#WhichHillary - It begins again as Hillary ducks California debates.

[pinebox]

It would appear that Hillary's words pretty much don't mean spit.

[morningfog]

1. It's always the same Hillary: the one that will most enrich and benefit her AT THAT MOMENT.

[NewImproved Deal]

2. From Goldwater Girl to Goldman Sachs shill...

[link:|

[floriduck]

3. If she can't or won't debate, how will she deal with Trump and/or difficult foreign leaders?

I'm not sure David Brock and paid posters will be able to have much effect on foreigners.

[Tarc]

4. What's the point of a debate when the result of the primary is no longer in doubt?

I'm sure the people of California have better uses of their time and tax dollars than to host a debate that will have no effect on the election.

[jeff47]

5. The point is keeping your word. Which is rather important when polls show you are not trusted. (nt)

[CrowCityDem]

6. Like how Bernie gave his word he would release multiple years of taxes?

[jeff47]

9. Sanders is not the one who is polling as untrustworthy.

Clinton is. Thus it is really, really stupid for Clinton to go back on her word yet again.

She risks basically nothing by going to the debate. By saying "nevermind!", she emphasizes that she will say whatever is expedient in the moment, and then do whatever she wants later. That is precisely why polls show her as not trusted.

It also hurts her efforts to reconcile with Sanders supporters, since it's yet more evidence that any promises she makes to placate them will not be honored.

It's almost as dumb as interrupting the firestorm over the letter the Republicans wrote to Iran in order to remind everyone about her emails.

[CrowCityDem]

10. So not a word about Bernie lying to you, me, and everyone else?

[jeff47]

15. Why? It's not relevant.

This isn't a Clinton vs Sanders problem. Remember how you guys already declared victory?

It's a problem for the general election.

[CrowCityDem]

34. You just said keeping your word matters. Is that only for Hillary?

[jeff47]

36. You declared victory, remember?

Were you wrong when you declared victory? 'Cause the only way Sanders is relevant is if Clinton hasn't won yet.

So which would you like:
1) Clinton has won.
2) Sanders is relevant.

Pick one, 'cause they're mutually exclusive.

[Matt_in_STL]

55. She can ask about it at the debate. Great idea!

[YouDig]

16. So it's OK for him not keep his word? It's about polls, not integrity then.

[jeff47]

21. You guys already declared victory, remember?

Sanders isn't relevant to the problem this creates for Clinton in the general election.

[YouDig]

26. But only Sanders people think this creates a problem in the general election.

Nobody else thinks there's any point debating when the primaries are over.

[jeff47]

31. First, you need those Sanders people in the general election.

So demonstrating you will lie to them is not a good idea. Kinda hard to promise them anything when you keep demonstrating you will lie to them.

Second, polling shows "untrustworthy" as Clinton's biggest problem. And believe it or not, not all pollsters are Sanders supporters.

Finally, the debate is, at worst, a free campaign ad.

This decision basically has no real upside for Clinton, and lots of downsides.

[YouDig]

40. There are downsides to debating.

The biggest is that it gives Bernie a platform to attack her.
If she fires back, she risks angering his supporters, if she doesn't she looks weak.
For example, the discussion we just had, I asked about Bernie's taxes, and you said he doesn't need to impress anyone for the general election. Which is true, but debating against someone who can go all offense because he's not actually a viable candidate anymore is a very one-sided thing.

Also it distracts her from going after Trump.

Sure, there are upsides too, but don't pretend there's no downside.

[jeff47]

45. Those downsides aren't going to affect the outcome.

The biggest is that it gives Bernie a platform to attack her.
If she fires back, she risks angering his supporters, if she doesn't she looks weak.

So, you think Trump will be a kindly gentlemen, or perhaps some more practice would be helpful?

Also, please cite any vicious Sanders attacks that significantly damaged Clinton in the general election.

Also it distracts her from going after Trump.

Why? She can tailor all her responses to be anti-Trump.

Believe it or not, a candidate who can't walk and chew gum is not a good thing.

Sure, there are upsides too, but don't pretend there's no downside.

There is no downside that will affect the primary, and it gives Clinton a free anti-Trump platform.

Heck, if she was clever, she could use the debate to start fence-mending with Sanders supporters.

[YouDig]

57. You really don't understand the difference between attacks from the left and from the right?

This is basic stuff. Of course Trump will attack her, he's Trump. Attacks from Bernie are more harmful, because he's at least perceived as being on the side of the Democrats.

