Biden Easily wins Virginia Democratic Primary

The exiting of Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar from the 2020 Democrat primary contest and their pledge of support to Joe Biden in an effort to blunt Bernie Sanders' campaign prospects seems to have worked in Virginia.  While Virginia is moving to solid blue state status, it remains a moderate Democrat state where socialism even when coupled with the term democratic does not hold strong appeal as evidenced by Biden's 20 point lead over Sanders with almost all precincts reporting. Sanders supporters claim that Sanders represents "the majority" yet his winning of only 23% of the vote argues otherwise. Only in Sanders world does 23% trump - no pun intended - the other 67% of the voters.  Sanders' inability to win even half of the Democrat vote in Virginia (even in Northern Virginia) does not bode well for his ability to win in the key Mid-West states that will likely determine who wins the Electoral College in November.  It is a reality that Sanders - who like Trump only sees what he wants to see - and his base refuse to face.  Disturbingly, Sanders will no doubt claim his drubbing in Virginia was due to a conspiracy - imagined in Sanders' mind - of billionaires, the Democrat "establishment" and CEO's.  Anybody but the 67% of voters who voted for someone else. A piece in the Washington Post looks at Biden's win in Virginia.  Here are highlights (note how some Trump supporters voted for Sanders):

RICHMOND — Former vice president Joe Biden easily won Virginia's Democratic primary Tuesday, according to unofficial early returns, with exit polling suggesting that voters mostly chose the candidate they thought had the best chance of defeating President Trump.

With most of the vote counted, Biden was far ahead of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Biden stands to gain many of the 99 delegates up for grabs in the increasingly blue state, according to unofficial returns.

In interviews with voters around Virginia, Biden emerged as a consensus pick only late in the game. Many said they settled on him after their preferred candidates dropped out. Others didn't decide until they stood in the voting booth.

But most shared one goal: "I want to get Trump out of office by all means necessary," said Josephine Stewart, 66, a cook for Richmond public schools who opted for Biden.

Virginia is still deciding its shade of blue. On Tuesday, that uncertainty followed voters to the polls, which closed at 7 p.m. with official returns expected soon after.
 In early exit polling by Edison Media Research, over half of Virginia Democratic primary voters said they would rather see the party nominate a candidate who can beat Trump, compared with about 4 in 10 who said they’d prefer a candidate who agrees with them on major issues.

About half gave Biden the best chance of winning in November, while roughly 2 in 10 said Sanders is best-positioned to beat Trump.

Across the state, polling places reported turnout slightly higher than usual. Absentee voting was up; Virginians cast nearly 54,700 votes in advance of Tuesday’s primary, up from just over 26,000 in 2016, according to the nonpartisan Virginia Public Access Project. At Yorkshire Elementary School in Manassas, Tim York cheerfully announced that he, too, chose Sanders in the open primary — in hopes of helping Trump get reelected in November.

“He’s the weakest candidate,” York, 39, said of Sanders, predicting that the senator’s calls for Medicare-for-all and free college tuition would turn off moderate voters. “I think the president has a good chance, regardless, but especially against Bernie.”

Concern that Sanders is vulnerable to Trump drove many voters to settle on Biden as the safer bet. In Henrico, Kate Giska, a 39-year-old small business owner and political independent, came to vote with her 7-year-old son. “My son’s name is Bernie, but we don’t think that Bernie is our candidate,” she said, describing Sanders as “just too extreme, just like Trump is a little too extreme. We’re kind of, like, in the middle, just, like, status quo, just get along.”

She voted for Biden, someone she thinks has appeal for “the middle voter, a candidate that can attract the masses.”

Virginia’s establishment Democrats have come out hard for Biden in the past few days. Former governor Terry McAuliffe led the charge, pumping up crowds and rallying other leaders, including Sen. Tim Kaine, Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney and Del. Lamont Bagby (D-Henrico), head of the legislature’s Black Caucus. The question playing out Tuesday was whether that grass-roots enthusiasm is broad enough for Sanders to win.

