Democrat Demolition Derby, Redux

[GregShaw]

Are you allowed to hunt deer with 5.56?

Depends on the state. In the past UT didn't allow it, but they changed requirements sometime to make it legal. Not a good idea for muleys, but smaller deer elsewhere it is barely adequate with good bullets/ammo

[JWB]

AR-16

[GregShaw]

AR-16

I can excuse that, after all M16 = AR-15, the 'clips' is less excusable, magazine != clip.

[shep854]

John F'in Kerry (did you know he served in Vietnam?) stumping for Joe Biden:

 

"There’s not a veteran here who would take an AR-16 with a long clip to go out and shoot a deer or shoot anything”

 

https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1223961063043018753?s=09

Obviously Mr Heinz still doesn't spend time with grass-roots vets.

[lucklucky]

Seems to have happened a disaster. First the Des Moines poll hidden, i bet the poll company will not be not fired, they just had the wrong results ....

 

Buttigieg campaign got word that at least one survey respondent had been read an incomplete questionnaire that did not include Buttigieg’s name. “While this appears to be isolated to one surveyor, that could not be confirmed with certainty,” the executive editor of the paper wrote, and acting with an abundance of caution, they declined to release the poll at all.

 

 

Nevertheless, a tweet made the rounds that night purporting to give the poll’s results, and after doing some reporting around this, FiveThirtyEight can confirm that it contains the correct final findings of the unreleased Iowa poll: Sanders 22 percent, Warren 18 percent, Buttigieg 16 percent, Biden 13 percent. Imagine the news cycle that would have been, with national front-runner Biden making such a poor showing in the last, highest-profile poll before the caucuses.

It should be noted that Selzer and Co., the pollster in charge of the Iowa Poll, has an A+ on our FiveThirtyEight Pollster Rating. You can read my 2016 profile of Ann Selzer here.

 

 

As if every poll there are not mistakes.

 

https://fivethirtyeight.com/live-blog/iowa-caucus-2020-election-live/#254963

 

 

Now the Iowa primary results stuck in limbo. Strange Banana Democracy things happening...

[Murph]

The Democrats could F**k up a wet dream, they blew the Iowa Caucuses. Incompetent Communist morons. https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-inconsistencies-found-in-democrat-iowa-caucus-reporting-conspiracies-explode

 

[media][/media]

[Panzermann]

 

Are you allowed to hunt deer with 5.56?

Depends on the state. In the past UT didn't allow it, but they changed requirements sometime to make it legal. Not a good idea for muleys, but smaller deer elsewhere it is barely adequate with good bullets/ammo

 

 

Also what is called deer in CONUS is smaller than in Europe. A whitetail is more european roe sized.

 

 

 

 

John F'in Kerry (did you know he served in Vietnam?) stumping for Joe Biden:

 

"There’s not a veteran here who would take an AR-16 with a long clip to go out and shoot a deer or shoot anything”

 

https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1223961063043018753?s=09

Obviously Mr Heinz still doesn't spend time with grass-roots vets.

 

 

Well, I would take a shorter magazine to not get hung up on brush.

 

 

 

Ehrm wasn't the AR-16 the .308 variant of the AR-18?

 

 

---

 

 

 

 

Now the Iowa primary results stuck in limbo. Strange Banana Democracy things happening...

 

Dole bananas?

[BansheeOne]

I see lawsuits over election results even before the campaign for the main event begins this time.

[DKTanker]

And the winner of the Democratic Party Iowa Caucus is.....wait for it.....Donald J. Trump.

[Der Zeitgeist]

Can someone explain to me the strange obsession with using technology for election purposes in the US?

Why even use an App for vote counting? Why use voting machines at all?

 

Over here, paper ballots that are hand counted worked pretty well for the past 70 years, and there doesn't seem much incentive to add unnecessary levels of technology into the mix.

[Stuart Galbraith]

Well you have to look at what happened in 2000. It doesnt seem so much the method of voting, as the people managing the entire process, ie, fucking idiots.

[Der Zeitgeist]

Well you have to look at what happened in 2000. It doesnt seem so much the method of voting, as the people managing the entire process, ie, fucking idiots.

 

In 2000, you had election workers use magnifying glasses to scrutinize "hanging chads" on punched card ballots. Again, a layer of technology for vote counting that adds additional uncertainty.