[joshcryer]

50. CTR needs to get their shit together.

Clinton will do the debate and fueling the narrative that she won't or that it's good that she won't just shows out how of touch you guys are.

[joshcryer]

49. There's literally nothing at this point she can do to change that status.

She'll do the debate, and people like you will say she was dragged in to it or she flip flopped or some such absurdities, even though she never said she wasn't going to do it. Innuendos and lies from the Moonie Times perpetuated and reposted around the net for no good reason. So there's that.

In reality she has not ducked or even so much as threatened to duck a debate since this damn thing began. Not once. She's gone to every single one of them. But she's still untrustworthy. That status she cannot shed. Because you will always and forever find a reason to make up some bullshit rhetoric to make her out to be some evil corrupt individual.

[HooptieWagon]

33. Where's the Goldman-Sachs speech transcripts?

[Tarc]

22. We have better things to do with our time, e.g. Trump.

[jeff47]

24. And to defeat him, you're going to need to shore up that "untrustworthy" problem.

She risks basically nothing by going to the debate. Heck, it's a free campaign ad.

By going back on her word, she hurts that "untrustworthy" number. She also makes it harder to placate Sanders supporters, because it yet again demonstrates she will say whatever is expedient now, and do whatever she wants later. Which means Sanders supporters are less likely to trust any promises she makes to placate them.

[Tarc]

37. I think on some issues here, we're in "suck it up, buttercup" mode

So, sorry. Debate season's over.

[jeff47]

47. Which will cause you to lose.

Convincing people to not vote for Trump is not the same as convincing them to vote for Clinton.

[Tarc]

52. I think we'll be fine, thanks

The DU Bernie contingent is not representative of the whole. You holdouts are a statistical insignificance.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

13. Tax dollars ? Lol.

[hootinholler]

14. Yeah! Fuck California Voters!

It's all wrapped up no need to go vote for Hillary in Ca!

You are full of awesome!

[Tarc]

20. It's called a calendar. Look it up.

Sometimes elections are wrapped up before the last states vote, too bad. California was a Super Tuesday state in 2008, why did they move back to June?

[hootinholler]

23. It's called Hubris

Look it up.

[TransitJohn]

38. Tax dollars?

[timmymoff]

7. They love their little lying Goldwater Girl

So another lie won't matter.

[virtualobserver]

8. there are not enough arrows on the #WhichHillary icon

[xynthee]

11. Didn't she promise to debate him in May?

I'm pretty sure it was part of the arrangement. I can't believe she'd go back on her word!! :

[jeff47]

18. Yep. Which is why this is a really, really dumb move by the Clinton campaign.

Her greatest weakness is polls show people do not trust her. Going back on her word to avoid a debate that is very unlikely to change the result hurts that yet again.

Even worse, it demonstrates that any promises she makes to Sanders supporters to placate them are unlikely to be honored.

[xynthee]

41. Maybe Bernie should break a few promises himself!!

It seems only fair! I could forgive him!!

[libdem4life]

12. Problem with this is that for the first time in a long time,

California voters matter. I'm not sure how this will go down, but for whatever reason (she's winning or internals dismal) it's a flip-off.

[apnu]

19. Hillary needs around 92 PDs to close this thing right?

There are 475 delegates in California. Even if Bernie wins 75% of them, Hillary will net 118, pushing her to victory.

And there are other states still to primary as well.

[jeff47]

25. Nope.

At least, if you want to only include pledged delegates. She basically has to win every remaining contest about 85-15 to get enough pledged delegates. So she's not going to clinch that way.

[apnu]

27. Well the Democratic party nomination isn't decided by PDs alone

We can't pick and choose what to include or not include.

The Democratic Party uses pledged delegates and super delegates in total. Of that total, right now, what is Hillary's magic number?

[jeff47]

35. I'm aware. It will just be the first time since superdelegates were created

that they cast the deciding vote.

That's not a strong position to be going into the general election.

[apnu]

39. How can you say that? This isn't over.

This year, there are 4051 PDs. Hillary has 1771 of them, which is 44% right now. Bernie has 1499 of them which is 37%.

It is still very possible that Hillary will win a majority of PDs in the end. There are 475 PDs up for grabs in California and there's a 272 PD difference between Clinton and sanders. If Cali is a 50-50 split, Bernie is no better than he is now, as each candidate would net 237.5 PDs.

We won't know if Bernie will win the majority of PDs from here on out. We are waiting on Montana, Arizona, New Jersey, and the Dakotas too.

