2016 election. Hillary and Jeb are over-rated

[boneyard bill]

As the 2016 presidential race is getting into high gear (even earlier than usual), the "smart money" has been on Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, but they are already vastly underperforming expectations.

It's like pulling teeth for the press to get Hillary to take a stand on just about anything, and the scandals continue to pile up. Eventually, Hillary is going to have to explain the missing e-mails, and the explanation won't help her campaign. Meanwhile, the latest poll shows Bernie Sanders getting over third of the vote in New Hampshire while Hillary just barely tops 50%. That's a huge jump for Sanders in a very short time, and he isn't even a Democrat! He's older than Ronald Reagan was when Reagan, our oldest president, took office. And he doesn't have a lot of money.

Is Sanders going to win the Dem nomination? Probably not. But that's a change from "certainly not" a month ago. But if Sanders could continue to gain ground, it could attract a lot of weightier Dems into the race including VP Joe Biden, NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, or Massachusetts Senator, Elizabeth Warren.

Like Hillary, Jeb Bush was anointed the front-runner by the media although certainly not with certitude applied to Hillary. Of course, Bush has a famous name. Without it, he would probably be polling numbers similar to John Kasich. Nonetheless, his poll-leading numbers barely break double digits and reality is that most voters outside of Florida know virtually nothing about him.

And this is true for pundits as well. Yes, he will be able to raise money. Yes, he has the connections to build a first-class national campaign and a strong grass-roots organization. But how well can he perform on the national stage? How well can he handle questions on foreign policy, the national economic situation, or national surveillance? Governors never deal with these issues, and there is no reason to assume that Bush will be better at it than Scott Walker or even Rick Perry.

Certainly, Bush's first foray into that arena was not promising as he wound up taking roughly three different positions on the Iraq War with the span of about a week.

At this stage of the game I have to suggest that there might not be another Democrat with enough muscle to best Hillary but she is not a sure thing. I wouldn't put any money at all on Jeb Bush.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Scandals continue to pile up? The Fndn has issues, but that is about it. If Hillary gets a cold that is considered a scandal to the right wing.

Jeb Bush wasn't annointed anything. He is a likely front runner because he was Governor of a critical Battleground State and he is an establishment Republican, perhaps one of the only in the crowd. The reason why he is a front runner is because there is almost no one else in the race that is even remotely capable of being President. Rubio is doing his best to shift gears to become a bit more mainstream. Otherwise, the field consists of losers, radicals, idiots, and Jeb Bush.

 

[untermensche]

Not only is Hillary over-rated she is misunderstood by most.

She is portrayed as a leftist but she is actually slightly right of center. She supported the invasion of Iraq for example.

It's just that the Republicans have drifted so far to the looney far right Hillary appears as if she is on the left.

Sanders is an actual candidate from the left and because of this he could win the nomination, but there are too many factors to make any rational predictions at this point, and we should stop caring about predictions and only focus on the issues anyway.

 

[Nice Squirrel]

DONALD TRUMP WILL WIN!

THE REST ARE LOSERS!

ALLCAP4EVER!

 

[fromderinside]

<sup><sub>DONALD TRUMP WILL WIN!

THE REST ARE LOSERS!

ALLCAP4EVER SUCK!</sub></sup>

fixed it.

 

[arkirk]

<sup><sub>DONALD TRUMP WILL WIN!

THE REST ARE LOSERS!

ALLCAP4EVER SUCK!</sub></sup>

fixed it.

What exactly did you fix? The idea of Trump somehow makes me kind of gag. The real problem is that people are not getting the message that what our government does in the next 20 years may amount to sink or swim for a considerable portion of the human race. When you crowd the leadership field with such grossly egocentric characters...Trump, Clinton etc. etc. it means that nobody in leadership will be anywhere near thinking about things that must be addressed right now.

 

[bilby]

fixed it.

