I Am Feeling Really Good About Hillary's Chances Tomorrow

[stopbush]

I have been saying for weeks that one cannot underestimate the fact that Hillary has the union vote sewn up, and that she is also strong with Latinos, many of whom are in unions in LV.

Yesterday, Jon Ralston reported that Hillary has the Latino vote sewn up as well. I trust this guy - I lived in Vegas for a while, and he has his finger on the pulse of LV and NV politics. He also isn't afraid to tell the truth.

This is in sharp contrast to the wishful articles one reads averring that the union vote is split along generational lines, with young people favoring Bernie and older people for HRC. Sorry, but I've been in unions (Teamsters, for one, and that was when I was in my mid-20s), and the prime directive in any union is that your strength comes through unity, and that lack of unity dilutes or negates the strength and power of the body as a whole.

While there will always be individual union members who will buck the union's positions, in most cases they stay united, no more so than in a caucus situation where you are standing in a room with your fellow union members and everybody in the room sees exactly who you are supporting. Much more difficult to buck the trend than in a primary where you cast a secret ballot.

I'm feeling good about tomorrow based on the facts on the ground, not on emotion or wishful thinking (thought it doesn't hurt to have 538 projecting Hillary with a 75% chance of winning NV).

[workinclasszero]

1. I hope she does well

And then on to SC where Bernie is gonna get an *ss whipping!

[leftofcool]

2. She's got this. Super Tuesday the primary will be over.

[stopbush]

6. NV will be Bernie's Waterloo.

I can understand why after the NH win he decided to try a little harder in NV, a state he not only ignored, but where he also had train wrecks trying to get his organization and ground game together. Where HRC has a great ground game and organization - plus the endorsements of every union in the LV (except Culinary, who didn't endorse this time around) and the local liberal newspaper - Bernie is forced to rely on a massive TV ad buy. Never where you want to be in a caucus, especially if you're going up against a candidate who has done the hard and time-consuming work.

In retrospect, he might have been better off writing off NV. He could have concentrated his time and resources into the later races. By choosing to fight Hillary on her territory, he risks losing NV big time, followed by losing SC even bigger time and being wiped out on Super Tuesday. As bad as it will be for Bernie to be one-out-of-four after SC, it will be worse after Super Tuesday.

Of course, if he somehow pulls out NV (doubtful - 538 has him at a 26% chance of winning, and this the day before the caucus), well, then his momentum coming out of NH is intact if not enhanced. But at this point, a win in NV for Bernie is a very heavy lift.

[Cha]

3. Gracias for your perspective, stop.

It's so good to hear. I don't count on anything until it's done. Then I breathe.

I was so catatonic the night of the Iowa caucus.. And, then she won.. I don't care how close it was she made history!

Fugeddabout NH.

[stopbush]

8. Thanks. My perspective is colored by my having lived in Vegas for three years.

For most people, NV is a state they never ever think about. A state whose one calling card is Las Vegas, where you can carry a beer down the street and not get arrested, and where you depend on the pictures your friends took to remember what you were doing for those three days when you were blitzed out of your mind and overeating at the buffets.

That's not at all what it's about when you live in LV. There are tons of families who live there. Very high transient population of people who come for the sun and the lower COL and who never visit The Strip after a few years of living in town. Many move on after 5 years. But during the time they're in LV, they work hard and take things very seriously. Unions are YUGE because of the hotel/hospitality industry. They can quickly and naturally become your second family, especially as your union job is usually providing you not only with steady employment at a decent wage, but health benefits, paid vacation time, sick days and often family leave, because that's what unions get for their employees.

These are not people who are open to the idea of getting rid of their employer-provided free health insurance for some single-payer plan that will actually cost them more out-of-pocket than the plan they already have. These are people who realize their benefits are the result of what the Democratic Party has done for them over the decades - they don't take kindly to people bashing the Party that worked to make their lives better.

Which is why I've been sitting back laughing at the BSers who imagine that these union types are going to split their vote to support an interloper like Bernie. It isn't going to happen. The union members will all be heading back into work on Monday. They work with each other every day. The last thing you want to be is the guy who publicly stood up in a caucus room and announced you were splitting from the union endorsement to back Bernie over Hillary.

[Cha]

9. Sounds Good.. thank you for all of that.. you write really well.

BS vows to be the guy who will trash the Dem party more than the teabagger nom. lol

[stopbush]

15. Thanks. My day job involves being a writer. Wish I typed better!

[Cha]

16. Oh that's funny.. I pegged you!

[DavidDvorkin]

4. Are any more polls of Nevada due before tomorrow?

[SunSeeker]

5. Hillary had a powerful performance at the town hall last night.

She really drove the point home that Sanders voted against Ted Kennedy's 2007 immigration reform bill, while she voted for it and that immigration reform - including path to citizenship - would be her priority.

[Cha]

10. Good to know that part, too, SunSeeker. Have you seen her "Brave" ad for Nevada?

[SunSeeker]

13. I don't think I saw that one. Got a link? nt

[Cha]

14. Yes.. bring tissues..

[SunSeeker]

22. Oh yeah, I did see that one. It shows Hillary's heart. nt

[HillDawg]

7. I am..

Nervously confident. I think she has it, but you never know.

[Cha]

11. That's right.. that's my theory.. you never know until it's over.

Then I breathe.

[Hekate]

12. +1

[book_worm]

17. I hope you are right--I hope it is a solid victory

In 2008 HRC did well in Las Vegas and I feel if she does well there again tomorrow she will win this.

[Cha]

18. What do you think about this, stop?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/110750155

[stopbush]

19. While R dirty tricks are to be expected, I really don't see a lot of Rs participating

in this effort as it is a caucus, not a secret ballot primary, where you are done voting in a few minutes. One wonders just how many Rs will be willing to hang for hours in a caucus room to screw the D vote, only to have to return next week and do it all again for the Rs.

I can't imagine what it would be like for an R operative to spend hours with a bunch of committed Ds, many of them union workers. People standing in a room together naturally start having conversations, and unless you've been trained in espionage, your being a non-D will be exposed pretty quickly. If D voters who are Bernie caucusers realize that they have a bunch of Rs in their midst, many will simply cross over to Hillary to negate their presence. Even the win-at-any-cost Bernie supporters will realize these are Rs trying to skew the vote their way. That's no way to win an election. I can see such R operatives being hounded out of the caucus rooms in short order.

They are asking college kids who are naifs to the political process to act like Nixon's plumbers. They not only don't have the experience and skills to do this. They don't really have the will. How deep is your commitment to a political party when you're just starting out as a voter?

[Cha]

20. I hope so! It's so weird that they could be able to do that at all.

It will be interesting.. we'll all have talk about it Saturday night after it's over.

Thank you!

[stopbush]

24. NV Dems said today they will pursue legal action

against anyone who tries this ploy.

[Cha]

25. I saw that!

I didn't think the activists there would just stand by.. hoping they had some recourse.

Interesting times.

[stopbush]

27. Just the threat will stop this ploy in its tracks.

Best defense is a good offense.

[pandr32]

23. I am loving your fact-based optimism

I will add my emotion and wishful thinking, too, because it is so hard not to!

[Cha]

26. Agree!

[fun n serious]

28. I'm Hoping so.

I'll be watching closely tomorrow.