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The consensus in the 2012 postmortem books is that the Obama campaign had an advantage because he didn't have a primary challenger so they got to use all that primary cash to run ads "defining" Romney as a greedy, corporate suit. A challenging task, indeed! The party rules committees have a long history of solving the problems of the last campaign instead of solving the problems of the next campaign. Obviously the Democrats aren't going to get to get to just ignore the primary like Obama could in 2012. Well, OK, they might if Hillmentum is comes true, but probably not. The more important reforms for the Republicans will come later when we find out if they're able to cut down on the clown show aspects of the primary, like the Ames Straw Poll and the 20+ debates.
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Jan 25, 2014 01:06
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ManifunkDestiny posted:Idle speculation but this could also be posturing for a run at Boehner's job after the midterms oh my god can you even imagine a woman breaking the Hastert Rule and going against the tea party
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Jan 25, 2014 01:31
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nachos posted:oh my god can you even imagine a woman breaking the Hastert Rule and going against the tea party They have a policy of corrective rape.
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Jan 25, 2014 02:04
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The Entire Universe posted:They have a policy of corrective rape. Is it legitimate? Or does congress just shut it down?
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Jan 25, 2014 02:11
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Joementum posted:The consensus in the 2012 postmortem books is that the Obama campaign had an advantage because he didn't have a primary challenger so they got to use all that primary cash to run ads "defining" Romney as a greedy, corporate suit. A challenging task, indeed!
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Jan 25, 2014 02:47
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UltimoDragonQuest posted:Three nights of prime time coverage on every network should be inherently more valuable in August/September than June/July. Am I wrong about this or underestimating the effect of in-house ads vs. SuperPAC ads? I guess it depends on whether you plan to use your prime time coverage to show an old man arguing with a chair.
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Jan 25, 2014 02:49
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Joementum posted:The more important reforms for the Republicans will come later when we find out if they're able to cut down on the clown show aspects of the primary, like the Ames Straw Poll and the 20+ debates. There doesn't seem to me to be an effective way to do this. I mean even assuming you can successfully step on the state parties and convince them to drop activities that make them look relevant and raise them money, how do you stop outside groups from doing the same thing - megachurch pastors and Heritage Action and CPAC or whoever doesn't have to listen to the RNC's requests, and on the candidate side you have basic Prisoner's Dilemma[1] - nobody wants to be the only guy refusing to go to a Big Event, and it takes a heck of a lot of willpower for a politician to actively avoid limelight. Though this whole forum has taught me a lot about politics, so I'm eager to be corrected on this score. [1] - Actually it's worse than that - limiting those sorts of events inherently biases against longer-odds candidates. If I'm looking back at 2012 and plotting how I'm going to be the nominee and I'm not an instant top-tier candidate, my goal is to do something splashy that gets me that meteoric rise to the top of the pack, and then just not implode afterwards. I mean if you're narcissistic enough to run for President, you're narcissistic enough to think that you can totally avoid all those kinds of issues that blew up 2012 candidates so long as you can get that burst to the head of the pack.
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Jan 25, 2014 03:04
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Wow, that's a dumb move on the convention. I wonder if they're going to be open to another debate since the general will be starting that much earlier. It'd be hilarious if we get another long burn on the Dem primary side like we saw in '08 (either real or imagined) that combined with an early convention relegates the GOP nom to McCain Mk. 2.
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Jan 25, 2014 05:45
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Joementum posted:The more important reforms for the Republicans will come later when we find out if they're able to cut down on the clown show aspects of the primary, like the Ames Straw Poll and the 20+ debates. Since the only thing actually turning these things into a clown show were the candidates, that's a long haul for the RNC.
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Jan 25, 2014 16:17
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Has the "inevitable" candidate ever won? I have some bad memories from Hilary's run in 2008 and I don't find her to be quite the unstoppable force everyone else finds her to be. Edit: I guess my question is this: who else can the democrats field from their stable of electable and prime-time ready candidates?
