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Political Strategy for a Permanent Democratic Majority

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Sanders: “Hillary Clinton must become the next president of the United States. The choice is not even close”

The text of Senator Bernie Sanders’s address to the opening night of the Democratic Convention, which follows below, is cross-posted from npr.org.

Good evening. Thank you. Thank you very much. It is an honor…thank you. Thank you very much. It is an honor to be here tonight. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.

It is an honor to be here tonight and to be following in the footsteps of my good friend, Elizabeth Warren. And to be here tonight to thank Michelle Obama for her incredible service to our country. She has made all of us proud.

Let me begin by thanking the hundreds of thousands of Americans who actively participated in our campaign as volunteers. Let me thank the two and a half million Americans who helped fund our campaign with an unprecedented 8 million individual campaign contributions. Anyone know what that average contribution was? That’s right – $27. And let me thank the 13 million Americans who voted for the political revolution, giving us the 1,846 pledged delegates here tonight – 46 percent of the total. And delegates: thank you for being here, and thank you for all the work you have done. I look forward to your votes during the roll call on Tuesday tomorrow night.

And let me offer a special thanks to the people of my own state of Vermont who have sustained me and supported me as a mayor, congressman, senator and presidential candidate. And to my family – my wife, Jane, our four kids and seven grandchildren – thank you very much. for your love and hard work on this campaign.

I understand that many people here in this convention hall and around the country are disappointed about the final results of the nominating process. I think it’s fair to say that no one is more disappointed than I am. But to all of our supporters – here and around the country – I hope you take enormous pride in the historical accomplishments we have achieved.


False Equivalence Still Reigns Inside Beltway

From Erik Wemple’s “Top Beltway journalists cling to heinous assertion of Trump-Clinton false equivalence” at The Washington Post:

When top Beltway journalists Carol Lee of the Wall Street Journal and Jeff Mason of Reuters made the case in a USA Today op-ed that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump posed similar threats to a free and independent press, they weren’t suffering a momentary lapse of judgment. Or writing imprecisely in a rush to meet a deadline. Or some other such innocent explanation.

They meant it.

In a statement to the Huffington Post’s Michael Calderone, Lee and Mason — the outgoing and incoming presidents, respectively, of the White House Correspondents’ Association — explain what they were explaining:

“The White House Correspondents’ Association defends the First Amendment in the context of the presidency, and, as such, speaks up when a presumptive nominee from either party falls short. Our op-ed laid out legitimate and different concerns that we have about each candidate with regard to the press. We did not render a verdict on which candidate poses more of a problem; people can draw their own conclusions about that. To suggest that we were somehow presenting a “false equivalency” misses our point.

This is not about comparing one candidate with the other; it is about scrutinizing how the candidates would conduct themselves in the White House in relation to the press. We were clear in our op-ed about what concerns we have with Hillary Clinton and with Donald Trump on that specific point. We will advocate strongly for the winner in November to respect a free press based on the principles of the First Amendment, not on a scale shaped by his or her rival.”

That statement lacks one thing, which is the ring of truth.

The offending USA Today op-ed by Lee and Mason actually compared “one candidate with the other”; it actually presented “false equivalency”; it actually blurred and steamrolled the significant differences between the candidates. It’s all in these two paragraphs:

The public’s right to know is infringed if certain reporters are banned from a candidate’s events because the candidate doesn’t like a story they have written or broadcast, as Donald Trump has done.

Similarly, refusing to regularly answer questions from reporters in a press conference, as Hillary Clinton has, deprives the American people of hearing from their potential commander-in-chief in a format that is critical to ensuring he or she is accountable for policy positions and official acts.

Bolding added to highlight the smoking gun of false equivalency: that the anti-media policies of these two candidates are similar. The headline helps level the playing field, too: “Trump, Clinton both threaten free press.” As does the piece’s kicker: “Both Clinton and Trump can do better.”

The beauty of journalism is that once you’ve written a piece, you may retain the byline or even the copyright, but you don’t own the interpretations. That’s the prerogative of readers. Here, the message is clear — Clinton and Trump are co-threats to a free press in the United States. There was no effort to contextualize this message, no qualifiers, no reality check. That Lee and Mason chose to recommit themselves to a deeply flawed piece says a great deal about the catechism of “fairness” in old-line media organizations. They’re all bad, equally bad, goes the apparent thinking.

And let’s directly attack the common and facile fallback line that “people can draw their own conclusions.” Oh, no they cannot, Lee and Mason, because you two didn’t provide a comprehensive list of Trump’s and Clinton’s transgressions. You abridged the list to facilitate false equivalency. This is awful.