Quentin Kidd, a political scientist at Christopher Newport University, said he saw a similar phenomenon in Virginia in 2017: In the gubernatorial primary, former congressman Tom Perriello made a hard push for the Democratic nomination over then-Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam. Perriello ran to the left, tapping into a Sanders-like populism that brought him fervent support at rallies throughout the state.

But Northam wound up beating Perriello by a wide margin, with voters seeming to reward the more middle-of-the road, establishment candidate. Northam then easily defeated Republican opponent Ed Gillespie.

“Bernie may have a ceiling in Virginia,” Kidd said, because establishment Democrats still outnumber the young liberals.

My fear is that Sanders has a low ceiling in every moderate state, including the crucial Mid-West states.

A Nightmare Super Tuesday for GOP Establishment

Talking with a friend who is a political junkie like me, we both concluded that the GOP establishment is finally reaping the seeds of its own destruction that have been planted over the last several decades, commencing with the welcoming of the Christofascists into the party.  Using racism as embodied in Nixon's "Southern Strategy" and rampant homophobia as demonstrated by George W. Bush's use of anti-gay constitutional amendment ballots in 2004,  the GOP establishment courted and welcomed in  the forces now rallying to Donald trump's standard.  Almost as bad for the establishment is the fact that the universally hated Ted Cruz fared second best after trump in the Super Tuesday primary sweepstakes   A piece in the Washington Post looks at the sad state of affairs.  Here are highlights:

The window for stopping Donald Trump closed almost completely Tuesday night, leaving the demoralized anti-Trump forces with two weeks and no agreed-upon strategy for denying the New York billionaire the Republican presidential nomination.

Trump pulled out victories in seven of the 11 contests that made up the biggest single primary-caucus night of the nominating season. His remaining rivals — Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ohio Gov. John Kasich — and their allies were left to cling to the flimsiest of hopes that a reversal of his fortunes still lies on the near horizon.

For Rubio, the hope of many in the establishment, Super Tuesday turned into a super disappointment. He made a run at Trump in Virginia but fell short. Late Tuesday, he was declared the winner in the Minnesota caucuses. Still, that left his win-loss record this year at 1-14. Meanwhile, he was running third in at least half the states, and in some of those states his percentage of the vote was low enough that he was in danger of winning few or no delegates.

Despite five days of relentless attacks on Trump, which started at last week’s GOP debate in Houston and carried through a raucous weekend of campaigning, Rubio was not able to deliver significant results. He scored well among late-deciding voters; in Virginia they favored him over Trump by about 20 points. But there were not enough of them to overcome the hold Trump has on anti-establishment Republicans who remain in control of the nominating battle. 

Cruz did more than enough to argue that he should become the main challenger to Trump, carrying his home state of Texas, as he had long predicted, as well as Alaska and Oklahoma. Along with his victory in the Iowa caucuses at the beginning of last month, he remained through much of Tuesday night the only Republican who could say he had defeated the party’s front-runner anywhere.

Months ago, Cruz envisioned that Super Tuesday, with its Southern flavor, would be the day he took command of the GOP nominating contest. Instead, it was the day he managed to preserve his candidacy, although he remains at a distinct disadvantage against Trump, particularly with Rubio and Kasich still in the race.
For the GOP establishment, Super Tuesday had nightmarish qualities. Not only did Trump tighten his grip on the nomination, but the only candidate who has been able to beat him more than once so far is Cruz, the nemesis of Republican congressional leaders and what the Texas senator likes to call the “Washington cartel.” In a choice between Trump and Cruz, many who could be counted as part of that establishment would be hard-pressed to declare a preference.

What is remarkable is that the anti-Trump forces only recently awoke to the reality that Trump was on track to take the nomination. Instead, Trump has awakened a voting bloc that has soured on the party leadership. As he has continued to win, his support has continued to grow.
Trump predicted Tuesday night that establishment money will come pouring in against him over the next two weeks as he seeks knockout blows against Rubio in Florida and Kasich in Ohio. Up to now, that opposition has been scattered and inconsistent. They are loading up now for what could be one last effort to prevent something unimaginable to them when this campaign began.

