Hillary Clinton Selects Tim Kaine as Running Mate

[Dan '82]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/23/us/pol...37&gwt=pay

Quote:Hillary Clinton named Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia to be her running mate Friday, selecting a battleground state politician with working-class roots and a fluency in Spanish, traits that she believes can bolster her chances to defeat Donald J. Trump in November.

Mrs. Clinton’s choice, which she announced via text message to supporters, came after her advisers spent months poring over potential vice-presidential candidates who could lift the Democratic ticket in an unpredictable race against Mr. Trump...



http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/23/us/pol...37&gwt=pay

[Dan '82]

This indicates to me that Clinton is going to try and win of moderate, upper income Republicans who are turned off by Trump.

[Dan '82]

My take is that in terms of winning this election this is a good pick in the longer term I don’t think it doesn’t do much good. The Democratic Party is being run like a corporation that’s only interested in quarterly statements. Probably due to incompetence Trump is planning on doing things, like focusing on secular working class northerners that have the potential to benefit the Republican Party long term even if they are harmful this year.

[MillsT_98]

I think Hillary, by trying to play the "safe" card, is running as the "opposite" of Trump—safe, boring, predictable—the opposite of what Trump's trying to do. I wonder if that's going to work for her in the election.

[Eric the Green]

I think Hillary will need to show she can go to the left in many of her other appointments, and not do what Bill and Barack did and appoint Wall Street lawyers and executives. If she does not often go left, the Sanders wing will continue to grow, and Hillary and her wing will continue to be seen as "the Establishment." In a 4T that is a risky course to take.

But Trump picking Pence was the same strategy as Clinton picking Kaine-- the safe and boring choice. So the only one of the four of them that is not safe and boring is Trump himself.

I don't think the Trump strategy of appealing to white working/middle class men is going to work in the "long term;" not at all! I think that demographic is losing in the long term. In fact, the working class itself is going out. Workers are disappearing. There will have to be more safety nets for people that the machine does not employ, and Republicans do not offer that. Even Trump does not, although he gives lip service to infrastructure building, better trade deals and keeping social security, etc. He cannot finance those things with his severe tax cuts.

The safety net will have to be expanded in the automated and globalized future, which goes against the entire Reaganomics program of self-reliance and "government is the problem" ideology. America First is also a losing strategy, because globalization cannot be stopped; only adjusted to, and wrestled away from control by the class from which Trump comes.

[Eric the Green]

Here is our next veep campaigning with Hillary

[The Wonkette]

I pointed out in another thread that Elizabeth Warren and Corey Booker were out because as sitting senators, they would have to resign and then have their replacements appointed by the sitting Governor, who happens to be Republican.  Thus, the Senate would have a Democratic Senator replaced by a Republican.  Since the Governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, is a Democrat, the Senator replacing Kaine, should Clinton win, would be another Democrat, perhaps my Congressman Don Beyer.

[Anthony '58]

If nothing else, this cements Virginia as a blue state, in that it will mean that the Democrats will have won their fourth consecutive statewide election in the state (for President in 2012, for governor in 2013, and for the Senate in 2014).

[Eric the Green]

(07-23-2016, 07:42 AM)The Wonkette Wrote: I pointed out in another thread that Elizabeth Warren and Corey Booker were out because as sitting senators, they would have to resign and then have their replacements appointed by the sitting Governor, who happens to be Republican.  Thus, the Senate would have a Democratic Senator replaced by a Republican.  Since the Governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, is a Democrat, the Senator replacing Kaine, should Clinton win, would be another Democrat, perhaps my Congressman Don Beyer.

Warren would have been replaced in a special election, but that would have taken a few months, and MA voters can't be counted on to stay blue.

[Bob Butler 54]

(07-24-2016, 11:28 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(07-23-2016, 07:42 AM)The Wonkette Wrote: I pointed out in another thread that Elizabeth Warren and Corey Booker were out because as sitting senators, they would have to resign and then have their replacements appointed by the sitting Governor, who happens to be Republican.  Thus, the Senate would have a Democratic Senator replaced by a Republican.  Since the Governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe, is a Democrat, the Senator replacing Kaine, should Clinton win, would be another Democrat, perhaps my Congressman Don Beyer.

Warren would have been replaced in a special election, but that would have taken a few months, and MA voters can't be counted on to stay blue.

Alas, when any party has been in power long enough it can get even more corrupt than usual.  In Massachusetts, sometimes the Democrat is too entitled or too much part of The Machine.  It is sometimes seems wise to vote for the better candidate rather than the party which generally claims the platform one prefers.

The Republicans, however, don't generally last long.

[Anthony '58]

Quote:The Republicans, however, don't generally last long.

Scott Brown certainly didn't last long.