To recap the imbalance between Trump’s and Clinton’s approaches to the media, we’ll re-run the list of offenses cataloged in this blog’s initial post on this absurdity:

Trump campaign:

• Bashing outlet after outlet after outlet in his speeches, often using descriptors like “disgusting” and even calling one reporter a “sleaze” on national television;

• Singling out camera operators at his rallies for failing to pan the crowd. “Look at the guy in the middle. Why aren’t you turning the camera? Terrible. So terrible. Look at him, he doesn’t turn the camera. He doesn’t turn the camera,” said Trump;

• Promising to “open up” the country’s libel laws to make it easier to sue media organizations;

• Denying press credentials to various news organizations based on unfavorable coverage. They include the The Post, Politico, the Daily Beast, Univision, Fusion, the Des Moines Register and the Huffington Post;

• Expressing frustration with the media for investigating his record of charitable donations;

Suing a former campaign aide for violating a confidentiality agreement by speaking with the media;

• Hassling reporters for not staying in their designated pen at rallies;

• Boycotting a Fox News debate over vague concerns about one of its hosts;

Grabbing and pushing reporters;

• Hyping a bogus National Enquirer story that spun conspiracy theories about the father of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.);

• Failing to condemn the anti-Semitic backlash against a reporter who’d written about Trump’s wife, Melania Trump.

Clinton campaign:

• Herding media reps into a roped-off area at a New Hampshire event in 2015;

• Failing to make herself available to reporters on the campaign trail and in news-conference settings.

An alert Twitter user added to the lopsidedness:

This is a good piece, but you left “mocked a reporter’s medical condition” off the Trump list. https://twitter.com/ErikWemple/status/753680754580807680 

Some insightful comments from readers follow at the end of Wemple’s post.


Galston: Why Clinton v. Trump May Increase Voter Turnout

At Brookings William A. Galston writes about a new Pew Research Center study which indicates that voter turnout may be significantly higher than in recent years. He argues that, despite relatively low enthusiasm for the presidential candidates, the three quarters of the “voters who care a lot about the outcome…will turn out in droves to vote against the candidate they despise.”

Galston explains that, while enthusiasm for tbhe two presidential candidates is low, interest is high, with 80 percent of the poll respondents saying they have thought “quite a lot” about the election. This is the highest share measured in the past quarter century. Another 85 percent are “following the news about the presidential candidates very or fairly closely, also a quarter-century high.” And, 74 percent believe “it “really matters” who wins the election,”up from 63 percent in 2012.

Galston cautions, however, that voters dislike “the tone and substance of this year’s campaign” and there ius a 15 percent increase from 2012 in the number of voters who say the campaign is “too negative.” Further, “A record 41 percent of voters say that neither major party candidate would make a good president. This negative evaluation is more widespread for Republicans (46 percent) than for Democrats (33 percent).”

Galston queries Pew researchers about the seeming contradiction between enthusiasm and interest, and they provided him with data indicating that:

It appears that turnout can be relatively high even when voter satisfaction with the candidates is low, and vice versa. On the other hand, turnout tends to rise and fall in tandem with measures of voter interest and involvement. We would need a serious statistical analysis over a longer period of time to confirm these generalizations. Still, it is plausible that the Pew findings are pointing toward a higher turnout in 2016 than in 2012, perhaps as high as in 2008, although it is hard to be confident of that.

“In this era of high polarization,” concludes Galston, “we have become accustomed to high levels of mutual disapproval between political partisans. This year, disapproval is high within as well as between partisan ranks, setting the stage for what promises to be one of the most negative campaigns that any of us has ever experienced.”

For Democrats, the case for optimism is that voters already feel they know Trump quite well, since he dominates the news nearly every day, while Clinton still has room to re-introduce herself to swing voters who will soon be paying more attention to her ads and the presidential debates. The notion is that many swing voters who have doubts about Clinton will modify their attitudes once they witness her performance in the debates, and her more thoughtful policies and mature temperament will stand in sharp contrast to Trump’s dubious qualifications and comments.

Yet, Trump is skilled at media manipulation, and all too many members of the press are willing to comply. Democrats are going to have to outwork Republicans to insure that Clinton gets a fair hearing and that her impressive qualifications shine through her adversary’s smoke screen.


Silver’s Update: Trump’s Chances About 29 Percent

Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight post, “Election Update: Swing State Polls And National Polls Basically Say The Same Thing,” should give Dems reason for optimism, but not overconfidence. Here’s the scary graph:

Nonetheless, Trump’s overall position has improved slightly. He has a 22 percent chance to win the election according to the polls-only forecast, as compared with a 19 percent chance when we launched last Wednesday. And in polls-plus, which also accounts for economic conditions, his chances have improved to 29 percent from 26 percent.