Meanwhile, conservative columnist Jennifer Rubin recommends that Republicans get used to the idea of Hillary Clinton in the White House in a Post column.  Here are excerpts:

As the Republican Party’s future seemed to evaporate before its eyes, Republicans might, tonight, have been more interested than usual in what Hillary Clinton, who swept six states, had to say on Super Tuesday. Chances are, barring a miraculous turnaround in one of the races or an FBI indictment, we will be seeing quite a lot of her over the next few years. Republicans should come away with a few insights:

1. Her speech-making abilities are still not on a par with many politicians, but she has improved. Her voice is more modulated, and her message is more coherent than it has ever been.

2. Her message has been handed to her on a silver (Trump-engraved platter): “It’s clear that the stakes in this election have never been higher. And the rhetoric we’re hearing on the other side has never been lower,” she said. She continued, “If we resist the forces trying to drive us apart, we can come together to make this country work for everyone.” Just a few months ago this would seem cynical, disingenuous coming from such a polarizing figure who too often demonizes her opponents. Now, who can disagree with her call for more “kindness” and her rebuke that America never stopped being great?

3. She will have the advantage, as she did tonight in pivoting to a broad-based message that will appeal to independents and liberal Republicans while satisfying her own liberal base. “Instead of building walls, we’re going to break down barriers and build ladders of opportunity and empowerment so every American can live up to his or her potential,” she said. That rather vague but feel-good message will win over plenty of voters.

4. As Republicans battle tooth and nail for the nomination and for the future of the party, Clinton will be the beneficiary. With Republican anger (properly) directed at Trump and frustration building over which of the GOP candidates should get out, she can begin to repair her own reputation. She will likely have some success — unless the FBI rains on her parade.

5. With Trump in his victory speech still prattling on about the wall, Clinton sets up a contrast that politicians can only dream of enjoying: Sanity vs. lunacy, reason vs. irrationality and decency vs. mendacity.

6. Clinton is no longer the candidate most likely to abuse power or threaten her adversaries. Most voters, Republicans especially, shiver when Trump observes, as he did Tuesday night of the speaker of the House: “I’m sure I’m going to get along with him, and if I don’t, he’s going to pay a big price.” No wonder Trump swoons over Vladimir Putin.

7. As Trump — the most divisive figure in American politics in my lifetime — declares, “I am a unifier. I would love to see the Republican Party and everybody get together and unify,” one can almost hear Clinton laughing — not the phony laugh that grates, but a deep and sincere belly laugh. Yes, she’s in all likelihood going to have the last laugh in this campaign.

The GOP establishment brought all of this nightmare on itself.  I cannot summon up a shred of sympathy for the plight they now face.  The goal is to see the GOP routed in defeat in November.

Hillary Clinton Wins in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia

With the results in Massachusetts, Minnesota and Colorado still out, Hillary Clinton has racked up decisive wins in a number of states making the path to the nomination far more difficult for Bernie Sanders.  In Virginia, Clinton's victory was by 29 percentage points.  Her wins in some states in the Deep South were even more striking.  Only in his home state of Vermont did Sanders turn in a landslide result.  Politico looks at the results so far.  Here are excerpts:

This is the day Hillary Clinton has longed for.  The former secretary of state, who's struggled in two presidential elections to coalesce the Democratic Party behind her, notched decisive wins across the South Tuesday night on her way to a potentially prohibitive lead in the primary contest against Bernie Sanders. Clinton was announced the winner in Georgia, Virginia, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas and Texas as soon as polls closed. Sanders won Oklahoma and his home state of Vermont.

A cheerful Clinton made clear she's already eyeing a general election match up against Donald Trump, who was posting a similarly dominant night on the Republican side.

"We know we’ve got work to do. But that work, that work is not to make American great again," she said to an audience of supporters in Florida, invoking Trump's famous slogan. "We have to make America whole. We have to fill in — fill in what’s been hollowed out."

"The stakes of this election have never been higher. And the rhetoric we’re hearing on the other side has never been lower," she continued.

Sanders delivered a rally-the-troops speech after clinching his home state of Vermont. Saying he stood to rack up hundreds of delegates during the night, he urged his backers to ignore the impending string of statewide defeats and pledged to remain in the race into June.

