thegoodfellas/blogset-br huggingface dataset:
just themselves or just do it themselves to spend supporting a candidate, mentioning the candidate by name in campaign ads, ground activity, and anything like that. The only restriction is that they cant do this in consultation with the candidate; that is, this cant be anything that the candidate has any say in or control. The upside is well, the downside is from the standpoint of if you were in favor of limiting the unlimited money is that, well, theres no limit, and also the candidates will know who are the people. I mean, the world will get out who the people are contributing the large money. Also, a lot of the money is coming from individuals who are giving millions and millions of dollars. So theres a sort of inequality there thats really, really tremendous.On the other hand, the fact that the candidate doesnt control that money it means that the candidate cant spend that money on things he or she wants to spend it on: running his campaign offices, doing things he or she wants to do. And without getting just at least a critical mass of contributions to his or her campaign, it could cause difficulties for them. Now, for the moment at least, the amount of money in the game is probably enough to sustain a lot of candidates through Iowa and New Hampshire. After that, things can get a little more difficult for candidates who cant raise the money for their campaigns, even though they might have other groups and organizations ready to spend a lot on their behalf. But the answer is its the federal its the laws and Supreme and the courts.QUESTION: Hi. Im Kristoffer Ronneberg with the Norwegian daily Aftenposten. I have two questions. One is about polling. There was a PPP poll out in August regarding Donald Trumps supporters where it was revealed that two-thirds of them believe that President Obama is a Muslim and that he was born outside the U.S. How seriously should we take polls like that? Because I mean, theres an argument on the other side that goes that people will say anything about people they dont like. So how seriously should we take that?And the second question, more in the present: How damaging for the Republicans do you think Kevin McCarthys comments about the Benghazi committee and its political nature have been?MR SHAPIRO: Okay. So with regard to the PPP poll okay, so the way I think about any poll result, the first question I ask is: Who did the poll? PPP is a polling organization that has Democratic leanings to it. Its also a polling organization that does automated polling supplemented with internet surveys. Thats how they pick up cell phones. Okay, thats the but their polls seem to be in line with other polls. That particular finding about Trump supporters believing that Barack Obamas a Muslim, also believing that he was born somewhere else the level of well, the proportion of people who believe that, first of all, are disproportionately Republicans and conservatives. These are people
who opposed Obama and theyre inclined to disbelieve that. This is something thats been that was this is something that was talked about beginning in 2007, 2008, when Obama was running. Whether they really believe that is not fully clear. That is, theyll say that in a poll. My friend Gary Langer, who polls for ABC News, argues that if you ask a follow-up question in which you ask, Do you really believe that, or is that your kind of general or is it something that you generally sense or think? And theyll say theyll back off, and theyll say its something we generally sense or think.But those kinds of beliefs in facts that are untrue is symptomatic of the high level of emotional partisan conflict that exists in American politics today. The different those opinions, they are driven by partisanship. And a lot of us have talked about Ive written about this, but a lot of other people have written about it, too is that Democrats and Republicans live in two different worlds. That is, they see the world differently. They see global warming and climate change differently. The see Obama being a Muslim differently actually, it first it became first most visible for me and other people when it was determined that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. A lot of people still believe there were disproportionately Republicans. The fact things might have been a little murky in terms of what the CIA was telling the President. But also believed that there was an al-Qaida connection between Saddam Hussain and the Iraqis, which was patently untrue. The CIA was actually on the record saying that there was no but the thing thats kind of prevented that from dissipating is that a lot of Republican party leaders are dont visibly just state the truth about that. That is, theyll kind of hedge and haw, and sometimes theyll even repeat these things and say they believe those kinds of things themselves. And the big question is: Do we blame the psychology of ordinary voters here, or do we blame the leaders who are just fomenting this kind of thing? I think its a problem.QUESTION: (Off-mike.)MR SHAPIRO: Okay. Oh, that was well, first of all, that was consistent with what the Republicans some of the Republican leaders stated at the outset after Obama was elected in 2008, that they were going to do everything they could to basically make sure he was a one-term president. Now theyve shifted to make sure that Hillary Clinton is not a one-term first-term president. It really its a devastating comment given the context. Benghazi was a tragedy, and rather than doing fact-finding to find out really what happened, they basically turned McCarthy basically turned this into a political maneuver.QUESTION: Professor, hi. Sherwin Bryce-Pease, South African Broadcasting in the middle down here.MR SHAPIRO: Yeah.QUESTION: Hi. Earlier, you said that political you knew of no political scientists who wouldve predicted the current frontrunners, be it on the Republican side; I imagine the Democrats as well Trump,