Bernie must have blow outs by 30 points in all the states remaining at this point to overcome Hillary in the PD count. The odds of that are very small.

This thing is going to come down to the wire, we have to wait and see. I'm OK with it going on till the last state and territory.

[jeff47]

43. Because of the math you left out of your post.

What percentage of the remaining pledged delegates does Clinton need to win the nomination using only pledged delegates?

WAAAAAAAAAY higher than the roughly even splits we've been seeing. And losing OR by about 10 just set her back even further.

So unless you're prepared to claim Clinton is going to start winning 90-10ish, she's not going to get enough pledged delegates to win the nomination using only pledged delegates. So she will need superdelegates to win the nomination.

IIRC, that hasn't happened since superdelegates were created (they first appeared in the 1984 election).

Which means Clinton has a lot more fence-mending to do than any Democratic nominee since 1984 - all the others could point to their pledged delegate lead to help bring their primary opponent's supporters to heel. She won't have that. She'll only be able to say "the lobbyists we made superdelegates picked me". That's really, really, really unhelpful when the people you're trying to woo utterly hate the money and corruption in our current politics.

And fence-mending is not something Clinton does well. Or at all.

As I said a year ago, Clinton is a very dangerous candidate for our party.

[apnu]

48. Why do you keep insisting only PDs to win?

"What percentage of the remaining pledged delegates does Clinton need to win the nomination using only pledged delegates?"

Your question suggests that Hillary must win the magic number using PDs only. You can't do that in math. Either we talk about PD totals and PD totals only or we talk about Superd's and those totals, or a grand total of both.

It is illogical and irrational to talk about pledged delegates against the grand total.

Is that what you're doing? I'm confused.

But you want math? I love math, so I'm happy to answer your question about remaining percentage of pledged delegates.

All numbers from wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries,_2016#Schedule_and_results

4051 -- total pledged delegates for 2016 (it changes over the years)
2026 -- half of the pledged delegates (2025.5 is half, so I rounded up to 2026)
1771 -- Hillary's current PD count, as of today
1499 -- Bernie' current PD count
272 -- H v D difference. Hillary leads. (1771 - 1499)
255 -- Hillary's remaining PDs needed to reach 2026 (2026 - 1771)
527 -- Bernie's remaining PDs needed to reach 2026 (2026 - 1499)

Remaining pledged delegates:
Virgin Is. -- 7
Peurto Rico -- 60
California -- 475
Montana -- 21
New Jersey -- 126
New Mexico -- 34
North Dakota -- 18
South Dakota -- 20
DC -- 20
total 781

Now we can calculate what percentage of what Hillary and Bernie need to win the pledged delegate count.

Hillary: (255/781)*100 = 32.65%
Bernie: (527/781)*100 = 67.48%

[joshcryer]

53. There weren't enough delegates in 2008 either.

We've been down this road before.

[libdem4life]

32. I wasn't responding to delegate count. I mentioned that as a potential

excuse...Thanks, California, but I got this and can't afford to show up. You know, Trump and all.

[Waiting For Everyman]

17. He should just have a town hall of his own.

I like those better anyway. I don't want to watch her again, but I know Bernie wants some tv exposure in CA. A town hall would do nicely, better in fact.

[merrily]

28. #WhichHillaryLostMe

[frylock]

58. lol!

[ucrdem]

29. Begins again, LOL. It's been running since 1992.

[Duckhunter935]

30. Love that #whichHillary logo

[LenaBaby61]

42. She's not the one whose behind...

So she doesn't have to debate IMHO.

I'd say the same thing if the shoe were on the other foot.

Besides, who'd want to fool with Fox News who per THEIR latest polling, have BOTH Hillary Clinton & Bernie Sanders losing ground to Trump in the GE, which I don't believe for one minute.

But, that Fox methodology of polling

[nc4bo]

44. So which Hillary made the deal? I mean many of us know she fibs....ALOT

Why let the whole world in on it if you don't have to

[joshcryer]

46. She never fucking said she wasn't going to debate.

And of course when she does, because she has not actually ducked a debate since this thing started, people will say she flipped flopped.

[eastwestdem]

51. She's already won, why on earth would she debate and put any more time and effort into the primary?

Makes no sense on any level.

[oberliner]

54. Bernie Sanders: "It would be hypocritical of me to run as a Democrat...

because of the things I have said about the party."

Since we are playing the quote game.

[Jester Messiah]

56. Ah, homophones. Good for a laugh. n/t