The Many Faces of US Politics...

[screenexile]

At this stage I think the debates will be the major factor in this Election. If Hillary can lure the Donald into a few traps and call him out then she should win quite easy but if she lets him away with the childish bullying without fighting back smarter then she could be in real difficulty.

If she can turn this into a substantive debate on policies then she wipes the floor with him but if it turns into a dogfight then I think he wins which is a pity. It could end up being real car crash TV!!

I would love to stay up and watch it but it's far too late.

I hope she wipes the floor with him.

It doesn't matter if she is full of substance, these debates are all about "gotcha" moments or someone making the wrong facial expression or some smartarse putdown.

Think Bush Senior looking at his watch (OMG!!), Reagan ending the age issue in '84 with a joke or "besting" Jimmy Carter by saying "there you go again", Al Gore looking bored, the "You're no Jack Kennedy" putdown of Quayle.

The Trump campaign is furiously fighting back against the idea of him being fact checked as well during the debate. They know he has little to bring to the table in terms of details and  I guess are hoping that he is just allowed to bullshit away and look the part with no real time pushback.

Basically, with the low expectations, as long as he doesn't behave by an arsehole, he has little to lose, while she has a lot.

Just having a think about it there and it's going to be really difficult for him not to be portrayed as a bully beating up on a woman!!

That will probably be the over riding narrative that comes from this because he's not going to change and if he hits Hillary as hard as he did Jeb or Marco or Ted then it's not going to play as well as it did against those guys!

[Oraisteach]

You're right there, J70, and I fear that Roger Ailes has armed Trump with a few timely put-downs that will play well with the peanut-crunching crowd.  Substance, I fear, may well be irrelevant since these debates are debate in name only.

[Minder]

Has anyone seen this, at a Trump rally ?

https://youtu.be/eFQhw3VVToQ

[muppet]

An interesting piece on the appeal of Trump to white male workers and how it's related to the decline of unions:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/14/opinion/sunday/the-decline-of-unions-and-the-rise-of-trump.html?_r=0

It's very interesting that while the Republican party has been the main instigator of the disempowerment of the US trade unions, the vulnerable turn in their moment of need to ... a Republican candidate.

Yea, it would be like the UK unions turning to the Tories. Bananas.

[whitey]

Election could be decided tonight.... If either candidate has a melt down, could be game over

[Tony Baloney]

Has anyone seen this, at a Trump rally ?

https://youtu.be/eFQhw3VVToQ

The chap with the red hat should be running for President.

[stew]

At this stage I think the debates will be the major factor in this Election. If Hillary can lure the Donald into a few traps and call him out then she should win quite easy but if she lets him away with the childish bullying without fighting back smarter then she could be in real difficulty.

If she can turn this into a substantive debate on policies then she wipes the floor with him but if it turns into a dogfight then I think he wins which is a pity. It could end up being real car crash TV!!

I would love to stay up and watch it but it's far too late.

I hope she wipes the floor with him.

I hope he exposes her for the American/ Muslim killing machine that she is.

The woman is a coat-tailing hack that has failed at every turn as an elected official, except for getting elected, but hey, look at the people who have crossed her and their fate? I hope she bites when trump nails her on her husband, benghazi, her record, her comments on women,her love of big government and her husband's corrupt foundation, her support of partial birth abortion, her amazing capacity for lying and getting away with it and lastly, her deplorables comment.

[heganboy]

Stew,
So definitely undecided at this point? All to play for?

[whitey]

http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/?ex_cid=mobilebar&v=1


Getting closer by the minute

[muppet]

At this stage I think the debates will be the major factor in this Election. If Hillary can lure the Donald into a few traps and call him out then she should win quite easy but if she lets him away with the childish bullying without fighting back smarter then she could be in real difficulty.

If she can turn this into a substantive debate on policies then she wipes the floor with him but if it turns into a dogfight then I think he wins which is a pity. It could end up being real car crash TV!!

I would love to stay up and watch it but it's far too late.

