Cold water on both campaigns'..sorry.. but its true...

[Peacetrain]

Just buckets of the cold stuff..

Because we are going to be okay when the primary caucus season is over..

How do I know?

I survived 2008 on DU.. and have the scars to prove it.

Never in a million years would I have thought that I would support HRC in the future.

Never.

But here I am.

We get over the anger to find the common ground in the end.

Beacool.. did you ever in a million years think you would see me support HRC for anything??

Probably not..

The odds of BS winning now.. pretty dang slim.. but he is not going to stop, he is going to the convention and he will have say in the platform.. as he rightly should being a hard fought campaign

I may have to come to grips with Independents getting to pick the 2020 candidate.. Trying to wrap my head around that one.. but it might just be a reality I have to accept..

But no matter what.. come November most of us will be united

Is this a unity post.. no.. no one is ready for that yet.. it is just a been there and done that post..

[MADem]

1. Most of us who are left of center will be united. The few troublemakers

and false flag operatives will fold their tents and slink away (likely to return at the midterms with another dose of negativity), and the even fewer B-orB-ers (modern day PUMAs) will either hold their tongues or get the PPR.


I'm all for unity. We'll get there eventually.

[Peacetrain]

2. No unity yet.. but you know what made me write this..

was just remembering how much stuff got thrown a the walls in 2008.. but we all got there in the end..

[MADem]

4. Yes, those were rough and ugly days...but we were on the HOPE TRAIN in November.

And by January, we were all dancing at the CHANGE ball!!

It's been a great two terms. I'll miss the Obama family--they've done a superb job representing our nation, and I'll miss the POTUS--he's a helluva leader.

I'd love to see HRC appoint him to the Supreme Court! We'd need a Democratic Senate to make that happen, but oh, would that be fun!

He probably wants to make a little money first--can't say as I blame him.

[Peacetrain]

6. We did we did..

Remember some wanted to impeach him before he was even took office.. rofl.. those were hair on fire times.. but most of us were able to meet halfway on that bridge.. and that is what it takes.. when the time is right..

I am going to miss the Obamas so much.. we are going to miss that calm calm soothing voice that kept us together..I think even the republicans are getting a little sad to see him go..because the world without his calm hand is a little scary to think about..but that is the way any change in leadership affects us.. the great unknown

[liberalnarb]

3. I'm far to the left of center, and I'll support Hillary in the GE if it comes down to her as the

nominee. But I will do it as a duty, not with passion.

[MADem]

7. Well, I wasn't passionate about Obama, either, in 2008--but I learned to love him.

Now, I am gonna miss the hell out of him.

I will say that my preferred candidate in 08 played no small role in helping me "get over it." She gave a barn burner of a nominating speech, she rallied us to back BHO, she pushed/prodded us.

You never know what the future might bring. I'm just going to do all I can to make sure it doesn't bring Trump!

[liberalnarb]

8. He was my guy in 08 (+12).

And yes, we're all going to miss him. Even if some of us don't know it yet.

[moriah]

19. For some reason I thought you were an Obama supporter in 08.

It's been eight years, I've slept since then.

But it was easy for me to make the switch in 08, but I was EXTREMELY proud of my candidate for not letting the primary loss stop her working to help defeat McCain.

[MADem]

23. Nope, I was on Team H back then.

I wasn't at all happy when she lost, because I did think she had the better resume, the greater experience, and the most well known international profile (which is always helpful), but I got over it. She played a very large part in that process, too--she didn't hesitate but jumped right in and started helping elect BHO.

Doesn't look like that's going to happen this time...this article is painful:

http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/05/19/face-bernie-over/Bc7S0zENpazJEGeEInQtsJ/story.html?event=event25

[Codeine]

9. Meh. I've never been passionate about a leader.

That never ends well. I just want skilled sausage-makers in the kitchen.

[Warren DeMontague]

10. Yeah, and the insults, throwing shit at millennials, and hippie punching will stop too.

Hooray.

[MADem]

14. As will the fogey/geezer, "You're not cool because you don't Feel that Bern"

garbage, the absurd "You're a warmonger" charges, the racially tinged "low information voter" snark, and the mocking and denigration of female supporters (vagina voters) too.

Hooray.

INDEED.

I'm in General Election mode.

We have our candidate and she will defeat Trump in November.

[Warren DeMontague]

16. Anyone who is worried about being cool, themselves or others, is by definition not cool.

Self-Evident Truth, it's right there in the Declaration of Independence.

But the ground to be made up in terms of supporters for the GE is clearly with younger voters, and it will be incumbent in my opinion for the presumptive nominee to reach out to them, preferably with some real policy points.

