Obama hypes Warren to wealthy donors

[Lion Heart 15,041]

Sen. Elizabeth Warren has spent her presidential campaign railing against the donor class, making it known she doesn't want their help. 

She has publicly bashed millionaires, has sworn off high-dollar fundraisers and has refused large checks from Democratic bundlers. 

But behind the scenes in recent months, former President Obama has gone to bat for Warren (D-Mass.) when speaking to donors reluctant to support her given her knocks on Wall Street and the wealthy. 

And if Warren becomes the nominee, Obama has said they must throw the entirety of their support behind her. 

The former president has stopped short of an endorsement of Warren in these conversations and has emphasized that he is not endorsing in the Democratic primary race. 

But he also has vouched for her credentials, making it clear in these private sessions that he deems her a capable candidate and potential president, sources say.

More: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/475576-obama-talks-up-warren-behind-closed-doors-to-wealthy-donors%3Famp&ved=2ahUKEwj0pMLT5szmAhV0dc0KHds4A-YQFjADegQICRAB&usg=AOvVaw0hHGlAG5by4SbIOWsOyMPE&ampcf=1 

[Economy 52,864]

This is the issue with trying to supposibly refuse donations from a certain class

 

Rich ppl can donate too like anyone. The only issue is when those donations come with strings attached or demands to get something in return

 

But there are rich ppl who acknowledge the system is unfair too and support Democrats and don't expect anything in return

 

I don't think viewing all big donations as automatically bad is a balanced way to view things

[Eighteen 5,430]

i don't think he necessarily supports her as compared to any of the other candidates. i think he's worried about a certain lack of support should a progressive like warren be the nominee since should warren or sanders drop out, one or the other will gain a lot of that support and could beat biden, so a progressive winning the nomination is a very real thing. just my opinion

[Adakam 2]

Good

[Ladey Gaygay 9,321]

Sanders for president

[SKANK 14,288]

I wouldn't mind Warren as the nominee, with Pete as VP. If only because an HBO movie about the 2020 election cycle would be far more entertaining.

 

Pete: Listen Liz, we gotta do a fundraiser in Martha's Vin-

Warren: I don't have a sugar daddy, I've never had a sugar daddy, if I wanted a sugar daddy, yes I could probably go out and get one, because I am what?? SICKENING. You could never have a sugar daddy because YOU ARE NOT THAT KIND OF CANDIDATE. Baby everything I have I have worked for and gotten myself. I've built this campaign from the ground up. YOU ****ING BITCH! *throws kombucha*

 

[Othon 34,299]

12 minutes ago, Economy said:

This is the issue with trying to supposibly refuse donations from a certain class. Rich ppl can donate too like anyone. The only issue is when those donations come with strings attached or demands to get something in return. But there are rich ppl who acknowledge the system is unfair too and support Democrats and don't expect anything in return. I don't think viewing all big donations as automatically bad is a balanced way to view things.

It's an undeniable fact that the US government is much, much more responsive to the needs of the wealthy and well-off political donors than it is to the needs of the American people or to popular opinion. Cambridge published an extensive study in 2014 which incorporated decades worth of policy data which explains, in painstaking detail, how that is.

(https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B/S1537592714001595a.pdf/testing_theories_of_american_politics_elites_interest_groups_and_average_citizens.pdf)

Some choice selections:

"A proposed policy change with low support among economically elite Americans (one-out-of-five in favour) is adopted only about 18% of the time," they write, "while a proposed change with high support (four-out-of-five in favour) is adopted about 45% of the time."

and

When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organised interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the US political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favour policy change, they generally do not get it.

Yes, rich people can donate money to campaigns like everyone else, but they have infinitely more disposable income to blow on campaigns than everyday Americans, and there are countless ways that the rich can circumvent campaign finance laws to donate way more than they should. They have a massive leg up on the rest of us.

Rich people don't give their money away for free. Why would they do that? Why would billionaires like the Koch brothers go to the lengths that they did to build an entire political movement to install politicians with favorable views? They fund candidates that already believe what they want them to believe, that are pushing policy proposals that the wealthy would benefit from. No, not every wealthy person that donates money is some sort of evil genius conspiring to save themselves money, but the vast majority of them donate money because they expect something in return. That's how this system works. 

