2020 Presidential Election

[Martina]

She seems kinda awkward to me. Hillary could be genuine, but she schooled herself not to improvise or veer from the party line. You could see her thinking sometimes during pauses. Then she'd take a deep breath and resume the same ole script.

I don't care that Warren is kinda Minnie Mouse in her demeanor. The people who vote for movie star smarminess or parental figures are probably going to vote Biden. I don't know. There's so much misogyny out there that I am not looking forward to another woman candidate. Hillary Clinton was an asshole and deserved much of the animosity directed towards her. But not all of it. Not looking forward to the screaming and bile that will come from the right. I'd far prefer Warren to Biden, but she's still not a true progressive. It doesn't matter. Only Bernie is, of the candidates I know, and while I think he could beat Trump, I have little hope of him getting through the primaries even without super delegates.

[Martina]

I could totally live with Sherrod Brown.

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by Martina

She seems kinda awkward to me. Hillary could be genuine, but she schooled herself not to improvise or veer from the party line. You could see her thinking sometimes during pauses. Then she'd take a deep breath and resume the same ole script.

I don't care that Warren is kinda Minnie Mouse in her demeanor. The people who vote for movie star smarminess or parental figures are probably going to vote Biden. I don't know. There's so much misogyny out there that I am not looking forward to another woman candidate. Hillary Clinton was an asshole and deserved much of the animosity directed towards her. But not all of it.

This was a good twitter thread:

THREAD: After seeing this tweet from Politico, I decided to search for tweets by several mainstream news orgs and see how they use the terms “likeable,” “unlikable,” and “likability” when applied to men vs. women. The results are...stark.

First of all, those words are used far more often to refer to women. Politico did note in 2014 that Hillary Clinton—who at the time had a favorable rating in the 60s—was now “likable enough” vs 2008.

If you’re Politico and reporting that a male politician—former Illinois Mayor Rod Blahojevich—has been found guilty of trying to sell a US Senate seat like, though, it’s important to note that the jurors found him likable, criminality aside.

During the 2008 Democratic primary, the New York Times sarcastically referred to Hillary Clinton’s campaigning as a “likability tour.”

Last year, the @nytimes tweeted out a quote about British Prime Minister Theresa May that described her as “not human enough to be likable.”

In 2016, the Washington Post pondered whether Hillary Clinton was likable enough to win the election.

When it came to Republican former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, though, the Washington Post argued that “‘electability’ is not ‘likability.’”

The Washington Post also wondered if Mitt Romney would even “need to be” “likable” to win in 2012. Like, is that really necessary for a candidate?

Over at the Atlantic, we find that Gary Johnson — who had no idea what Aleppo was — was very likable in 2016 despite his “troubling economic policy.”

Of course, “Hillary Clinton’s whole likability thing” was “still an issue,” The Atlantic noted that year.

Perhaps Hillary Clinton should have asked NJ Gov Chris Christie how—a year after the Bridgegate scandal that saw his approval rating plummet to the lowest in the nation at 15%—he managed to get The Atlantic to consider that he might be the guy to “make Republicans likable again.”

Fox News has good news for at least one Democrat in 2016, though: Voters considered Sen. Bernie Sanders—known for lots of shouting and doom-and-gloom finger wagging—“likable enough to serve effectively we president.”

Also on Fox News, Newt Gingrich praised Sen. Marco Rubio for being “very likable.”

Republicans at Fox News even had high praise for Vice President Joe Biden’s likability in 2015. “One of the most likable people in Washington,” Dana Perino said.

Hillary Clinton, though? “When she’s not being criminal, she’s just being wooden and unlikable.”

If you’re Politico and reporting that a male politician—former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich—has been found guilty of trying to sell a US Senate seat like, though, it’s important to note that the jurors found him likable, criminality aside.

This follow-up thread includes A. Receipts of folks who argued in 2015/2016 that Elizabeth Warren would be a “likable” alternative to Hillary Clinton and B. Social science research that explains the “likability” conundrum for women in leadership.

Any woman who runs, it's going to be "of course a woman can be president, just not that particular woman."

Along with a heaping helping of "you shouldn't vote for a demographic but for the best candidate."

For 232 years all candidates were from a single demographic, which means exactly zero of them can now be remembered as "the best candidate."

"Its not fair to dismiss people's achievements in the past just because they were white males."

Actually it is because the means by which they were out into position to have the opportunity to achieve anything were unfair.

Is any election from before 1920 even still legitimate?

[Martina]

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...illary-clinton

[Kätzchen]

I think dark_crystal's post raises some important things that are persistent in current day American society: 1) sexism, 2) privilege and access to power, and 3) the voting and electoral system by which presidential candidates are measured as having 'won' any executorial seat of power.


And the article by The Guardian, found by Martina (her latest post): One of the persistent ideas I found in this particular article seems to pair nicely with the prevailing sexist tide of how sexism prevails within American Society. Per the article, Clinton won the popular vote by a large margin, yet wasn't chosen as President, due to what? Can it be said that her loss was due to unlikability? I don't think it can solely be said that unlikability was the determining factor. I think the reason Clinton couldn't secure the Presidency was related to the implementation of the super vote, the Electoral vote. I could be entirely wrong about that, but it just seems like what needs to be addressed is the voting system and use of the super delegate seat of determinant power utilized in the Electoral vote system.


Now that the House of Representatives (USHOR) is seated with an majority of Democrats, I wonder if the USHOR will make it a priority to address and rectify voting issues, which seem to persist in too many states of the Union.



On a personal note: Things I think about in choosing who I want to vote for in any election process seem to share a set of criteria I look for in any person who seeks an executorial seat of power. What I look for is things the person has done. For example, their track record pertaining to:

1) current and future US social policy, 2) labor, 3) economy, 4) who they partnered with to get things accomplished (past, present or future), 5) will they uphold past case law ruled in favor of Women's rights, LGTBQ rights, and Race (ie, racism, homophobia, sexism, etc) because in my mind, it's about social equity. Social equity issues and how do we collaborate to provide the best possible way to co-exist. These types of things are of importance to me when deciding who gets my proverbial vote of approval.