 

The question I'm asking is why even use stuff like that at all. Just use paper ballots and a pen. No hanging chads there.

Edited February 4, 2020 by Der Zeitgeist

[shep854]

'Voter disenfranchisement'...

[Ssnake]

Russian 1337 H4XX0RZ steal Democracy again, Iowan women hardest hit.

[Soren Ras]

 

Well you have to look at what happened in 2000. It doesnt seem so much the method of voting, as the people managing the entire process, ie, fucking idiots.

 

In 2000, you had election workers use magnifying glasses to scrutinize "hanging chads" on punched card ballots. Again, a layer of technology for vote counting that adds additional uncertainty.

 

The question I'm asking is why even use stuff like that at all. Just use paper ballots and a pen. No hanging chads there.

 

 

Which is what a lot of people have been saying all along. Paper works. It is practically impossible to hack/cheat in significant numbers without massive manpower which cannot be done unnoticed, and you have an audit trail.

 

It's a nobrainer. And yet for some reason many states keep trying tech fixes that invariably are worse.

 

--

Soren

[Jeff]

What a cluster. Tom Perez has been a disaster for the DNC but he's reliable to the establishment and checks the diversity box. Now, when Bernie wins, it'll be a nothingburger because everyone will be talking about New Hampshire (which Bernie will probably win). I laughed my ass off at all of the news channels and their wall to wall coverage of....nothing. All they could do was jibber jabber at each other about nothing while trying to make it sound exciting. All they had to do was run a caucus like they've done dozens of times before and they couldn't do it. Meanwhile, Trump who was basically unopposed, had 2X the people show up as Obama did in 2012.

[Brasidas]

 

 

Well you have to look at what happened in 2000. It doesnt seem so much the method of voting, as the people managing the entire process, ie, fucking idiots.

 

In 2000, you had election workers use magnifying glasses to scrutinize "hanging chads" on punched card ballots. Again, a layer of technology for vote counting that adds additional uncertainty.

 

The question I'm asking is why even use stuff like that at all. Just use paper ballots and a pen. No hanging chads there.

Which is what a lot of people have been saying all along. Paper works. It is practically impossible to hack/cheat in significant numbers without massive manpower which cannot be done unnoticed, and you have an audit trail.

 

It's a nobrainer. And yet for some reason many states keep trying tech fixes that invariably are worse.

 

--

Soren

The harder you make elections to steal, the more expensive it becomes to do the deed. The democratic party truly believes in distributing wealth, so you'd think they would put a system in place that a couple of neckbeards taking a break from Pornhub could accomplish in a night versus a manpower intensive country election board buyout. *shrug*

[Jeff]

Why the Iowa voting fiasco matters

The Democratic party looks incompetent, and public trust in election integrity has been further eroded

Charles Lipson

 

The Monday night caucuses were the biggest moment in four years for Iowa Democratic party. They screwed it up beyond belief. They had one task: to produce timely, accurate, and reliable vote totals, and they failed completely. TV anchors sat around filling time, waiting for Godot to show up with election returns. None appeared. The candidates themselves began flying off to New Hampshire for next week’s primary.

 

It was a fiasco, a huge embarrassment not only for state officials but for the national party. It denied the winners their big moment before the TV cameras on election night — and the fundraising bonus that goes with it. It left the losers wondering if they’ve been robbed. It left Iowans questioning whether they will ever hold caucuses again or keep their prime spot as first-in-the-nation. The bitterness over this mess will linger, and the Republicans will exploit it.

 

To begin with, this failure makes the Democratic party look ridiculous. The damage is compounded because they are the ‘party of government’. That’s their brand, and it has been since Franklin Roosevelt proposed the New Deal. Democratic policies almost always call for more government, run from Washington. When people point to social or economic problems, Democrats reflexively respond with laws, regulations, and bureaucracies to tackle them (and taxes to pay for them). That prospect looks a lot less appealing when you can’t count the votes in a high school gym. It doesn’t encourage people to say, ‘These are just the people to handle my healthcare.’

 

Second, Bernie’s voters came into the caucuses (a) thinking they would win, and (B ) not trusting the party apparatchiks to give them a fair shake. This mess deepens those fears. If they don’t come away victorious, many Sanders supporters will think they were cheated. That’s a problem for Democrats, who need a united party to win in November. The fiasco in Iowa only deepens the mistrust between Bernie’s supporters and the party’s traditional center-left. It was already deep, and ‘mistrust’ may be too mild a word.