Campaign donations buy access, and that access to prominent politicians lets these wealthy donors influence the conventional wisdom in Washington and help define what is considered to be "reasonable" and what policy proposals are considered to be "extreme."

(https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/19/your-money/a-citizens-guide-to-buying-political-access-.html)

This is why there has been such a major push over the last decade to do away with big dollar bundlers, insider consultant money gathering and fundraisers like the ones Warren criticized Buttigieg for holding and why American leftists criticize politicians when they hold swanky events with donors like this. We know what these sort of events facilitate, and that corruption is exactly why the American left is been calling for publicly-funded elections. 

[JusKeepBreathin 19,311]

I don't care. As long as she uses the money to crush Trump. 

Then she can change all the campaign finance laws she wants for both sides. 

[dit 46,738]

For me if rich ppl donate it is fine as long as that does not include PAC groups and what not. 

[Economy 52,864]

23 minutes ago, OG Gaga Stan said:

It's an undeniable fact that the US government is much, much more responsive to the needs of the wealthy and well-off political donors than it is to the needs of the American people or to popular opinion. Cambridge published an extensive study in 2014 which incorporated decades worth of policy data which explains, in painstaking detail, how that is.

(https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/62327F513959D0A304D4893B382B992B/S1537592714001595a.pdf/testing_theories_of_american_politics_elites_interest_groups_and_average_citizens.pdf)

Some choice selections:

"A proposed policy change with low support among economically elite Americans (one-out-of-five in favour) is adopted only about 18% of the time," they write, "while a proposed change with high support (four-out-of-five in favour) is adopted about 45% of the time."

and

When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organised interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the US political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favour policy change, they generally do not get it.

Yes, rich people can donate money to campaigns like everyone else, but they have infinitely more disposable income to blow on campaigns than everyday Americans, and there are countless ways that the rich can circumvent campaign finance laws to donate way more than they should. They have a massive leg up on the rest of us.

Rich people don't give their money away for free. Why would they do that? Why would billionaires like the Koch brothers go to the lengths that they did to build an entire political movement to install politicians with favorable views? They fund candidates that already believe what they want them to believe, that are pushing policy proposals that the wealthy would benefit from. No, not every wealthy person that donates money is some sort of evil genius conspiring to save themselves money, but the vast majority of them donate money because they expect something in return. That's how this system works. 

Campaign donations buy access, and that access to prominent politicians lets these wealthy donors influence the conventional wisdom in Washington and help define what is considered to be "reasonable" and what policy proposals are considered to be "extreme."

(https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/19/your-money/a-citizens-guide-to-buying-political-access-.html)

This is why there has been such a major push over the last decade to do away with big dollar bundlers, insider consultant money gathering and fundraisers like the ones Warren criticized Buttigieg for holding and why American leftists criticize politicians when they hold swanky events with donors like this. We know what these sort of events facilitate, and that corruption is exactly why the American left is been calling for publicly-funded elections.

Those would be the most ideal tbh. It's what we do in my Country and everyone has a set budget making it a level playing field

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

To me, this is kind of confirmation that even though Obama and Warren aren't like besties, he believes she is amenable to working within the confines of the system, as opposed to Bernie who is opposed to the system itself in many ways. I would have expected this in September-October when it really seemed like Warren was on track to win the nomination with her steady growth to overtake Joe, but now it seems more and more like a Biden v Bernie game  If this isn't old news just being reported on, it makes me wonder what it is about Joe that Obama truly has no faith in since Joe continues to be in the lead... and it makes me wonder why he thinks that Bernie would disappear first instead of Warren, or if he thinks her recent strategy changes will ultimately yield results that make her rise again. I don't see the latter happening, so he's really gotta have no faith in Joe to say this, and just hate Bernie or something  

Ultimately though, it's reform vs revolution for the N'teenth time. The current establishment M.O for Bernie is just try to forget he exists and has any chance of winning and to keep screaming "centrism!" on TV... Meanwhile Bernie increases his chances of winning Iowa, New Hampshire, California, and more and continues to do as well as Joe and sometimes even Better than Joe against Trump in these supposedly purple swing states and rust belt locations who "would never vote for a radical leftist like Bernie"  and attempts to keep saying Warren is *the* progressive in debates and interviews and not Bernie who is beating her nationally and in early states and basically everywhere, are just contributing to this narrative that Bernie isn't popular or has no chance of winning.