Clinton's wins in the South were powered by overwhelming support from African-Americans, who helped her deliver a similar drubbing in South Carolina last week. Sanders' inability to make inroads with the black community could ultimately sink his underdog campaign.

Even as polls were closing, Democrats began envisioning Sanders' role in the race after Clinton cuts off his path to the nomination. "He didn’t start off, in my view, thinking he was going to be the Democratic nominee," David Axelrod, a former aide to President Barack Obama, said on CNN. 

Axelrod said Sanders was likely to remain in the race to drive issues he staked his candidacy on, like economic inequality. "He has done that and he will continue to do that."

Sanders' goal was to emerge from Super Tuesday with a viable comeback path. But it's unclear how he envisions proceeding from here. His team has sketched a strategy that involves running up margins in the predominantly white states that have responded better to his message. He's hoping to rattle off wins in the weeks ahead in friendlier territory — Nebraska, Kansas and Maine, which are next on the calendar.

There are signs that Clinton has already turned her attention toward the general election and a potential matchup with Trump, who's poised to have a similarly dominant day on the Republican side. In a potential preview of a campaign against him, Clinton focused her victory speech in South Carolina on countering Trump's message, saying "America has never stopped being great" and that the country could use "more love and kindness."

Whether Clinton gets to maintain her focus on Trump will largely depend on whether she can notch a solid enough delegate lead to put Sanders in the rear view mirror. Though all of the Democratic contests award delegates proportionally — ensuring Sanders won't come away empty-handed — big wins by Clinton would put him in a deep hole in the battle to secure 2,383 delegates and the nomination.

Will Gay Men Deliver Today for Hillary Clinton

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In this political season, the number of polls and who is conducting them is proliferating.  Now, the dating/hook up app Scruff indicates that it polled its gay male users as to which of the Democrat presidential candidates they will be supporting.  The findings?  From the 15,000 app users surveyed, Hillary Clinton is the clear favorite with more than double Sanders’ support.  Indeed, she would win the gay vote in every Super Tuesday state other than Sanders' home state of Vermont.  The Bilerico Project has details.  Here are highlights:

As Senator Bernie Sanders and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton battle it out for the Democrat presidential nomination, Super Tuesday is seen as a make-or-break moment for the Sanders campaign. Sanders, who has surged in popularity over the past few months, has to do well in the 11 states holding primary elections today.

According to a new unscientific poll of Scruff users released last week, Clinton is the clear favorite of gay men who use the app. Clinton’s support is more than double Sanders’ and she would win the gay vote in every Super Tuesday state except for Sanders’ home state of Vermont. The poll surveyed nearly 15,000 Scruff users in the United States.

63% of respondents indicated they prefer Clinton over Sanders who garnered 31%. Nine times as many respondents (72%) identify as Democrats as versus the 8% who affiliate with Republicans.

While the limits of the poll are obvious since the hookup app only polled gay men who use their service, it’s still worth a second look. Why would respondents so clearly choose Clinton over Sanders by a larger margin than the general population?

While Clinton has a mixed history on LGBT issues, in recent years she’s become a champion of LGBT rights. Formerly opposed to same-sex marriage, she has now “evolved” on the issue and has always supported LGBT nondiscrimination protections. As Secretary of State, she famously declared that “gay rights are human rights” in a speech to the United Nations and pushed for greater acceptance of LGBT people worldwide.

Sanders has also been a supporter of LGBT rights including voting against the Defense of Marriage Act, so why are voters turning toward Clinton?

While Clinton has become linked to President Obama’s push for LGBT rights, Sanders has remained a relative unknown to the gay community. With a focus on income inequality, Sanders’ record on LGBT issues hasn’t been forefront in his campaign. Clinton, however, has been actively courting the gay vote for years and her publicity for facing down homophobic world leaders has kept her in the queer media. Until the presidential primary, Sanders has barely registered in the LGBT community.

