that a woman's proper place is barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Could she still win the Convention next year? Possibly, but that will require a degree of charisma I truly hope she possesses. Not because I want a Republican POTUS, but because she is the only GOP candidate who won't be an absolute disaster as POTUS.

hanuman wrote:Understand me, I'm certainly no conservative, and as a foreigner I don't have any direct interest in who becomes the next POTUS.

That´s just deluding yourself.

US presidents have a strong tendency to consider the world their playground, or their property or both. And often filled to the brim with enemies, and if there aren´t any, new ones can always be made.

In your case, without USAs mostly not so official support to the Apartheid regime, your country might very well have gotten something better much MUCH earlier. At the very least, the regime would likely have collapsed.

hanuman wrote:however, as America is still rightly regarded as the leader of the free world

Sorry, no. What free world? The world USA is spending more effort on spying on than it ever spent on spying against the USSR?

The parts of the world that it used subversive and covert operations against because leaders were not submissive enough towards US corporations? That´s been ongoing for over a century by now by the way.

A nation that considers torture and illegal jailing of whomever it feels like at the moment, are proper TOOLS, have no relationship to a free world other than as an enemy.

hanuman wrote:Trump currently holds a huge lead among GOP candidates

Seriously... I´ll tell you something i read on another forum, someone mentioned how Trump is a friend of the Clinton´s and that his candidature is probably trolling just to make the rep´s look bad...
Except he´s so outrageous that he makes the other republican candidates look better, just by comparison.

Trump is a joke. Not saying he cannot win, but he IS still a joke candidate.

hanuman wrote:Theonly viable candidate in my opinion is Fiorina.

Well she´s better than Trump at least. Don´t blame me if she ends up starting a world war though, i warned you.

hanuman wrote:However, to become the GOP candidate for POTUS, she first need to win the GOP state primaries, but she's a woman and too many of those primaries are dominated by hard line conservative voters - a group that seems to still hold fast to the idea that a woman's proper place is barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen.

Sadly close to the truth, even if its only for a minority.


Personally i don´t really expect either Trump or Fiorina to have any real chances.

Rep´s are indeed very unlikely to vote for a woman, even if it´s one so hardcore as Fiorina.

And Trump, unless he stops talking, he´s most likely to end up at the bottom of the race.
And possibly at the bottom of some nice little watery room with not so much of a view but a very nice set of concrete shoes.
He seems unable to open his mouth without offending someone, usually LOTS of someones.


Due to how US politics works however, i´m probably most inclined to expect another Bushman rep candidate.