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Jan 25, 2014 16:28
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dorkasaurus_rex posted:Has the "inevitable" candidate ever won? I have some bad memories from Hilary's run in 2008 and I don't find her to be quite the unstoppable force everyone else finds her to be. Biden, Cuomo, maybe one or two others. It depends what you define as an "inevitable candidate" as well; Bush Sr could be classified as one and he won handily; Nixon was also one after Eisenhower and he only barely lost his election, Gore also just barely lost after Clinton. Going back farther you have Taft who was personally approved by TR, you have a long string of Republican presidencies, and you even have Van Buren as successor to Jackson. "Inevitable" candidates haven't really won that much in the past 50 years because there was a pretty large amount of turmoil during that time.
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Jan 25, 2014 16:32
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computer parts posted:Biden, Cuomo, maybe one or two others. So basically we should get ready for President Ted Cruz?
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Jan 25, 2014 16:41
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Slate Action posted:So basically we should get ready for President Ted Cruz? No, because (politically) things have been fairly stable the past few years and people generally don't like gibbering morons as a president (Reagan and GWB may have been morons but they could hide it on the campaign trail).
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Jan 25, 2014 16:45
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The Warszawa posted:I do wonder if it's mollifying some donors who think 'oh if Romney didn't have to sit on that money ..." but I don't see it having an actual effect. Didn't he outspend Obama anyway? And all the money in the world wouldn't have made Clint Eastwood or the 47% tape disappear.
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Jan 25, 2014 16:53
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Alter Ego posted:Didn't he outspend Obama anyway? And all the money in the world wouldn't have made Clint Eastwood or the 47% tape disappear. The Obama campaign outspent the Romney campaign by quite a bit ($683,546,548 to $433,281,516), but Republicans outspent the Democrats by a tad when you count in all the PAC spending ($1,107,080,937 to $1,238,072,571).
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Jan 25, 2014 16:56
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Joementum posted:The Obama campaign outspent the Romney campaign by quite a bit ($683,546,548 to $433,281,516), but Republicans outspent the Democrats by a tad when you count in all the PAC spending ($1,107,080,937 to $1,238,072,571). Oh. Don't know why I thought that, then. Still, my second point stands. Romney was proof that money cannot buy votes. Incidentally, Joe, I've been wondering--what part of the Nixon tapes is that quote in your title from?
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Jan 25, 2014 16:59
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Those loving $ numbers. In Canada one the major parties who is resurging posted their best ever fundraising quarter and it was a paltry 4.4 million. Then again corporate donations are illegal ans the limit is $1200 a person. So um, is there anyone other than Biden opposing Hillary?
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Jan 25, 2014 17:04
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Alter Ego posted:Incidentally, Joe, I've been wondering--what part of the Nixon tapes is that quote in your title from? He's talking about a time, earlier in the coverup, when they tried to get Hunt to take the fall for the operation. They'd give him $1m, and then grant him clemency after the '74 election. Hunt didn't take the deal. Nixon later recounts that while being recorded in the White House and immediately after says that he's worried that Dean, who had just flipped, might have had a pocket tape recorder with Nixon talking about the payoff plan on an earlier occasion. bunnyofdoom posted:So um, is there anyone other than Biden opposing Hillary? Brian Schweitzer has all but said that he's running and Martin O'Malley is testing the waters.
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Jan 25, 2014 17:19
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Joementum posted:He's talking about a time, earlier in the coverup, when they tried to get Hunt to take the fall for the operation. They'd give him $1m, and then grant him clemency after the '74 election. Hunt didn't take the deal. Nixon later recounts that while being recorded in the White House and immediately after says that he's worried that Dean, who had just flipped, might have had a pocket tape recorder with Nixon talking about the payoff plan on an earlier occasion. I'm beginning to think the Dems may be in trouble in 2016. Isn't there anyone, oh, I don't know, young, exciting and either ethnic or a woman?