The Southernization and Dumbing Down of the Republican Party

Having lived in the South now for well over 40 years, I know first hand that at times the region is like one huge insane asylum, or perhaps more specifically, it is inhabited by those who suffer from wholesale bi-polar disorder.  On the one hand, many people can be charming and hospitable yet in the next moment show themselves to be racists and/or ignorance embracing evangelical Christians consumed by hatred of gays, liberals, non-whites, and anyone they deem "other."  Once the South came into the GOP tent, that inherent insanity slowly and steadily took control of the party, driving sane and rational people out as they could no longer stand the hypocrisy and ugliness that the "godly folk" personify.  Making matters worse, the primary calendar increasingly has allowed the ugliest elements in the South to have a disproportionate role in shaping the type of GOP candidate that can obtain an early lead in the nomination process.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at this growing problem.  Here are excerpts:

Southernization is a special problem for Republicans because their Southern supporters tend to be far more socially conservative than the rest of the party or the country. Southern politics is also more deeply polarized around race, giving backlash candidates a leg up. The GOP’s slide rightward creates electoral difficulties for it in presidential elections and is the central factor in Washington’s inability to find consensus on much of anything.

True, the whole carnival starts in Iowa, which is as Midwestern as you can get. But the caucus system gives more conservative Iowa Republicans an outsize influence because white evangelicals play a disproportionate role in what is a relatively low-turnout contest.

It is to the evangelicals’ credit as democratic citizens that they organize, mobilize and participate. But their civic virtuousness only makes the final result less reflective of opinion in the party, in Iowa itself and elsewhere.

New Hampshire comes next, and its voters frequently reach verdicts at odds with those Iowa renders. This means that South Carolina often plays a tie-breaking role on the GOP side. Talk about shifting the dialogue right: The site of the opening skirmish of the Civil War is not only one of the most conservative states in the nation; it is also one of our most racially divided polities. 

All of 1 percent of this year’s Palmetto State Republican primary voters were African American, according to a network exit poll — yes, 1 percent. Some 96 percent were white.

[N]ow we confront Super Tuesday. It includes primaries in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. Yes, this Southern-fried, hickory-smoked mix is leavened by primaries in Massachusetts and Vermont, caucuses in Colorado and Minnesota, and, on the Republican side, a “preference poll” in Alaska. But there’s a reason the day is often called the “SEC primary,” after the Southeastern college sports conference.

The Dixiefied calendar is now an issue in Republican presidential maneuvering, with the possibility that the Midwest would be further disenfranchised. Republican honchos may have presided over a party that “brought to life” and “fed” the “Frankenstein monster” they see in Donald Trump, as Robert Kagan wrote in The Post recently. Never mind. The feckless establishmentarians now have the temerity to tell Ohio Gov. John Kasich that he should do his part in their belated anti-Trump operation by dropping out in support of Florida Sen. Marco Rubio — even though Rubio has yet to win a single primary.

High-minded thinkers regularly bemoan the sharp polarization of American politics and wring hands earnestly over why this has come to pass. One of the principal causes is the Southernization of Abraham Lincoln’s party, and our primary process makes it only harder for those who would reverse the trend.

White Supremacists Endorse Trump Who Panders to the KKK

Ever since Richard Nixon and his advisers formulated the "Southern Strategy" in the 1960's to take advantage of southern white opposition to desegregation, the Republican Party has pandered to racists, typically through winks and nods and dog whistle messaging.  Not any more, now Donald Trump is embracing white supremacists and fanning racial hatred and division in a way not seen since the mid 1960's. The result is that white supremacist groups are endorsing Trump and running robo calls supporting his candidacy. As Huffington Post reports, the white supremacists are pulling out the stops from their new fuhrer, Donald Trump.  Worse yet, Trump is doing little to distance himself from these purveyors of hate. Here are highlights:

As the Republican presidential primary moves into the American south, white supremacist groups are working to mobilize racists to get out the vote for Donald Trump.

On Wednesday, David Duke, the white nationalist and former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard, encouraged his radio show listeners to volunteer for Trump's campaign. "Call Donald Trump’s headquarters [and] volunteer," he said on the "David Duke Radio Program." At Trump campaign offices, he said, "you’re gonna meet people who are going to have the same kind of mindset that you have.”