What exactly did you fix? The idea of Trump somehow makes me kind of gag. The real problem is that people are not getting the message that what our government does in the next 20 years may amount to sink or swim for a considerable portion of the human race. When you crowd the leadership field with such grossly egocentric characters...Trump, Clinton etc. etc. it means that nobody in leadership will be anywhere near thinking about things that must be addressed right now.

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy; even when Uncle Sam drops bombs on people, it doesn't seem to change very much geopolitically, and the number of people taking cover from the cluster munitions is not even 1% of the population of the planet.

Unless the new POTUS decides to start a worldwide nuclear conflict, what the US government does in the next 20 years won't have any effect at all on at least 90%, an probably nearer 95% of the human race. Most Americans forget that 'The USA' and 'The World' are not synonyms; The human race has at best a passing interest in who you have as your leader - after all, whoever it is will be replaced within 8 years.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

As the 2016 presidential race is getting into high gear (even earlier than usual), the "smart money" has been on Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, but they are already vastly underperforming expectations.

It's like pulling teeth for the press to get Hillary to take a stand on just about anything, and the scandals continue to pile up. Eventually, Hillary is going to have to explain the missing e-mails, and the explanation won't help her campaign. Meanwhile, the latest poll shows Bernie Sanders getting over third of the vote in New Hampshire while Hillary just barely tops 50%. That's a huge jump for Sanders in a very short time, and he isn't even a Democrat! He's older than Ronald Reagan was when Reagan, our oldest president, took office. And he doesn't have a lot of money.

Is Sanders going to win the Dem nomination? Probably not. But that's a change from "certainly not" a month ago. But if Sanders could continue to gain ground, it could attract a lot of weightier Dems into the race including VP Joe Biden, NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, or Massachusetts Senator, Elizabeth Warren.

Like Hillary, Jeb Bush was anointed the front-runner by the media although certainly not with certitude applied to Hillary. Of course, Bush has a famous name. Without it, he would probably be polling numbers similar to John Kasich. Nonetheless, his poll-leading numbers barely break double digits and reality is that most voters outside of Florida know virtually nothing about him.

And this is true for pundits as well. Yes, he will be able to raise money. Yes, he has the connections to build a first-class national campaign and a strong grass-roots organization. But how well can he perform on the national stage? How well can he handle questions on foreign policy, the national economic situation, or national surveillance? Governors never deal with these issues, and there is no reason to assume that Bush will be better at it than Scott Walker or even Rick Perry.

Certainly, Bush's first foray into that arena was not promising as he wound up taking roughly three different positions on the Iraq War with the span of about a week.

At this stage of the game I have to suggest that there might not be another Democrat with enough muscle to best Hillary but she is not a sure thing. I wouldn't put any money at all on Jeb Bush.

Good post, and I agree. I would not be at all surprised if neither of them get the nomination. Yes, I think Hillary could very easily lose it, like she did last time (to Obama).

 

[Tom Sawyer]

How are they overrated? Everyone seems to know and agree upon exactly who and what they are.

I'd say they're both properly rated.

 

[+or-1]

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy; even when Uncle Sam drops bombs on people, it doesn't seem to change very much geopolitically, and the number of people taking cover from the cluster munitions is not even 1% of the population of the planet.

Unless the new POTUS decides to start a worldwide nuclear conflict, what the US government does in the next 20 years won't have any effect at all on at least 90%, an probably nearer 95% of the human race. Most Americans forget that 'The USA' and 'The World' are not synonyms; The human race has at best a passing interest in who you have as your leader - after all, whoever it is will be replaced within 8 years.

It's incredible to me how few Americans understand this simple fact.

 

[barbos]

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy; even when Uncle Sam drops bombs on people, it doesn't seem to change very much geopolitically, and the number of people taking cover from the cluster munitions is not even 1% of the population of the planet.

Unless the new POTUS decides to start a worldwide nuclear conflict, what the US government does in the next 20 years won't have any effect at all on at least 90%, an probably nearer 95% of the human race. Most Americans forget that 'The USA' and 'The World' are not synonyms; The human race has at best a passing interest in who you have as your leader - after all, whoever it is will be replaced within 8 years.

