Electoral Map

Hillary is clearly flawed. She still has more advantages than does Trump. We'll see if she blows them in the general election.

 

I don't think Kasich would accept, and I would lose respect for him if he did.

 

Michigan Primary Votes Cast:
Democrat: 1.1M (essentially spread between 2 candidates)
Republican: 1.3M (spread over the top 4 candidates)

GOP +200k

Pennsylvania Primary Votes Cast
Democrat: 1.65M (2 candidates)
Republican: 1.56M (5 candidates)

Dems: +100k

To argue that PA and MI aren't in play is almost as silly as saying that Trump doesn't have enormous momentum in each, as his message is custom-tailored to them, or that Hillary's intent to simply be a continuance of President Obama's 8-year economic mess will either allow her to hold any advantage or hold off Trump's message.

She can certainly break from supporting Obama's policies, and abandon more than a year of campaign rhetoric. How well do you think that goes over with her support amongst black voters, already thread-thin and tenuously held?

BTW - This post isn't "at" you, 2Maggit, just toward the discussion.

 

Keep in mind the democratic party has stolen a few pages from the GOP playbook and has been actively suppressing the vote where ever possible. I myself was told I "wasn't registered democrat" despite having done so when I moved last June, having received mail from Clinton, received confirmation of my registration, and even phone calls from the Clinton campaign. I produced both the campaign letter and registration confirmation and so they had me fill out a provisional ballot.

I am not a snow flake. This has happened to hundreds of thousands of young Democrats in several states, and in some cases it did prevent them from voting/caucusing.

The lines in Arizona were 6 or more hours long to vote. In many places, people were asked for ID and told they must have it which is untrue.

So to me, the "+200k" numbers have to be considered through the prism of "Democratic establishment did not want a big turnout." They only wanted retirees and upper middle class voters.

 

The Democratic primary in Ohio just had a net loss of 1.1M votes from the number cast in 2012.

One million Ohioans sat at home. Will some of those vote in the general? Surely. How many? 10%? 25%? Hell, go crazy and say 50% - because even at that high-water mark of spontaneous participation (and which nothing suggests is coming, BTW), HRC loses Ohio and handily.

Trump can't take either Ohio or Florida for granted, and if he doesn't, he won't come close to losing either. And, again, we find ourselves at PA & Mi.

Or, someone can tell me the other and yet unnamed state where HRC is going to magically pull of a win, amongst those that lean / are battlegrounds - because right now, absent WI (which I think she wins, BTW) or a few middling / smallish states, I don't see anywhere that she can either gain ground or offset even moderate losses. Anyone see a state I'm missing?

Quick aside: If even her supporters don't believe she has a chance in most battleground states, and she doesn't, then you don't have a candidate who is merely "flawed", but one who seems destined to lose.

She will be devastated to lose either PA or MI, and she could easily lose either. Or both.

 

Trump can - and I believe will - ferociously and simultaneously attack her from both the right and left, and he's going to force her toward embracing either Obama or Sanders' supporters, but will disallow both.

As these are not the same groups at all, it will rend her in half, even before she is forced to pick, and will thereby and largely alienate one of the two crucial groups of voters that she must have in order to win.

She can have one, but not both. And she'd better plan on putting about 75% of her money and effort in the Rust Belt, regardless of even this.

 

I'm confused as to the middle part and the no chance in the battleground states. You haven't deluded yourself into thinking that Clinton has no chance in places like Pennsylvania, Florida, Michigan, Virginia, etc? Because I can assure you that's not the case, at all. They will be hard fought, most likely, and Trump is facing an uphill battle in a fair number of them.

If I had to guess, I think that Clinton will take Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania with Virginia being an interesting trend and Florida probably ending up in Trump's column. My guess is the election will look similar to 2004 in terms of closeness and spread of electoral college votes.

 

I haven't seen anything from Kasich to suggest he wouldn't jump at it. I don't think Trump will pick him though as he is a loose cannon and would probably have a public disagreement with Trump about once a week.

 

She does face a potential Al Gore 2000 scenario with a faction (Which included yours truly at the time) of the party trying to make a statement to the party at large. I remember Hillary supporters in 2008 saying they wouldn't vote for Obama, but then came around by November. A lot will depend on whether Sanders will throw his support behind Hillary to ward off the Nader Effect or he'll go the route taken in 2000 as the antagonist. I'm thinking that Sanders will be more conciliatory than Nader since Nader was a third party candidate, but he's not a conventional player, either. Hillary would be wise to play nice with Bernie. I think the Obama supporters are more apt to stay in the fold.

 

http://www.youngcons.com/source-kasich-absolutely-not-interested-in-being-trumps-running-mate/

It sounds like Trump is very interested. Not out of the question but it appears Kasich would have to reverse course.

 

I think Hillary needs the Bernie situation to play out clean for her as well.

 

I think Clinton has too much pride to run on being Obama's third term and will try to distance herself from him as well.

 

If she does, she's a fool. He's got a solid approval rating right now, especially among Democrats, and she can phone her husband's former VP to see how well that strategy works out.

 

The whole primary system is a farce. The Presidential election using the electoral college is out dated, IMHO.

What a boondoggle.

 

She has the nomination wrapped up and would be wise to not go for the jugular. Play nice with Bernie, offer to consider/implement some of his ideas into her general election campaign and ride out the few remaining primaries would be the smart play. She sics Bubba on Sanders in order to deliver the coup de gras and she'll have a self-inflicted wound, a gaping one, to tend.

 

No worries, I enjoy the debate.

 

That's what I'm thinking. Looks good on paper in OH, but every press conference where Kasich gets a question about a Trump position is probably a disaster.

Hell, it took him about 10 minutes to break his "alliance" with Cruz.

 

Trump/Trump 2016

 

Completely anecdotal and totally insignificant considering what state I'm in, but a coworker who claims to be a lifelong Democrat just told me he would rather not vote than choose between Clinton and Trump. Even mentioned Clinton being the devil. He was also skeptical of Sanders, but it was nothing compared to how he viewed Clinton.

 

This election will truly be a hate off.