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[mainiac]

Every election is different.*

*except for 1892 of course

[TheBiggerFish]

Yes, but the results tend to be the same a lot.

[Lord Shonus]

Even in the Republican party (which is firmly wedded to the Conservative identity to appeal to the Baby Boomers that form their strongest support base and thus changes less than the Democrats do), the party platform changes to some degree or other based on prevailing social winds, and to a greater degree based on the individual candidate. Even going from Reagan to Bush II had significantly differences, and Clinton, Obama, Sanders, and Clinton would probably all be in different parties in Europe.

[mainiac]

Yes, but the results tend to be the same a lot.

Well yeah, that's because of this annoying thing called the voters.

Tens of millions of people really passionately believe that abortion is evil.  Tens of millions of people really passionately believe it is an essential freedom.  They aren't going to wake up the morning after an election and feel like they dont care anymore.  The exact same fault line will be there whether the president is democratic, republican, anarchist or nazi.  So all the voters angry to a policy will still be there.  The reason why the same arguments persist year after year is because we are a democracy!  The entire point of our government is to make the important stuff the things we disagree about.

Unrelated, cool graphic about the last debate:

[Dutchling]

yes

[Bauglir]

yes

somewhere, somebody i never want to meet is gleeful that they finally have the final component for their realdoll

[mainiac]

What's the difference between a realdoll and a fleshlight with a picture on it?

[misko27]

I hear Rubio got roasted.

[mainiac]

I hear Rubio got roasted.

Hoist on his own petard more like.  All he needed to do was say "yeah you too!"  Literally, those exact words would have been enough.  Instead he broke.

I also think that people were rating Rubio higher then he was before the debate.  So they will say this is a bigger deal then it was because they will be saying he lost strength he never had in the first place.

[mainiac]

I've been a naysayer of a brokered convention for a long time but now I'm starting to wonder.  I see six candidates with a plausible path to the nomination.  While we will probably see a big culling of the herd after New Hampshire but it seems less likely then most years.  We could see two non-Trump and Cruz candidates sticking around past super-Tuesday, splitting the vote four ways.  I wouldn't say it's more likely then not but it's a lot more likely then any other year.

[smjjames]

Especially considering that the super pacs help keep them going further than they typically would have. Carson vowed to take it all the way to the convention (if possible for him), Trump is definetly going to stick around. Rubio, Cruz, and Bush could have the funding to keep going.

Probably going to come down to whether one candidate gets the majority through super tuesday and the rest of march, and whether it becomes a mess with no single candidate getting a huge lead and several getting lots of delegates.

Also, three new polls out, with one having Rubio and Cruz tied and Bush and Kasich tied, and one with Rubio and Kasich tied. We should expect to be surprised, what with things looking chaotic.

[mainiac]

It is plausible to think that four different candidates could win states on super tuesday.  If that happens then one quarter of the delegates would be awarded and the race would still be open.

[smjjames]

http://www.cnn.com/2016/02/08/politics/michael-bloomberg-2016-election/index.html He's officially considering a bid, should have jumped in MONTHS ago IMO.

[mainiac]

Bloomberg is basically the candidate for those horrified by the idea of a popular enthusiasm for politics having an impact on policy.  Gotta keep 'em down.

[RedKing]

Or horrified at the potential slate of candidates. I'm not saying I'm ready to #BloombergIntoSpring, but I'd give him a look, especially if Clinton gets the nomination.