I hope she wipes the floor with him.

I hope he exposes her for the American/ Muslim killing machine that she is.

The woman is a coat-tailing hack that has failed at every turn as an elected official, except for getting elected, but hey, look at the people who have crossed her and their fate? I hope she bites when trump nails her on her husband, benghazi, her record, her comments on women,her love of big government and her husband's corrupt foundation, her support of partial birth abortion, her amazing capacity for lying and getting away with it and lastly, her deplorables comment.

Stew I think you are finally warming to her. This election might be a bit soon, but I could see you voting for her re-election.

[J70]

At this stage I think the debates will be the major factor in this Election. If Hillary can lure the Donald into a few traps and call him out then she should win quite easy but if she lets him away with the childish bullying without fighting back smarter then she could be in real difficulty.

If she can turn this into a substantive debate on policies then she wipes the floor with him but if it turns into a dogfight then I think he wins which is a pity. It could end up being real car crash TV!!

I would love to stay up and watch it but it's far too late.

I hope she wipes the floor with him.

I hope he exposes her for the American/ Muslim killing machine that she is.

The woman is a coat-tailing hack that has failed at every turn as an elected official, except for getting elected, but hey, look at the people who have crossed her and their fate? I hope she bites when trump nails her on her husband, benghazi, her record, her comments on women,her love of big government and her husband's corrupt foundation, her support of partial birth abortion, her amazing capacity for lying and getting away with it and lastly, her deplorables comment.

Who crossed her and what fate did they meet? What lies did she get away with? (and are you even remotely aware of the ludicrous hypocrisy of wishing Trump would beat on this basis?) Are you aware that the GOP has led the way on killing and war?

Lastly, while she may have got the proportion wrong, the deplorables comment was right on the money.

[Gmac]

an hour and a half under the bright lights be interesting to see how Hillary holds up.

[tyssam5]

one of the issues that most people face when looking at the coverage of the US elections is that what they see is actually just that  - coverage. It is the media and their friends and colleagues talking about the race and what is happening. the more outrageous the coverage the more papers are sold, the more viewers for the show, the more page impressions and higher ad revenue.

To combat this and to look at facts I'm going to suggest you take a look at fivethirtyeight.com Nate Silver is regarded (yup- opinion again) as one of the best statisticians around. Take a look at his wikipedia page to see how successful he has been in the past. The short version is that in 2008 and 2012 he called the state race accurately in 49 out of 50 and then 50 out of 50.

The models he use has Hillary at the most likely win since polling started, at 91.6%
Silvers models are quantitative analytics and factor in a lot of external dependencies, but not news or opinion.
The site is treated as an academic paper and references are included so you can see where the data is being sourced.

At this point there is a one in 12 shot that Hilary will not be the first female president of the Unites States. with the only states in play really being Arizona and Georgia.

However the big question for the republicans at this point in the process is what to do about the Donald. To stew's point is he really a Republican? Can the candidates for election from the GOP take the calculated gamble to come out against him?

if Hilary wins the Dems need 4 more seats in the senate to own it (in a 50-50 vote the Vp casts the deciding vote) Can the GOP hold those seats?

There is an opinion piece here
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/trump-may-start-dragging-gop-senate-candidates-down-with-him/
which looks at the polling data and suggests (again an opinion not a fact) that it will require a new pattern in american voting for the Republicans to hold on to many of these seats, which is ticket splitting. Usually in the US the voters pick the party of the presidential candidate they prefer and vote for that party the whole way down the ticket. if that pattern continues, the GOP could be in serious trouble.

Down to 55 - 45 % at the minute, with my other fav predictor the bookies, Trump is not <2-1

Lot of deplorables out there.

[J70]

an hour and a half under the bright lights be interesting to see how Hillary holds up.

Is this a health conspiracy thing?

[Gmac]

an hour and a half under the bright lights be interesting to see how Hillary holds up.

Is this a health conspiracy thing?

she had pneumonia 2 weeks ago ? No