 

Third, the confusion over vote-counting in Iowa underscores a larger, more ominous problem: Americans’ declining confidence in the integrity of their elections and the legitimacy of the winners. For democracy to flourish, voters must believe elections are fair and the winners honestly chosen. The public’s growing skepticism is fed by party leaders who refuse to accept defeat graciously. That’s more than simple courtesy. It is the foundation for the peaceful transfer of power between opposing parties, democracy’s great achievement. That transfer requires that the losers publicly acknowledge the winners’ legitimacy.

 

In recent years, losers have grown more reluctant to do that. At a 2016 Republican presidential debate, a moderator asked the candidates if they would accept the results if they lost. It was troubling enough that the question needed to be asked. It was more troubling that Donald Trump didn’t immediately say ‘yes’. (He did later.) Unfortunately, nobody asked the Democratic candidates. They should have.

 

The Democrats’ refusal to accept the 2016 results has been the leitmotif of the entire Trump presidency. Hillary Clinton has never accepted her loss. She has never given a full-throated acknowledgment that Trump was honestly elected. Her party seems to agree. It was why they pressed for the Mueller investigation. Dissatisfied with those findings, Adam Schiff is now making the same argument about the coming election. Unless we remove Trump immediately, he told the Senate trial, he might steal the 2020 election. That’s nothing more than a dangerous slur unless he provides supporting evidence. He hasn’t. But it’s the thought that counts, and it’s a malicious thought. Still, it does highlight the crucial importance of fair elections and reliable results. What happened in Iowa doesn’t help.

 

Monday night’s Iowa Caucuses were a mess, a debacle, a failure, a fiasco…a Dead Parrot. They made the Democratic party look incompetent, stole the spotlight from the winners, deepened the rift between Bernie Sanders and party regulars, and further eroded public trust in election integrity. It’s hard to image a worse way to begin the primary season.

 

https://spectator.us/iowa-voting-fiasco-matters/

[rmgill]

 

 

Are you allowed to hunt deer with 5.56?

Depends on the state. In the past UT didn't allow it, but they changed requirements sometime to make it legal. Not a good idea for muleys, but smaller deer elsewhere it is barely adequate with good bullets/ammo

 

 

Also what is called deer in CONUS is smaller than in Europe. A whitetail is more european roe sized.

 

 

 

 

John F'in Kerry (did you know he served in Vietnam?) stumping for Joe Biden:

 

"There’s not a veteran here who would take an AR-16 with a long clip to go out and shoot a deer or shoot anything”

 

https://twitter.com/tomselliott/status/1223961063043018753?s=09

Obviously Mr Heinz still doesn't spend time with grass-roots vets.

 

 

Well, I would take a shorter magazine to not get hung up on brush.

 

 

 

Ehrm wasn't the AR-16 the .308 variant of the AR-18?

 

 

Varmint hunting.

Feral Hog Hunting.

 

In the former case, you might want 30 round mags for 5.56.

In the latter, 20 or 30 round magazines of 7.62 OR .300 blackout.

 

Also, the 2nd Amendment isn't about hunting.

Edited February 4, 2020 by rmgill

[Jeff]

An op-ed from Tom Perez (DNC Chairman) yesterday about how much effort they put into the Iowa Caucuses.

 

"This didn't age well" just doesn't cover it.

 

How We Prepared for 2020
Tom Perez

Tonight, our party’s presidential nominating process officially kicks off in Iowa. Today, I’m reflecting on the three years we’ve spent preparing for this moment, the changes we’ve made to make sure we are ready. I’m proud of the historic reforms we passed to increase transparency and accessibility, and that the power is where it belongs: with our voters.

 

Our party is at its strongest when we empower the grassroots. Last cycle, it was obvious some voters were unhappy with parts of the nominating process. Just like we do every four years, we looked at ways to improve how we choose our presidential nominee. And thanks to the reforms we made, we are excited to have one of the most transparent and inclusive primaries in history. This year’s process has empowered the grassroots and ensured our presidential nominating process reflects the will of the voters who will carry us to victory.