In Minnesota and Vermont, a white supremacist super PAC called the American National Super PAC has begun circulating a robocall in support of Trump.

"The white race is dying out in America and Europe because we are afraid to be called 'racist,' says William Johnson, the leader of the white nationalist American Freedom Party. He goes on to bemoan "gradual genocide against the white race," and how few "schools anymore have beautiful white children as the majority." He signs off by telling recipients, "Don’t vote for a Cuban. Vote for Donald Trump."

But Trump's response to the white supremacists backing him is hardly enough to put them off, said Mark Potok, senior fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit that monitors hate groups. "Trump has 'quote unquote' repudiated these groups, but only in the most milquetoast way imaginable," Potok said in an interview. "The fact is that white nationalists are mobilizing for Trump whether he likes it or not."

Trump's habit of retweeting messages posted by white supremacists, sharing them with his 6.4 million Twitter followers, hasn't helped matters.  

Like Johnson, Duke framed the GOP primary as a contest between Trump and two people of color, Sens. Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Ted Cruz (Texas). “Voting for these people, voting against Donald Trump at this point is really treason to your heritage,” Duke said Wednesday.

 A piece in Crooks and Liars looks at Trump's failure to disavow groups such as the KKK.  Here are excerpts: 

Jake Tapper actually did ask the GOP front runner, Donald Trump, about his support from white supremacist groups and former KKK grand wizard, David Duke on this Sunday's State of the Unionon CNN.

Good for Tapper, but what we got in response was basically the Sgt. Schultz from Hogan's Heroes excuse:

TRUMP: Well, just so you understand, I don't know anything about David Duke, okay? I don't know anything about what you're even talking about with white supremacy or white supremacists. So, I don't know, I mean, I don't know. Did he endorse me or what's going on? Because, you know, I know nothing about David Duke. I know nothing about white supremacists and so you're asking me a question that I'm supposed to be talking about people that I know nothing about. […]

Well, I'd have to look at the group. I mean, I don't know what group you're talking about. You wouldn't want me to condemn a group that I know nothing about. I'd have to look. . . . . I don't know anything... honestly, I don't know David Duke. I don't believe I've ever met him. I'm pretty sure I didn't meet him. I just don't know anything about him.

Trump claims he's got such a wonderful memory. It's amazing how it seems to have failed him now, isn't it? He knows full well he needs the support from those racists if he's going to win in the south. He's not about to disavow them before the primary is over.

New York Post Endorses Obama

While the New York Post is generally no friend to liberal politics and I often disagree with its editorial views, in its endorsement it hits upon precisely what I see to be the issues as to why Hillary Clinton should NOT be the Democrat nominee. The Posts views pretty much mirror my own whether Hillary fully deserves all the criticisms or not. Here are highlights from the Post (http://www.nypost.com/php/pfriendly/print.php?url=http://www.nypost.com/seven/01302008/postopinion/editorials/post_endorses_barack_obama_813218.htm):

We urge them to choose Obama - an untried candidate, to be sure, but preferable to the junior senator from New York. Obama represents a fresh start. His opponent, and her husband, stand for déjà vu all over again - a return to the opportunistic, scandal-scarred, morally muddled years of the almost infinitely self-indulgent Clinton co-presidency. Does America really want to go through all that once again?

It will - if Sen. Clinton becomes president. That much has become painfully apparent. Bill Clinton's thuggishly self-centered campaign antics conjure so many bad, sad memories that it's hard to know where to begin. Suffice it to say that his Peck's-Bad-Boy smirk - the Clinton trademark - wore thin a very long time ago. Far more to the point, Sen. Clinton could have reined him in at any time. But she chose not to - which tells the nation all it needs to know about what a Clinton II presidency would be like.

Now, Obama is not without flaws. And, again, he is not Team Clinton. That counts for a very great deal. A return to Sen. Clinton's cattle-futures deal, Travelgate, Whitewater, Filegate, the Lincoln Bedroom Fire Sale, Pardongate - and the inevitable replay of the Monica Mess? No, thank you.