[MADem]

18. People who use "not being cool" as a slur quite obviously have that problem.

The over-arching point, though, is that seeking to denigrate--even if the arrow misses the mark--is a shit thing to do.

I challenge your assertion about younger voters--generally, they're the No Shows in elections. AWOL. Missing. Not there. They're doing better than they have in years past in recent elections but they're still running well below their old fart parents and grandparents.

And this time round, the ones who show up to "Bust" and choose to vote for that right winger Trump will be like chickens voting for the Colonel ( JC Watts' daddy). And....we've now got a Libertarian (Republicans who don't care about choice, being gay, and who like to smoke pot) in the race, who is backed by the charming if quirky Bill Weld, former "liberal GOP" MA governor who lost his ambassadorship because Jesse Helms put a hold on it) . The kids, some of 'em, anyway, might divvy up their influence and wander over that way, just to be youthfully contrarian. Some threaten to give the ever-present Jill Stein their vote.

They can do what they'd like, but I do think anyone who misses out on the opportunity to vote for our first female POTUS will be lying about it in a decade or two and claiming that "they were there," rather like a mirror image of all those Republicans who insisted they didn't vote for Nixon in 72 after he resigned, even though he won in a landslide!

Bottom line, though? We'll find the votes. Hillary Clinton is the best candidate in the race. She's tough and she doesn't quit. I'm not going to quit on her.

[Warren DeMontague]

21. We could undercut half the Libertarian argument if we just gave up the authoritarian fantasy that it

is somehow the government's job to tell consenting adult citizens what they can do with their own bodies, bloodstreams and consciousness, when they aren't harming or endangering anyone else.

We've managed to figure out that the government shouldn't have the right to throw people in prison for having consensual adult sex with someone of the same gender, and we've reached a point where we understand our tax dollars have better things to do than trying to censor the internet of naughty words and pictures of naked men and women... so eventually will we get to that place where we realize that spending 60 Billion plus a year and filling up our prisons in an endless quest to keep citizens from catching an unauthorized, "wrong kind" of buzz, is equally idiotic--- not to mention fundamentally contrary to the most basic precepts of liberty.

But in the meantime, it's one area where we need to play catch up to the L's, and no amount of worn-out cliches about about "Republicans who smoke pot" are going to change that... not as long as the DNC is represented by people who gleefully vote to send medical marijuana users to prison.

[MADem]

22. That argument, though, is the truth. Those libertarians ARE

mean-spirited, wingnut Republicans who want to smoke pot and don't worry overmuch about social issues. They still don't want to chip in to help those less fortunate than they are and they don't believe in the idea that a rising tide lifts all boats. Their attitude is "I've got mine--now you go and get yours...if you can."

I don't know if we'd undercut their argument, really--there will always be social elements that a cadre "disapproves of" for whatever reason--public nudity, e.g. They'll always find a home with the outliers. If we ever got to the point where humans agreed on all (or even most) social issues, we'd probably not have a need for politicians at all.

[Warren DeMontague]

27. We are approaching that point, however, because political trend-watchers have noticed a DEFINITE

move toward a (sorry for the word, again) small-l "libertarian" consensus on social issues.

In short, propelled in large part by millennials, we are approaching a point at which the great majority of Americans don't give a shit if consenting adults choose a) drugs b) porn c) gay sex d) birth control and abortion and e) a pain-free exit for themselves when terminally ill, etc.

IF our party could bring itself to finally abandon this tired "values voter" shit and embrace a throaty advocacy of what I believe is a fundamentally liberal approach to personal freedom, again, we could capture this wave and basically would leave the "Libertarian" party to the Ayn Rand-roids, the people who hate taxes so much they want to privatize the fire department.

This is not exactly an academic exercise, either. In my home state the Democratic Party stands for things like marijuana legalization, the right of the terminally ill to make their own end of life determinations, and strong personal privacy protections, we have even stronger free speech (anti-censorship) protections than the 1st Amendment contains. We also have a nude bike ride every year that draws over 10,000 nude bike riders.

And perhaps not so coincidentally, we enjoy both strong support across the generations AND we get exceptional turnout even in "off" years.

It is something to think about.

[MADem]

29. Sorta like the Roaring Twenties--everything old is new again.

There was an astounding amount of laissez-faire attitude back then, with regard to every social point you mentioned, which is why the children of the sixties often found more more common cause with their grandparents than they did with their parents.

But...as the pendulum does do, it swung the other way, and once the 2nd World War ended, the morality police took the high ground. Then, in the sixties, swinging as they were, it went the other way again...and then back again, to the Moral Majority and all that happy horseshit.

