Your 2016 Presidential Candidate Speculation Thread

huh, thoughtcrime, cool. guess that's what the domestic wiretaps are for. keep your eyes on the skies, folks.

that is fantastic

Yes sending drones over to kill people, surely that will more folks over to our side.

“If I’m president of the United States and you’re thinking about joining Al Qaeda or ISIL, I’m not going to call a judge,” he said. “I’m going to call a drone, and we will kill you.”

http://i.imgur.com/rkVYipe.jpg

i'm sure everyone will be cool with this strategy

http://i15.tinypic.com/53ucxtl.gif

JE unable to wash loser-stink off of himself

btw the Dems are looking for "their" Koch Bros (can u spare $100 M?)

In planning sessions and one-on-one meetings with donors, Mr. Ickes, who is a Priorities USA board member, and other Clinton supporters are discussing how to raise as much as $300 million for Democratic outside groups. That is almost twice as much as Democratic super PACs and other outside groups spent to help re-elect President Obama in 2012, when conservative super PACs far outspent liberal ones.

This ambitious goal will require the emergence of a new class of at least 20 Democratic donors who can give $5 million or even $10 million each. Mr. Ickes said recruiting them would not be easy.

“Our side isn’t used to being asked for that kind of money,” Mr. Ickes said. “If you asked them to put up $100 million for a hospital wing, they’d be the first in line.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/us/politics/democrats-seek-a-richer-roster-to-match-gop-in-2016-election.html

what do you folks think of o'malley? is he a serious person? (i don't mean a serious candidate.)

― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Sunday, May 31, 2015 12:43 AM (Yesterday)

i read a longish interview with him at salon a while back and he came off as decent and thoughtful, but tbh not terribly inspiring.

omg at that lindsey graham quote. sometimes these guys' right-wing ids surface in all their homicidal splendor.

i dont understand why he even needs to send a drone cant we have drones that just automatically read yr thoughts then kill u

I can't stop laughing at the Lindsey Graham quote! OMG.
This is gonna be a fun campaign.

naw, gotta keep the human decision-maker element. the decider. i'm picturing lindsey graham strapped into Cerebro and surrounded by red buttons of death. i guess that's basically what we have now except for the mind-reading.

the commander guy

http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--Oh1HHcXo--/19aerwsa364gdgif.gif

today's WashPo/ABC poll:

http://i.imgur.com/vBKrLex.jpg

other/no opinion 2016

did Bobby Jindal somehow slip into 0%? his May dot doesn't even exist

Biden surging ahead!

the {candidate X is formidable} is aa strange election cycle tradition, like of course they were formidable in their home states otherwise they wldnt have made it to the presidential candidate level, but it says very little about whether theyll be able to out perform the other candidates who were also formidable at the state level http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/05/jeb-bush-2016-campaign.html

tho this one at least has a il info abt jebs shady business dealings

He also got involved in what to my mind is his most eyebrow-raising venture. In 2007, Jeb became a consultant to a company named InnoVida, whose CEO claimed to have cheap, ready-to-build temporary homes for victims of earthquakes and other natural disasters. Later, he joined the company’s board of directors. There was just one problem: The CEO, Claudio Osorio, was lying. His business was largely imaginary. Eventually, an investor in InnoVida sued. Osorio pleaded guilty to fraud and is now in jail. InnoVida declared bankruptcy.

In court records, Jeb claims he was acting in good faith when he served as a consultant to the company. (He’s since returned $270,000, though the company’s trustees sought nearly $470,000.) His spokeswoman, Kristy Campbell, adds that the governor hired a former federal-law-enforcement agent to conduct a background check on Osorio and his company. “The report he received,” she says, “didn’t have any red flags that indicated criminal or financial wrongdoing.”

But Linda Worton Jackson, the lawyer who represented InnoVida’s creditors, points out that even the simplest form of due diligence — namely, consulting the internet — should have raised those red flags.