Boo!

Yes, that’s right, Dems. One of the top analysts of political statistics rates Donald Trump’s chances of being elected President at better than one out of four and only slightly less than one out of three on the eve of the GOP convention. It could happen.

Imagine a range of unlikely, but not-out-of-the-question scenarios, like a stock market/401K meltdown, a brutal terrorist attack, Clinton hitting the banana peel, or Trump somehow starts listening to smarter advisors etc. Or a perfect storm of all of the above, and yes, it could get worse.

But don’t bet on it. Silver is not giving due consideration to unquantifiable factors like: the Democratic ad storm that is about to cover Trump with a tsunami of well-earned shame; nor the bizarre circus that the GOP convention is getting ready to present; nor the ad campaign introducing Hillary Clinton as a person of exceptional seriousness, accomplishments and actual likeability. And then there will be the debates, which will spotlight the intellect and temperament of the two candidates. Oh, and don’t forget the impressive competence and management of the Clinton campaign in stark contrast to that of her Republican rival. Weighing all of that, a Democratic landslide is far more likely than a Trump upset.

The takeaway from the rest of Silver’s nuanced analysis offers a much more optimistic picture of Clinton vs. Trump polling, and he notes that “Clinton’s state polls tell a stronger story for her than the national polls do.” Given the realities of political polarization in America, she is doing as well as could be expected in early July.

Still, shite sometimes happens. The worst thing would be for Democrats to drift into complacency and overconfidence. That’s the danger.

Instead, Democrats must create more of a sense of urgency and excitement about this election, less based on fear of Donald Trump in charge of the world’s economy and the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile than on the opportunity to secure a working majority for progressive change. We’re not likely to see a better one for a long time.

Let’s not settle for a Clinton victory and a modest Senate majority. That’s a recipe for continued gridlock and political frustration. What is needed is an explosion of grassroots Democratic activism, including  energetic voter registration, education and turnout campaigns of unprecedented intensity. For those who want a better future for their children and a better America, that’s the challenge of the hour.


Dems in Good Position to Win NC

Yesterday J. P. Green flagged a post by Sam Wang, an expert on probability statistics,  who pinpoints North Carolina as the only state he could rate a genuine toss-up at this political moment.

Today President Obama will join Hillary Clinton in Charlotte to help boost her campaign and see if they can move NC into the “leans Democratic” category. Obama won the state’s electoral votes in 2008, but lost it in 2012. In their Bloomberg.com post on the changing political views of educated white voters in the tarheel state, Margaret Talev, Jennifer Epstein and Gregory Giroux note that African Americans are expected to be about one in four NC voters in November.

Since 2012 the demographic winds have shifted in a slightly more favorable direction for NC Democrats. Perhaps even more significantly, the NC Republican establishment has made an awful mess of their prospects by cranking up hysteria on the transgender bathroom “issue” with the ‘HB2 law,’ which has cost the state significant business revenues and embarrassed NC residents.

Talev, Epstein and Giroux quote Morgan Jackson, a Raleigh consultant to the Clinton campaign, who notes the effect of the publicity and other trends favoring Clinton and the Democrats in NC, which also has a GOP governorship and Senate seat being contested:

…We are growing in a more diverse way, the electorate’s getting less and less white, and more urbanized, and more folks have college degrees. All those things are connecting together. And there’s a huge out-of-state migration into these areas. People move to where the jobs are.”

Meanwhile, Jackson said that that the HB2 law had “turned off all of suburbia” and represented “a big mistake” for Republicans. A number of artists, from Bruce Springsteen to Cirque du Soleil, nixed plans to perform in the state, while some, like Cyndi Lauper, said they would donate proceeds from their shows there to LGBT causes.

“It very quickly went from being about bathrooms, or even discrimination, to jobs and the state’s reputation nationally,” said Jackson. “Exactly the voters Trump needs to bring over not only are turned off by his rhetoric, but the water is poisoned by HB2.”

The authors also quote TDS founding editor Ruy Teixeira, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and author of major works on changing political demographics and political attitudes in the U.S., who sees Democrats making significant inroads with white educated voters: “The moment [Trump] became a serious candidate, it immediately presented itself as a hypothesis…” Further,

Texeira said Clinton isn’t expected to win a majority of the white, college-educated vote in North Carolina, and that she doesn’t have to to carry the state. He said she just needs to do better than Obama did in 2012, when he took about 30 percent of that vote. “If the minority vote’s very strong for Clinton and she can even do somewhat-less-bad among the white, college-educated vote, then that should be enough,” he said. “If she got 40 percent it’s almost a lock that she wins the state.”