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Jan 25, 2014 17:52
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Alter Ego posted:Didn't he outspend Obama anyway? And all the money in the world wouldn't have made Clint Eastwood or the 47% tape disappear. As Joe said, it depends on your metrics, as raised and spent are different and the numbers are close enough that it doesn't matter. Here's the link I keep handy for these discussions: http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/campaign-finance Romney only raised 460m from traditional fundraising, vs Obama's 726m. Which is abysmal. Including the PAC numbers, raised/spent say different things between the two races (Democrats raised more total money, but Republicans spent more), but all numbers are extremely similar and right around the one billion mark. In the end the Republicans, in total, raised about 7.5% less. The numbers from 2008 were surprisingly similar, if you just crop out the Super Pac numbers. Obama raised $760m to McCain's $4-500m (in 2008, correct me if I'm misremembering), and if it wasn't for the Citizens United ruling Republicans would have just pulled a sequel to McCain's terrible campaign. The other takeaway is that any final words on the election "X outspent Y!" is likely cherrypicking information from extremely close numbers to make a point, unless you're pointing out the actual difference that has been in play since 2008- Republicans only raising about 2/3 of what the Democrats are getting from "real people", with equal numbers coming about from PAC money. edit: McCain raised 368m and spent 333m vs Obama's $745m and $729.5m in 2008. Romney admittedly raised more, but without Super Pacs it would have been a very one sided race. Pythagoras a trois fucked around with this message at 19:01 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 17:57
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dorkasaurus_rex posted:I'm beginning to think the Dems may be in trouble in 2016. Isn't there anyone, oh, I don't know, young, exciting and either ethnic or a woman? A lot of people have been talking about Kamala Harris, but she probably needs to be governor or senator first.
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Jan 25, 2014 18:25
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dorkasaurus_rex posted:I'm beginning to think the Dems may be in trouble in 2016. Isn't there anyone, oh, I don't know, young, exciting and either ethnic or a woman? The Democratic candidate in 2016 is in the vicinity of 90% likely to be Hillary or Biden. There's a decent bench after that but most of them aren't touching this one unless Hillary bows out. However, if you think Christie can't win any longer, the GOP bench is Walker, Rubio, another Bush, another Paul and a bunch of clowns - not awful but nobody who's above the 40/60 range vs. either of them.
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Jan 25, 2014 18:36
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Badger of Basra posted:A lot of people have been talking about Kamala Harris, but she probably needs to be governor or senator first. It's almost impossible to become President without being either a senator, governor, or VP. Harris has no real profile outside of California at the moment, so it wouldn't do her any good to try to run for president in 2016. She would be better served focusing her efforts on becoming senator or governor and using that as a stepping stone (though neither Boxer or Feinstein's giving up their seats any time soon, and when Brown is termed out they'll likely be a crowded field for that office).
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Jan 25, 2014 18:40
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Ammat The Ankh posted:It's almost impossible to become President without being either a senator, governor, or VP. Harris has no real profile outside of California at the moment, so it wouldn't do her any good to try to run for president in 2016. She would be better served focusing her efforts on becoming senator or governor and using that as a stepping stone (though neither Boxer or Feinstein's giving up their seats any time soon, and when Brown is termed out they'll likely be a crowded field for that office). I would think Kamala Harris would be the favorite for after Brown, even with a crowded field, but that's just unfounded guesswork on my part, unfortunately.