Some would argue that current Middle East Mess is a result of what US government did.

 

[dismal]

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy;

Most of us in the US are only marginally affected by US policy.

 

[SimpleDon]

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy; even when Uncle Sam drops bombs on people, it doesn't seem to change very much geopolitically, and the number of people taking cover from the cluster munitions is not even 1% of the population of the planet.

Unless the new POTUS decides to start a worldwide nuclear conflict, what the US government does in the next 20 years won't have any effect at all on at least 90%, an probably nearer 95% of the human race. Most Americans forget that 'The USA' and 'The World' are not synonyms; The human race has at best a passing interest in who you have as your leader - after all, whoever it is will be replaced within 8 years.

Some would argue that current Middle East Mess is a result of what US government did.

With more than a little justification. The Middle East is suffering from the continuing war between the Sunni and the Shia factions of Islam and between various Sunni factions. Incredibly we in some cases are supporting in one country a faction that we are fighting against in another country. And we seem to be arming both sides in virtually all of the conflicts.

All of this was pretty well in an uneasy balance before we blundered into Afghan and Iraq. We upset the balance in favor of the Iranians and the Shias by unwittingly handing them Iraq.

Not to mention that it was the US that conceived and spread the neoclassical economics time bomb of deregulation of the financial sector that went off causing the Great Financial Crisis and Recession of 2008 and the equally ill conceived idea of austerity as the preferred way of recovering from said recession.

And don't forget our refusal to face up to the biggest single threat facing man, climate change.

I'd say that this is solid evidence that the US has more than a marginal impact on the rest of world.

 

[boneyard bill]

Scandals continue to pile up? The Fndn has issues, but that is about it. If Hillary gets a cold that is considered a scandal to the right wing.

Jeb Bush wasn't annointed anything. He is a likely front runner because he was Governor of a critical Battleground State and he is an establishment Republican, perhaps one of the only in the crowd. The reason why he is a front runner is because there is almost no one else in the race that is even remotely capable of being President. Rubio is doing his best to shift gears to become a bit more mainstream. Otherwise, the field consists of losers, radicals, idiots, and Jeb Bush.

If liberal Democrats actually like Jeb Bush, it is clear that there is something wrong with clear and even more evidence that he is unlikely to win the GOP nomination.

But I can't for the life of me figure out why a libdem would like Bush. He's a warmongering neo-con from the word go and is about at likely to do whatever he says as foreign policy as his "no nation-building" brother did or the current "I'll get out of Iraq" president has done. Neither Jeb and Hillary will do much to change the status quo and the status quo stinks.

 

[boneyard bill]

Not only is Hillary over-rated she is misunderstood by most.

She is portrayed as a leftist but she is actually slightly right of center. She supported the invasion of Iraq for example.

It's just that the Republicans have drifted so far to the looney far right Hillary appears as if she is on the left.

Sanders is an actual candidate from the left and because of this he could win the nomination, but there are too many factors to make any rational predictions at this point, and we should stop caring about predictions and only focus on the issues anyway.

When is the last time the Dems elected a president from the left? FDR perhaps. When did they even nominate a left-wing candidate. I'll give you George McGovern in '72 and maybe Dukakis in '88 although that's bit of a strtetch.

 

[boneyard bill]

As the 2016 presidential race is getting into high gear (even earlier than usual), the "smart money" has been on Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush, but they are already vastly underperforming expectations.

It's like pulling teeth for the press to get Hillary to take a stand on just about anything, and the scandals continue to pile up. Eventually, Hillary is going to have to explain the missing e-mails, and the explanation won't help her campaign. Meanwhile, the latest poll shows Bernie Sanders getting over third of the vote in New Hampshire while Hillary just barely tops 50%. That's a huge jump for Sanders in a very short time, and he isn't even a Democrat! He's older than Ronald Reagan was when Reagan, our oldest president, took office. And he doesn't have a lot of money.