The authors add that Clinton is now doing much better with white educated voters:

Recent national polls of registered voters show Clinton leading with college-educated whites, a group that Obama lost by 14 percentage points nationally in 2012 and by four points in 2008. The size of her advantage in late June varied from just one point in a Wall Street Journal-NBC News survey, to an eight-point edge in a Washington Post-ABC News poll, to 10 points in a Quinnipiac University survey.

…If the shift in the white, college-educated vote nationally holds in swing states, Texeira predicted Trump is “toast.” “Trump would have to carry the white, working class vote by something like 36 points or 40 points,” he said.

…White, college-educated voters could also help Clinton strengthen Democrats’ prospects in states like Colorado and Virginia, which rank No. 1 and No. 9, respectively, in a Bloomberg analysis of 2014 U.S. Census Bureau data that calculates the percentages of non-Hispanic whites age 25 or older who hold bachelor’s degrees or higher. They are 44.4 percent of the population in Colorado and 40.3 percent in Virginia.

The question is, can Trump offset Clinton’s inroads with educated white voters with equivalent or better performance with white voters who have less than a college education? Trump’s prospects are further diminished by Clinton’s clear edge with Latino voters in NC and other swing states.

Much depends on the respective voter turnout operations of the two campaigns. Given the signs of increasing disarray in Trump’s campaign and the impressive management displayed by the Clinton campaign, the smart money favors the Democrats.


New PPP Poll: Public Not Happy with GOP Senators/McConnell Role Blocking Supreme Court Nomination

A new Public Policy Polling survey of registered voters in six swing states — AZ, IA, NH, OH, PA and WI presents findings which are more interesting than the usual horse race polls. As the PPP memo on the surveys explains:

New Public Policy Polling surveys in 6 key battleground states where Republican Senators are up for reelection this year find that voters don’t trust Donald Trump and would rather have Barack Obama picking a new Supreme Court justice than him. As a result they overwhelmingly support hearings on Merrick Garland’s nomination to the Supreme Court, and are inclined to punish the vulnerable Republican Senators who are holding up his selection.

…-Voters in all six states, by margins ranging from 5 to 23 points, say they don’t trust Donald Trump to nominate a Supreme Court justice. Voters in WI (34% trust Trump, 57% don’t) and in the home of Judiciary Committee Chair Charles Grassley of IA (35% trust Trump, 52% don’t) are particularly skeptical of Trump’s ability to name a Justice.

That puts all of the hand-wringing about Hillary Clinton’s “trust” problem in context. Further, the memo states “voters in all six states clearly say that they *do* trust President Obama with the responsibility of making a Supreme Court selection, especially in contrast to Trump. In the key Presidential battlegrounds of Iowa, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin Obama has at least a 9 point advantage over Trump on that question in every state.

Poll respondents said they trusted Obama more than Trump for selecting the next Supreme Court justice by the following margins in each state: AZ+1; IA+10; NH+14; OH+11; PA+9; and WI +17. In addition, “More than 60% of voters in each of these states supports hearings for Garland, by margins ranging from 38 to 46 points. That includes overwhelming support from critical independent voters, and even plurality support from Republicans in 4 of the 6 states”

The PPP surveys indicate that Republican senators in these six states are in trouble — “5 of the 6 have negative approval ratings and the one exception, Chuck Grassley, still has his worst approval numbers in years with them coming in only narrowly on positive ground at 43/40. Voter unhappiness about obstructionism on the Supreme Court issue could be what flips all these toss up races into the Democratic column and gives them control of the Senate next year…”
Even better,

One other thing serving as a drag on these vulnerable Senate Republicans is the unpopularity of their leader, Mitch McConnell. McConnell’s approval rating is under 15% in all six states, and being tied to him has the potential to damage the political standing of the members of his caucus. His net approval ranges from -26 at best to -45 at worst in this set of states.

Gratifying though it is to see Mitch McConnell paying a price for his obstructionist “leadership,” there are as many as five other swing/battleground states, including FL, MI, NC, VA and ME, and some of them show close margins in the presidential contest and/or senate races.

But the margins in the six states of the PPP surveys are nonetheless impressive and indicate that the public is tiring of the GOP senate leadership’s obstruction of an exceptionally well-qualified nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. Put that together with the fallout following Speaker Ryan’s refusal to allow votes on popular gun safety measures, and the GOP looks even more like an elitist political party that thwarts the democratic process to block even moderate progress.