“A simple Google search would have shown that Osorio had already committed the same type of fraud,” says Jackson. It’s true: Even in 2007, it was possible to punch Osorio’s name into Google and find a lawsuit over a bogus electronics concern he’d founded. In fact, Osorio had been sued several times for fleecing investors before 2007. Had the investigator gone to the clerk’s office at the federal court in Miami, he would have discovered this, including a subsequent class-action suit against the electronics company, in which it was called a “fraudulent scheme.” And there were plenty of warning signs about Inno­Vida itself: Nine months before Jeb climbed aboard, a judge evicted the company from its factory space. One of its part owners had also been convicted of selling cocaine. “Jeb was paid $15,000 a month,” Jackson adds. “That’s a lot of money to be a consultant to a company you know nothing about.” To say nothing of being on its board. He attended at least two meetings. “You do not generally see politicians on the board of directors of a Ponzi scheme,” she says. “That’s what’s unusual here.”

that chart is what one expects in the gen public's No One Is Paying Any Heed period.

hmm yeah that is worse than Jeb's schools racket, hadn't heard of that before

that chart is what one expects in the gen public's No One Is Paying Any Heed period.

― the increasing costive borborygmi (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, June 2, 2015 12:36 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

actually the fact that theres no clear front runner on the republican side is atypical

or even forget no clear front runner the fact that no one can crack 12%

walker has kochmentum!

Jeb Bush could! Until people took a closer look.

i hope rand paul stays in the race as long as possible to keep the issue of surveillance, etc. in the debates

that said, i suspect that once he opens his mouth about other stuff, he'll cease to be a credible candidate

kind of like his dad

feel like he has a strong enough built in base that he shd be able to hang in at least through the first few primary states

I expect him to stick around the longest tbh

Inno-Fraudo-Da-Vida, J. E.,
Don't consult for a con man

well yeah i think the intensity of the paul fanbase will mean he sticks around far past the point when he ceases to be a credible candidate for the nomination

...again, like his dad

yup

morbs otm about "no one is paying any heed," I think. bear in mind that at this point in 1999, neither bush nor gore had even officially announced yet even if they were presumed frontrunners (obv in case of gore). the whole W vs. mccain (plus the third-tier goof troop) thing wasn't even rolling until the fall at least. giuliani was the presumed front-runner at this point in 2007 IIRC.

giuliani was the presumed front-runner at this point in 2007 IIRC.

This still delights me a great deal.

...again, like his dad

― he quipped with heat (amateurist), Tuesday, June 2, 2015 1:47 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

he is much more legit than his dad tho, while not being actually legit, tho he might end up doing worse if the libertarian bases isnt as pumped on him

is much more legit than his dad tho, while not being actually legit

you could be hired on the cable, joe

Morning Lagoon

i wish! if anyone from fox new is reading this call me i will say whatever u want

giuliani was the presumed front-runner at this point in 2007 IIRC.

This still delights me a great deal.

― Johnny Fever, Tuesday, June 2, 2015 12:55 PM (36 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah i still remember a conversation with a professor, who is the smartest person i know, and he insisted that guiliani would be our next president, a prognostication which filled me with fear

smart people can be very wrong!

(btw the professor was equally horrified by his own prognostication)

i look forward to walker failing

although i would look forward even more to him being swallowed up by a quicksand-like vat of pig shit

Yes. I should note that many of these guys run to give them leverage when their agents negotiate FOX and ABC "This Week" contracts.

oh i think walker really, really wants the brass ring

and so do Bush and Rubio. But Fiorini and Santorum? Their contracts are up.

huckabee is the most obvious example

it'd almost (/almost/) be funny if by some bizarre twist rand paul actually ended up with the nomination. he'd probably be at least as freaked out as any of us. no way he actually expects to be president.

I don't think Rand Paul is running for the 2016 presidency, but I definitely think he's running for the 2020 or 2024 presidency. His hat's in the ring now as a "different" kind of Republican, and now he'll have 4-8 years to balance that with ingratiating himself with the GOP establishment.

Randy's playing some long game yeah

He's made a big show of reaching out to nontraditional Republican constituencies, and unlike his dad, he doesn't seem like an old crackpot. I imagine his hope is that, within the next 4-12 years, the GOP/general polity shifts closer to his "soft" libertarianism, and he shifts a little to the traditionally conservative side while still giving off the "optimist with new ideas" vibe.

"optimist with new ideas and clothes two sizes too big for him" vibe.

I think intheblanks is right about the hope of a continuing libertarian shift, but I think it's a losing game for Rand Paul. People can pull off "newcomer with new ideas" sometimes when coming from a governorship - they're relatively "new" nationally and they've had some space to say "We tried this innovative program in my state, and accomplished X and Y." Within the next 4 to 12 years, Senator Rand Paul will have racked up a ton of votes on a ton of little bills and will seem a lot more like a boring old politician, by then in his 60s, hair graying. Obviously this isn't universal - McCain somehow managed to make "maverick" stick on himself - but you really can't be the youthful force of big zesty ideas forever.