Is Sanders going to win the Dem nomination? Probably not. But that's a change from "certainly not" a month ago. But if Sanders could continue to gain ground, it could attract a lot of weightier Dems into the race including VP Joe Biden, NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, or Massachusetts Senator, Elizabeth Warren.

Like Hillary, Jeb Bush was anointed the front-runner by the media although certainly not with certitude applied to Hillary. Of course, Bush has a famous name. Without it, he would probably be polling numbers similar to John Kasich. Nonetheless, his poll-leading numbers barely break double digits and reality is that most voters outside of Florida know virtually nothing about him.

And this is true for pundits as well. Yes, he will be able to raise money. Yes, he has the connections to build a first-class national campaign and a strong grass-roots organization. But how well can he perform on the national stage? How well can he handle questions on foreign policy, the national economic situation, or national surveillance? Governors never deal with these issues, and there is no reason to assume that Bush will be better at it than Scott Walker or even Rick Perry.

Certainly, Bush's first foray into that arena was not promising as he wound up taking roughly three different positions on the Iraq War with the span of about a week.

At this stage of the game I have to suggest that there might not be another Democrat with enough muscle to best Hillary but she is not a sure thing. I wouldn't put any money at all on Jeb Bush.

Good post, and I agree. I would not be at all surprised if neither of them get the nomination. Yes, I think Hillary could very easily lose it, like she did last time (to Obama).

Right now it's hard to what Democrat has the muscle to compete with Hillary, but it's early and someone like Obama could still emerge.

 

[boneyard bill]

5% of the human race lives in the USA. The rest of us are only marginally affected by US policy; even when Uncle Sam drops bombs on people, it doesn't seem to change very much geopolitically, and the number of people taking cover from the cluster munitions is not even 1% of the population of the planet.

Unless the new POTUS decides to start a worldwide nuclear conflict, what the US government does in the next 20 years won't have any effect at all on at least 90%, an probably nearer 95% of the human race. Most Americans forget that 'The USA' and 'The World' are not synonyms; The human race has at best a passing interest in who you have as your leader - after all, whoever it is will be replaced within 8 years.

Some would argue that current Middle East Mess is a result of what US government did.

Absolutely, and Ukraine as well. And Ukraine could lead to that thermo-nuclear war that the rest of the world has to worry about. But the US is also an important economic power and if we fuck up our economy (as we have) the rest of the world is going to feel it.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Some would argue that current Middle East Mess is a result of what US government did.

Absolutely, and Ukraine as well. And Ukraine could lead to that thermo-nuclear war that the rest of the world has to worry about. But the US is also an important economic power and if we fuck up our economy (as we have) the rest of the world is going to feel it.

That should read, "When the US fucked up their economy in 2008, the rest of the world felt it!"

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Scandals continue to pile up? The Fndn has issues, but that is about it. If Hillary gets a cold that is considered a scandal to the right wing.

Jeb Bush wasn't annointed anything. He is a likely front runner because he was Governor of a critical Battleground State and he is an establishment Republican, perhaps one of the only in the crowd. The reason why he is a front runner is because there is almost no one else in the race that is even remotely capable of being President. Rubio is doing his best to shift gears to become a bit more mainstream. Otherwise, the field consists of losers, radicals, idiots, and Jeb Bush.

If liberal Democrats actually like Jeb Bush, it is clear that there is something wrong with clear and even more evidence that he is unlikely to win the GOP nomination.

Huh?

But I can't for the life of me figure out why a libdem would like Bush.

Huh?

He's a warmongering neo-con from the word go and is about at likely to do whatever he says as foreign policy as his "no nation-building" brother did or the current "I'll get out of Iraq" president has done.

Interesting there, just as matter of factly equating W's and Obama's foreign policy.

Neither Jeb and Hillary will do much to change the status quo and the status quo stinks.

Personally, I don't understand how a Libertarian can like Hillary Clinton.

 

[Sarpedon]

If liberal Democrats actually like Jeb Bush, it is clear that there is something wrong with clear and even more evidence that he is unlikely to win the GOP nomination.

It is clear.