@Olivier5,
Quote:Just because you were cocksure that HRC would win doen't mean everybody had the same ironclad certainty.
Not just me, of course. It was the broad consensus. Wrong as we know.
Quote:I did relay Moore's post and express fears that Clinton was vulnerable, more likely to loose than Sanders.
We all knew Clinton has vulnerabilities (who doesn't, particularly if female) but almost everyone got the degree wrong. As to "more likely to lose than Sanders", that's a claim or assumption which I see no reason to grant credence. But you've not given answers for either 1) or 2) that would demonstrate some unique prescience on the part of anyone re election result other than Moore.
Quote:To question 3, no I haven't. Have you read anything about "The Capital in the 20th Century" by Piketty, which I advised you to look at?
I haven't read Piketty (nor other economists, it's an area of study I've chosen to forgo). Perhaps you could make some case as to how Piketty clarifies the subject at hand (the election result or specifically why Clinton was, in his theory set, a predictably losing or unacceptable candidate).
I cite that essay and Mayer's work because unless one gets familiar with the long-term project that was undertaken by influential figures on the right beginning in the early 70s and culminating now with the vast organizational structures and operations which the left is up against then any theorized solutions for the left are going to be badly in error. Unless one gets a grasp of what the Federalist Society, Heritage, Freedom Partners, Scaife, Coors, Bradley, and all the other near countless entities operating within the Koch umbrella have slowly and methodically been up to over decades, one simply cannot get a handle on barriers to modern progressive candidates. These are now deep structural factors at federal and state level.
Quote:People have been writing about "dark money" (what a selling title!) for decades. Did you read "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" by Greg Palast? It dates to 2002 and the issue was certainly not new at the time...
That derogation of Mayer's work (marketing) is both juvenile and uneducated. I have not read that particular book by Palast but I've been a fan of his work for decades (I just recommended him to another person earlier this week). But though Palast's and Mayer's work have definite points of convergence, nobody has drawn out the structural factors I am talking about at anywhere near the depth and breadth of Mayer. You really need to read that book and so does everyone else.
Quote:I think question 4 misunderstands the US election process. It is also irrelevant to anything.
The election process is understood. In fact, it is very well understood by the right wing entities of which Mayer describes and Trump's win in the states that titled the EC to him would not have happened outside of their expertise and organization in those states (and all other states as well). Trump had no ground game to speak of. That work was done partly by the RNC but in coordination with this right wing machine (who had the big money and the organizational systems in place).
And it is decidedly not irrelevant. Trump won by only 80,000 votes in three states and lost the popular vote by 3 million. Had Clinton's people properly understood that particular vulnerability and managed to organize in a manner superior to what the opposition was smartly doing, she wouldn't have lost in this ridiculously odd and peripheral way.
Sanders' supporters were passionate and that's for reasons we all understand. But I've never had indication that they grasped these barriers to success I am speaking about. And they certainly didn't have the organization means or the money to wage an effective response to what the GOP has available. Heart is important, passion is important and good intentions are important and an ethical rejection of the role of money in elections is important. But they are deeply insufficient now.
So, thanks for your response. I going to end off the discussion with you here.