 

Unfortunately, I don't think a future where Bernie won the nomination (or superdelegate majority, but not over 50%) and Obama is reluctant to endorse him, canvas, etc. is unfeasible when he says things like this and that comment about old white guys getting out of the way for women  Like, would he actually be able to get his wealthy donor friends to get on board with being fairly and appropriately taxed, and to lose their ability to massively influence the white house directly? I can't see that playing out well for them, they'd be furious  

[Economy 52,864]

10 hours ago, ItsTommyBitch said:

To me, this is kind of confirmation that even though Obama and Warren aren't like besties, he believes she is amenable to working within the confines of the system, as opposed to Bernie who is opposed to the system itself in many ways. I would have expected this in September-October when it really seemed like Warren was on track to win the nomination with her steady growth to overtake Joe, but now it seems more and more like a Biden v Bernie game  If this isn't old news just being reported on, it makes me wonder what it is about Joe that Obama truly has no faith in since Joe continues to be in the lead... and it makes me wonder why he thinks that Bernie would disappear first instead of Warren, or if he thinks her recent strategy changes will ultimately yield results that make her rise again. I don't see the latter happening, so he's really gotta have no faith in Joe to say this, and just hate Bernie or something  

Ultimately though, it's reform vs revolution for the N'teenth time. The current establishment M.O for Bernie is just try to forget he exists and has any chance of winning and to keep screaming "centrism!" on TV... Meanwhile Bernie increases his chances of winning Iowa, New Hampshire, California, and more and continues to do as well as Joe and sometimes even Better than Joe against Trump in these supposedly purple swing states and rust belt locations who "would never vote for a radical leftist like Bernie"  and attempts to keep saying Warren is *the* progressive in debates and interviews and not Bernie who is beating her nationally and in early states and basically everywhere, are just contributing to this narrative that Bernie isn't popular or has no chance of winning.

 

Unfortunately, I don't think a future where Bernie won the nomination (or superdelegate majority, but not over 50%) and Obama is reluctant to endorse him, canvas, etc. is unfeasible when he says things like this and that comment about old white guys getting out of the way for women  Like, would he actually be able to get his wealthy donor friends to get on board with being fairly and appropriately taxed, and to lose their ability to massively influence the white house directly? I can't see that playing out well for them, they'd be furious  

Tbh although Bernie wants revolution hardly anyone else in government seems to want to go to his extent. Even Elizabeth Warren the second most left Candidate does not support the level he wants to go to on certain things

 

I have a feeling if Bernie did win the Presidency, not much would happen because even the Democrats wouldn't be on board with most of his proposals

[Bt1 5,213]

Good for them. 

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

1 minute ago, Economy said:

Tbh although Bernie wants revolution hardly anyone else in government seems to want to go to his extent. Even Elizabeth Warren the second most left Candidate does not support the level he wants to go to on certain things

 

I have a feeling if Bernie did win the Presidency, not much would happen because even the Democrats wouldn't be on board with most of his proposals

Most of them wouldn't be with Elizabeth either, and the vein between both situations is corruption and money in politics. For example, most democrats who have to be "moderates" in the current congress aren't really like moderate ideologues who truly believe in ridiculous triangulations between dem and republican viewpoints, many of them are  just like unable to be populists or to offer material change for their constituents because of the fear of their donor money going to the opposition, being withheld, etc. and not because the people they represent it don't want those things generally, so it's my calculation that those people are a lot more swayable to a Bernie Sanders or Warren administration through political pressure. Joe Manchin types exist ofc, but the problem for any populist president or administration will be to break the stranglehold of corruption. The people in America, even in these "purple districts" want things like M4A, $15 minimum wage, Free College. It is the political establishment and punditry that are afraid of those things, and thats because they have to be. The whole point of a Sanders presidency is to re-write the way the Democratic party works to revert it to FDR era politics where they were the Working-Class Party, the party of the people and for the people. It currently isn't.