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Jan 25, 2014 18:44
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As far as women and minority candidates on the Democratic bench, should Hillary decline to run, Gillibrand would likely open an exploratory committee and Klobuchar has been giving speeches in Iowa. Deval Patrick has said he's definitely not considering 2016, but again that could easily change without Hillary in the campaign. I think it's still too early for Booker and the Castro bros haven't won (and probably can't win) statewide, and Warren is comfortable in her Senate seat, but there will obviously be a lot of talk about them. Oh, and Chelsea turns 35 in 2016 
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Jan 25, 2014 18:45
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Joementum posted:Oh, and Chelsea turns 35 in 2016
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Jan 25, 2014 19:02
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George P, or as he's referred to by his grandpa, the brown one.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:18
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He's also the not-so-bright-one, which is why they sent him to Rice, where Poppy could keep an eye on him.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:23
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dorkasaurus_rex posted:Has the "inevitable" candidate ever won? I have some bad memories from Hilary's run in 2008 and I don't find her to be quite the unstoppable force everyone else finds her to be. Inevitable candidates win all the time it's just usually inconvenient to frame it that way after the fact, obviously they prevail most of the time in Republican primaries but they're almost as successful during Democratic ones. 2008 was also a very different kind of cycle, the Democrats were looking extremely strong going into the general so the nomination was more valued than ever and Obama was almost as strong a candidate as Clinton from the start. Remember that Obama out fundraised Hillary in Q1 and Q2 in 2007, there is nobody on the horizon who has any hope of doing that in 2015.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:33
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Joementum posted:The Obama campaign outspent the Romney campaign by quite a bit ($683,546,548 to $433,281,516), but Republicans outspent the Democrats by a tad when you count in all the PAC spending ($1,107,080,937 to $1,238,072,571). The important thing to remember here is that not all dollars are equal. PACs don't get the advantageous advertising rates that must be offered to candidates' campaigns. Exacerbating this was the fact that Romney's command structure was (as required by law) decentralized and not coordinated with the candidate. As a result a lot of that money was wasted on old/non-productive messaging or grifted as it passed through various hands, and they didn't bother pre-buying ad time in advance, so their last-minute ad buys were even more costly than PAC advertising normally is. So a dollar in a candidate's campaign fund is much, much more valuable than a dollar spent by a PAC. In terms of numbers PACs were paying 50% more than candidates during the 2012 primary and close to November PACs were getting charged up to six times as much, before you even get into the relative value of a dollar spent on a coordinated message in a key area versus a dollar allocated by Karl Rove's fever dreams. Of course it's debatable if the same conclusions hold true in an off-cycle like 2014 (much less message saturation and competition for ad time), and they probably wouldn't hold under a GOP administration who was swiss-cheesing the law with FEC interpretations and refusals to prosecute violators. Paul MaudDib fucked around with this message at 21:07 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 20:49
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Paul MaudDib posted:The important thing to remember here is that not all dollars are equal. PACs don't get the advantageous advertising rates that must be offered to candidates' campaigns. Exacerbating this was the fact that Romney's command structure was (as required by law) decentralized and not coordinated with the candidate. As a result a lot of that money was wasted on old/non-productive messaging or grifted as it passed through various hands, and they didn't bother pre-buying ad time in advance, so their last-minute ad buys were even more costly than PAC advertising normally is. So a dollar in a candidate's campaign fund is much, much more valuable than a dollar spent by a PAC. While a lot of this is very interesting in an 'I didn't know that' sort of way, do you actually believe that the bolded part was true and that the largest PAC contributers to help R-Money win weren't effectively at his beck and call in a slightly more round about manner?
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Jan 25, 2014 22:48
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Also the Romney campaign didn't get the favored ad rates either since they usually waited until the last minute to do their bookings.
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Jan 25, 2014 22:50
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Caros posted:While a lot of this is very interesting in an 'I didn't know that' sort of way, do you actually believe that the bolded part was true and that the largest PAC contributers to help R-Money win weren't effectively at his beck and call in a slightly more round about manner? Actually, yes. The big surprise about 2012 is just how ineffective all the extra money from Citizens United ended up being. A big part of this was the huge proportion of conservative funds that went to groups other than Romney's campaign. I do think they will get much better at it. Remember, this was the first presidential campaign since Citizens United, give them some time and they will get great at coordinated non-coordination, but the Romney campaign definitely did not have the control over the money that they would have liked.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:02
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gently caress You And Diebold posted:Actually, yes. The big surprise about 2012 is just how ineffective all the extra money from Citizens United ended up being. A big part of this was the huge proportion of conservative funds that went to groups other than Romney's campaign. I do think they will get much better at it. Remember, this was the first presidential campaign street Citizens United, give them some time and they will get great at coordinated non-coordination, but the Romney campaign definitely did not have the control over the money that they would have liked. The main inefficiencies with Romney's campaign were "people skimming money to profit at the expense of the greater good" which is practically a required trait to join the Republican Party. There's no guarantee it will get better if the national party remains as weak as it has been for the past few decades.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:04