But every time it does swing, there's a little push forward.

That old "incrementalism," I guess.

I will not be surprised if the pendulum swings a few more times before we see some equilibrium. I doubt either one of us will live to see that day, though, when everyone agrees on most social issues. There's too much enjoyment in team sports, the push and pull of competing priorities...! Look at DU--this is supposed to be a board for people who want to elect more Democrats/fewer Republicans to public office, yet some can't help but threaten a "Buster" approach to the election this year. On the GOP side, there are people who are saying No Effing Way to Trump, too, so I guess "Disunity" is on the menu this season!

[Warren DeMontague]

30. Actually, the overwhelming political consensus in the 60s was fairly socially conservative.

But much of what you say has truth. I have an aunt who was smoking pot with jazz musiicans in the 40s.

Still, its a new century. Many of the old axioms may not apply.

[MADem]

31. There was a push-pull. I remember that time very well, actually.

There were people who thought Nixon was the one, and those who thought he was a monster. Prior to that, there were people who thought LBJ's prosecution of Vietnam was appropriate, and others who asked him "How many kids did you kill today?"

There was no "consensus." Not by a long shot! It's just that the opposition lacked focus, organizational skills and sufficient numbers to prevail. But they got older, and grew those skills, and they kept many of (though maybe not all) of their idealistic principles.

Push and pull, back and forth, two steps forward, one back.

It's how we do stuff.

[insta8er]

5. This year it's different, there is a group of people who will not bow to the same old

politics of yesteryear. The politics that likes to divide and steal from the regular folks, by means of big money controlling our democracy. 2016 is the year that radical change to the 2 party system will get started, the movement will bring about change in the years to come. Slowly from the bottom up.

[Fawke Em]

12. Even if most HERE are united, that won't be true in the real world.

Independents don't like her.

[pmorlan1]

32. UNITY?

Oh unity will be seen at DU because most of the Sanders supporters will leave if she becomes the nominee (a lot of them have left already). But that's not real unity, that's faux unity. Sure, it will give the illusion of unity but that's all it will be - an illusion. And you are correct the real world will show something far different.

[barrow-wight]

13. I will support either nominee.

I support most of the issues of both candidates. I probably support more individual policies of Bernie's than I do Hillary, but they're not the policies I care most for. I don't care for Bernie at all as a person and think his scorched earth policy is terrible, but I'll vote for him in the GE to stop Trump. Either of the Democratic candidates would be a thousand times better than that buffoon.

[lovemydog]

15. I'm left of center and support the most liberal candidates

in every election.

I believe Clinton's experience and proposed policies, backed by a strong liberal Congress and more involvement in local levels by liberals, will get us closer to our goals of universal health care, a much higher minimum wage, diplomacy rather than insecurity.

Thank you for your post.

I hope you enjoy a wonderful weekend!

[a kennedy]

17. You da man Peace.......and ditto, ditto, ditto...... eom

[liberal_at_heart]

20. Maybe they're not different for you. They are different for me. I was a Democrat for 20 years.

I am now an Independent. I will not do as I have done in the past and just get over it and hold my nose and vote for the lesser of two evils. I have an autistic son who will be turning 18 this year. I have seen the misery that Obama's Race to the Top put him through and now I have to wonder if he will even be approved for SSI because Democrats don't have enough of a spine to tell the Republicans no on cuts to social services during budget deals. No, things are definitely different for me this time and it is because I can no longer just sit and wait for Democrats to start standing up for my children's future. I know they won't. And because they won't stand up for my children's future I will not stand up for them. I will however stand up for Bernie because I know he will fight for my son and the rest of my family.

[Skwmom]

24. This year has created lots of Independents.

[Katashi_itto]

25. Sorry. No.

[Thinkingabout]

26. Yes, we do need unity, most of all we need a Democrat in the WH.

The thought of a Trump presidency is overwhelming. Who knows what he will do and say even tomorrow.

[Fairgo]

28. Evolution, devolution, cascade & revolution

Complex systems and corruption do not mix. You can sustain the illusion of discourse only so long. When the truth is hollowed out and people are pushed to the edge, sustaining that illusion becomes a precarious balance. All at once, there will be a moment, a flutter of butterfly wings, and the whole thing comes crashing down in surprising ways. If you look you can see the signs. When both parties become an obvious joke, when the candidates they fete are generally disliked. When people quit buying the "lesser of two evils" argument and start picking at the rhetorical shackles of demagoguery. Your past experience is snap shot on a spiral, not a circle...tracing a certain and accelerating path to an event horizon. Hang on.