 

Here are some of the most significant reforms:

 

Automatic delegates. Four years ago, nobody had voted but candidates had already accumulated delegates to the convention because of the old rules pertaining to automatic delegates (sometimes called “superdelegates”). This year, automatic delegates won’t vote on the first presidential ballot, unless a candidate has already passed the threshold to secure the nomination. Put simply, on the first ballot, our nominee will be determined by pledged delegates, who are selected by Democrats in their local communities and pledged to candidates based on the outcomes of the state primaries and caucuses.

 

New rules for caucuses. Some of our major changes this year have to do with how states administer their caucuses — and they are all geared towards making our nominating process more transparent and accessible to more voters. You’ll see some of the changes relating to caucuses on display this week in Iowa. States with caucuses are required to provide absentee voting or some other method for those who cannot vote in person, create a process for publicly reporting delegates for each candidate, have presidential preference recorded on paper in case of a recount, and set the national convention delegates based on the first level of voting. What does this mean for caucusgoers? In Iowa, individuals can now participate through new satellite caucuses in the state — and around the world. In Nevada, there will be Strip caucus sites and expanded days of voting.

 

Expanding access to primaries. This year, seven states are switching from a caucus to a primary because of our rules. We’ve encouraged states with primaries to use all means possible to allow same-day or automatic registration, and same-day party switching for the Democratic presidential primary process.

 

Many rules are the same from previous cycles. In every state, a presidential candidate must receive at least 15% of the vote to be eligible to receive delegates, and delegates are awarded proportionally (there are no “winner take all” contests) to how candidates fare at the local and state levels.

 

Our North Star has been to grow our party, increase participation in our democracy, and put Democrats in the best possible position to win in November and beyond. Unlike in past years, at the start of this process there is no presidential candidate who can say they have any delegate votes for the national convention before the contests have begun. We are proud that our nominee will be determined based on the outcome of the grassroots vote in every state and territory.

 

We’ve made important reforms to our debate process as well. For the first time in history, we used a grassroots donor threshold to give anyone who wanted to see a particular candidate on stage the ability to help make it happen. The goal was to make our nominating process more inclusive and grassroots-focused than ever before.

 

And it worked. The donor threshold energized millions of grassroots donors earlier than ever before in the process, and candidates across the country saw increased engagement, donations, and action from their supporters. Now that votes are being cast, candidates who have secured just one pledged delegate from these first contests or are polling above 10% can make the stage.

 

I’m exceptionally proud of the reforms the Democratic Party has made to fulfill our promise to our voters and rebuild their trust in our party. These changes are all about the future. They’re about growing our party, uniting our party, and earning the trust of committed Democrats like you. I can’t say this enough: The new DNC is doing things differently. We’ve passed the strongest reforms to our party in decades. And because of this work, we’re poised to take back our democracy in November and win elections up and down the ballot for years to come.

 

https://medium.com/@TomPerezforDNC/how-we-prepared-for-2020-a876a644b158

 

 

[BansheeOne]

Well, let's phrase is positively: they achieved massive international media attention. Much more so than if one candidate had blown the field away and been annointed the savior from Trump. Sure, it's all ridicule and exasperation, particularly harsh from sources who really hope for a Democratic win in November. But any publicity is good publicity, right?

 

Right?

[Yama]

Of course! Infamy is only a subtype of fame.

[Yama]

The question I'm asking is why even use stuff like that at all. Just use paper ballots and a pen. No hanging chads there.

Oh come on. Paper & pen are not agile, transformative, synergistic platforms for tomorrow's dynamic election world.

[EchoFiveMike]

Can someone explain to me the strange obsession with using technology for election purposes in the US?

Why even use an App for vote counting? Why use voting machines at all?

 

Over here, paper ballots that are hand counted worked pretty well for the past 70 years, and there doesn't seem much incentive to add unnecessary levels of technology into the mix.

 

All things happen for a reason. If the reason you're "told" doesn't make any sense, you should question the teller about their obvious lies.

 

For the stupid and/or gullible, the DNC ap did exactly what it was paid for, prevent an undesirable public outcome and allow time to "fix" the document-able results. S/F....Ken M

[lucklucky]

 

The question I'm asking is why even use stuff like that at all. Just use paper ballots and a pen. No hanging chads there.

Oh come on. Paper & pen are not agile, transformative, synergistic platforms for tomorrow's dynamic election world.

 

Imagine making a Power Point about paper and pen voting.... Worlds colliding!

 

Edited February 4, 2020 by lucklucky