Fiorina, Carson; Sanders, Clinton on the other side. Why is that?MR SHAPIRO: Well, the way political scientists think about this is that early on, its possible for a fringe candidate to get this kind of attention. And Trump had gotten it earlier. Now, if you want to read about this, the place to go is look at the writing of John Sides for the Washington Post in the part of the online newspaper called the Monkey Cage. Hes written this; hes also written a book with Lynn Vavreck called The Gamble, which they kind of track the dynamics of the elections. And a lot hinges on candidates emerging, getting money, and then also media coverage.Trump initially getting a lot of attention and support was not unusual. The thing thats unusual is that hes lasted so long. Because once he gets once he becomes the leader, he gets a lot of attention. He then the press then put him under a microscope. And usually what happens is that the more that gets reported on the candidates, the more they dig up things that work that should work in the candidates work against the candidates. Whats striking here is that hasnt happened yet. That is and it hasnt happened yet because of the dissatisfaction among the Republican electorate for mainstream candidates, that even when he says even when he and Carson and Fiorina say outrageous things, theyre they may acknowledge that its outrageous, but their dislike for the mainstream mainstream politics at this moment is such that theyre still supporting them.With regard to Sanders on the Democratic side, this is sort of classic in-fighting in the Democratic party in terms of the extreme liberal wing of the party versus the more moderate wing of the party here. And with whats going and then Barack Obama is situated in all of this as well. If he were running for re-election, things would be very different, but he obviously cant run for a third term. And we didnt see this in his in 2012. Hillary Clinton represents the kind of sort of the mainstream moderate liberal wing of the party. Id say initially she was sort of identified with Obama, being his Secretary of State and so forth. Sanders basically is able to capitalize on and reflect the dissatisfaction that the Obama Administration didnt push things further to the left and try to battle the Republicans, even though they really couldnt get anything done given the fact that Republicans controlled the House and the Senate. And so theres a wing of the party that really wants to push the party to the left. And at this moment, the upside for them of supporting Sanders is that they may not realistically think he can get the nomination, although I dont think thats necessarily far-fetched, but his running can push Hillary Clinton to the right to the left. And weve seen this already. The latest thing was when she just announced in the last day or so that shes against the Asian trade treaty case in point. And
the big question is that how far is she going to go to run against Obama? And will it even raises the question, will she go out of his way to try to get his support and have him campaigning for her. And there we can have a long conversation about that.MODERATOR: Were going to take a question from Washington. Washington?QUESTION: Hi. Can I --MODERATOR: Go ahead, we can hear you.QUESTION: Thank you, Dr. Shapiro. I just want to follow up on the last question about Donald Trump. You say his high approval rate wont last long, so when would he expect his approval rate to come down?And the second question is about Joe Biden. I noticed there is the handout approval rate about Joe Biden is quite high. And would you see hes as a threat to Hillary Clinton, and when would it be? Thank you.MR SHAPIRO: Okay, so lets take Trump first. Okay, theres this lead in these pre-election polls, and theres his approval rating. Now, his were talking about his approval rating among Republicans and conservatives. In the public as a whole, hes not widely approved. But in that but in the relevant constituency for the election, hes doing well. Just for the record, I was one of the people who wouldve predicted that he would not have lasted this long. And the fact that Carson and Fiorina have been have done well is a little bit mind-boggling to me at the moment, especially someone who studies public opinion and wrote a book called The Rational Public, so (laughter) Im wondering a little bit about that.With regard to how long itll last, I at this point, barring him saying even something even more outrageous and its hard to believe how much more outrageous he could get in some respects I think this will last at least to Iowa. And the thing to watch for in Iowa is whether one of the mainstream candidates is able to either win or do much better than expectations, because then the focus will shift. It could shift in the context of the next debates or other things that happen along the way. But it looks as though he at the moment, at least, hes got staying power at least to Iowa, and hes got his own money to spend, so which he can spend on his own campaign expenses. Hes not relying on other groups.Biden in terms of Bidens overall general approval, thats its very solid. In the pre-election polls, however, hes been well, no. Hes been running behind Hillary Clinton. On the other hand, he hasnt announced his candidacy yet. So its not necessarily a fair comparison. Hes the candidate who could really do a lot of damage to Hillary Clinton in terms of attracting some of her voters. Hes probably less likely to attract Sanders voters, and his entering the race could be well, it could hurt Clinton, but it could also be a boost for Sanders, who could wind up being basically having a conceivably having a plurality of support