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computer parts posted:The main inefficiencies with Romney's campaign were "people skimming money to profit at the expense of the greater good" which is practically a required trait to join the Republican Party. There's no guarantee it will get better if the national party remains as weak as it has been for the past few decades. Particularly if the shadow-RNC the Kochs are quite expressly forming comes to fruition.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:09
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gently caress You And Diebold posted:Actually, yes. The big surprise about 2012 is just how ineffective all the extra money from Citizens United ended up being. A big part of this was the huge proportion of conservative funds that went to groups other than Romney's campaign. I do think they will get much better at it. Remember, this was the first presidential campaign since Citizens United, give them some time and they will get great at coordinated non-coordination, but the Romney campaign definitely did not have the control over the money that they would have liked. That's assuming most of the super PACs are more interested in getting people elected than bilking the rubes.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:18
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comes along bort posted:That's assuming most of the super PACs are more interested in getting people elected than bilking the rubes. Oh I definitely think that is how they are now, but in the future I think campaigns will have much stronger control/oversight of the super PACs, even though they aren't supposed to. This won't prevent the super rich crazies who basically make their own super PAC to push whatever issue/candidate they are focused on, but overall I think that the loose money will become more efficient than they were in 2012. I doubt they will ever be as efficient, much less more efficient, as direct campaign cash though.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:24
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gently caress You And Diebold posted:Actually, yes. The big surprise about 2012 is just how ineffective all the extra money from Citizens United ended up being. A big part of this was the huge proportion of conservative funds that went to groups other than Romney's campaign. I do think they will get much better at it. Remember, this was the first presidential campaign since Citizens United, give them some time and they will get great at coordinated non-coordination, but the Romney campaign definitely did not have the control over the money that they would have liked. The real issue is downballot. A big surge out unregulated outside cash may not affect the Presidential race, but it can sure tilt things for individual congressional races and state legislature contests and ballot proposals. As the post-CU plutocracy gets smarter about targeting its efforts, that's where their money is going to go, and that's really bad news for liberals.
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Jan 25, 2014 23:28
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Caros posted:While a lot of this is very interesting in an 'I didn't know that' sort of way, do you actually believe that the bolded part was true and that the largest PAC contributers to help R-Money win weren't effectively at his beck and call in a slightly more round about manner? Not in the sense that Romney can say "our internal polling shows we're weak in Florida and we need to do a $20m ad buy on how much Obama loves Castro to shore it up". Are they "on his team" sure, but if you have four dozen people calling the shots many of those shots are going to be redundant and wasteful, or made less effective because of the fog of war between the campaign and the PAC. I kind of implied it in my post but I basically agree with FYADbold that they will become more directly controlled as time goes on. It will be the usual game where they start eating out the meat of the regulations around the edges and eventually they neuter the oversight and restrictions. Every time something goes to the Supreme Court you'll lose a little more ground, and if the GOP takes over the White House they'll run wild. gently caress You And Diebold posted:Oh I definitely think that is how they are now, but in the future I think campaigns will have much stronger control/oversight of the super PACs, even though they aren't supposed to. This won't prevent the super rich crazies who basically make their own super PAC to push whatever issue/candidate they are focused on, but overall I think that the loose money will become more efficient than they were in 2012. I doubt they will ever be as efficient, much less more efficient, as direct campaign cash though. The shadow-GOP approach is very, very worrying to me. I see it as a way to end-run around the separation between PACs and campaigns, and all the regulation and disclosure that campaigns entail. Paul MaudDib fucked around with this message at 00:25 on Jan 26, 2014 |
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Jan 26, 2014 00:20
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gently caress You And Diebold posted:Oh I definitely think that is how they are now, but in the future I think campaigns will have much stronger control/oversight of the super PACs, even though they aren't supposed to. This won't prevent the super rich crazies who basically make their own super PAC to push whatever issue/candidate they are focused on, but overall I think that the loose money will become more efficient than they were in 2012. I doubt they will ever be as efficient, much less more efficient, as direct campaign cash though. The PACs which actually work with campaigns have effectively zero impediments to collusion as is. The law is more or less a formality which mostly serves to ensure a campaign hires a halfway competent lawyer. There's no incentive to keep the seemingly infinite number of grifter super PACs from getting their money from the seemingly infinite number of stupid people. That's what's going to keep the overall effectiveness of super PACs fairly low.
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Jan 26, 2014 00:26
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