Like, Pete's Public Option plan and Biden's public option/aca expansion plan, both are things Democrats currently say they would support because they "aren't as radical as M4A", but these are also things that they said in 2007-2008 and then Private Insurance killed the Public Option via lobbying Republicans and we get the heritage foundation BS of the individual mandate. Intelligent people know how talking points work, and it is never surprising to make distinctions of what politicians are genuinely concerned about M4A or other proposals, and which ones take a **** ton of money from private health insurers and big pharma and who will never veer from corporate approved talking points, so we know where people stand ultimately.

The idea that corporates will support reform more than revolution when they've shown to be averse to all of it for the last 40 years is just as naive tbh. The only reform they support is reform that fundamentally doesn't change their material conditions - so the only way I could see that they would even support Warren's modest wealth tax is if they can prevent her from enforcing anti-trust regulations and increasing the funding of the IRS to conduct audits and be aggressive on tax avoidance. That's the kind of thing I could see under a Warren presidency with Obama telling the donor class to support her. He's signaling that she'd be okay with this kind of thing, even if it would ultimately mean middle class tax raises and her breaking her promise. That's Neoliberalism in a nutshell. She gets to claim a victory, but its deeply unpopular politically which favors the right, meanwhile  the wealthy who contribute to both sides of the aisle ultimately benefit. 

Bernie has a plan for this supposed grid-lock government though; Warren does not  

[Economy 52,864]

3 minutes ago, ItsTommyBitch said:

Most of them wouldn't be with Elizabeth either, and the vein between both situations is corruption and money in politics. For example, most democrats who have to be "moderates" in the current congress aren't really like moderate ideologues who truly believe in ridiculous triangulations between dem and republican viewpoints, many of them are  just like unable to be populists or to offer material change for their constituents because of the fear of their donor money going to the opposition, being withheld, etc. and not because the people they represent it don't want those things generally, so it's my calculation that those people are a lot more swayable to a Bernie Sanders or Warren administration through political pressure. Joe Manchin types exist ofc, but the problem for any populist president or administration will be to break the stranglehold of corruption. The people in America, even in these "purple districts" want things like M4A, $15 minimum wage, Free College. It is the political establishment and punditry that are afraid of those things, and thats because they have to be. The whole point of a Sanders presidency is to re-write the way the Democratic party works to revert it to FDR era politics where they were the Working-Class Party, the party of the people and for the people. It currently isn't.

Like, Pete's Public Option plan and Biden's public option/aca expansion plan, both are things Democrats currently say they would support because they "aren't as radical as M4A", but these are also things that they said in 2007-2008 and then Private Insurance killed the Public Option via lobbying Republicans and we get the heritage foundation BS of the individual mandate. Intelligent people know how talking points work, and it is never surprising to make distinctions of what politicians are genuinely concerned about M4A or other proposals, and which ones take a **** ton of money from private health insurers and big pharma and who will never veer from corporate approved talking points, so we know where people stand ultimately.

The idea that corporates will support reform more than revolution when they've shown to be averse to all of it for the last 40 years is just as naive tbh. The only reform they support is reform that fundamentally doesn't change their material conditions - so the only way I could see that they would even support Warren's modest wealth tax is if they can prevent her from enforcing anti-trust regulations and increasing the funding of the IRS to conduct audits and be aggressive on tax avoidance. That's the kind of thing I could see under a Warren presidency with Obama telling the donor class to support her. He's signaling that she'd be okay with this kind of thing, even if it would ultimately mean middle class tax raises and her breaking her promise. That's Neoliberalism in a nutshell. She gets to claim a victory, but its deeply unpopular politically which favors the right, meanwhile  the wealthy who contribute to both sides of the aisle ultimately benefit. 

Bernie has a plan for this supposed grid-lock government though; Warren does not  

What's his plan?