once the votes been divided. And so the big question for the Democrats is its the classic question of kind of waiting for the candidate. In one of the past elections, it was waiting for Mario Cuomo, and now were waiting on Joe Biden.QUESTION: Professor, actually the question from the todays briefing announcement, how different ethnic groups in the United States influence American elections, and if I may add religious group, how these data is important.MR SHAPIRO: Yeah, okay. I was posed that question early on in terms of preparing for the briefing and I did a lot of homework on this with regard to the primaries. The problems is is in all these primary election polls, the samples are very small. And also, on the Republican side, were really when we say were talking about conservative Republicans, were talking about whites, for the most part. So theres no racial element in there. The religious element in there, however, is the basically the evangelical wing of the Republican party, the segment of the party thats conservative on social issues. And whats pretty striking here is that Trump is not getting his support from that group, or if he is, theyre kind of casting their religious values out the window. Carson, however, is; Fiorina has been trying to. And I think the how those evangelical Protestant voters vote in the primaries and caucuses is very important. But Trump for the moment has defied logic on a lot of that. All of the mainstream Republican candidates have been trying to make pitches to that group as well, and in particular, Rubio has done it and Cruz has done it. Cruz has been very effective on that front but hasnt been able to kind of break out of the pack in terms of support, and Bush has obviously been trying. Its pushed those candidates to the right in terms of taking conservative positions on social issues like abortion, gay rights and gay marriage, and the like. So religion is important in the party.On the Democratic side, based on the data Ive seen, its basically Hillary has her largest base of support among Democrat primary caucus participants, and in particular, nationally and in states with significant proportions of African Americans, her support is extraordinarily strong. Now, that was the case actually in 2008 as well, but Obama was able to move that by the time of the South Carolina primaries. In this case, shes not running against Obama or another African American candidate. Her challenger here well, Biden could pose a challenge. Sanders poses a general challenge, but he has not broken through yet with regard to the ethnic and racial base of the Democratic Party that is, African Americans and Latinos, and Asian Americans have emerged as well, but the Latino vote and the Asian American vote is a vote to watch in particular states in the general election. And there are identifiable states and particularly for Latinos, like Nevada and Colorado. Theres a lot of talk about how the Democrats can make breakthroughs in
states like Arizona and Texas, but that doesnt look like its going to be in the cards. But its the general election where those divisions become more important.MODERATOR: Lets do another question from New York and then well go to Washington. I know there were a couple questions over there against the wall. QUESTION: Hi, my name is Marija Sajkas. I work for Novi Magazin from Serbia. You said earlier that Trump is still not under microscope. Do you mind telling us your opinion why is that? And then the other one is if he ends up capturing all the electoral votes, does he automatically becomes the nominee, or he still needs to be approved by Republican Party? Thank you.MR SHAPIRO: Okay. In terms of Trump being the thing is is that Trump has been under the microscope and hes been able to survive it simply based on the fact that these at least in these polls, the conservative Republicans who were responding, the Republicans who were responding to the polls, are basically willing to give him a basically willing to ignore that given the fact that they oppose mainstream the mainstream candidates. And also its basically his own just their perception of his general leadership qualities and kind of saying vague things, but basically being persuaded that he could be a more a stronger and more forceful leader. And the juxtaposition here is between him and Obama, not him and the other candidates.With regard to the selection of Trump as the Republican nominee, if he gets a majority of delegates in the primaries and caucuses, hes the and the delegates vote faithfully, because they have to actually vote at the convention, and if they vote the way theyre supposed to vote, he would get the nomination. The Electoral College comes into play in the general election. If he were to run in the general election and got the majority of electoral votes, hes the president. But once but a majority of delegates, theres nothing theres no theres no higher authority after that. MODERATOR: Lets take the next question from Washington, D.C.QUESTION: Hi, Dr. Shapiro. My name is Mineko Tokito and Im with the Yomiuri Shimbun Japanese newspaper. Thank you so much for this opportunity. I just wanted to ask earlier you mentioned that a scenario in which no candidate would have the majority of delegates by the time of the convention, and I was just wondering how much of a chance we have for to see a brokered convention. Thank you.MR SHAPIRO: Thats a good question. Well, we havent had one in a very long time. Weve got to go back to the 1950s, 60, for that kind of thing. But in recent years, the what Ive always found very interesting is that in the last several elections we have the campaign playing out, but no one starts to talk about the rules and the allocation of delegates until a few primaries and caucuses have occurred. And they start counting, and then they kind of realize that, well, theres no candidate
breaking out of the pack here, and what if this kind of thing continues?The kind now, what we did see in the last election is it took quite a while before Mitt Romney got a majority of delegates. Also for the Democrats in 2008, it took a while before Obama clearly had clearly taken the lead. So things get dragged out there. The question then is what about the prospects of it really getting dragged out to the end or even close to the end. And what makes I would argue that it becomes more likely in the current election because of the number of candidates, the existence of rules in a lot of the states with proportional allocation of delegates. Its only until later where its possible for a Republican candidate to kind of run the table, so to speak, in terms of winning successive states that have winner-take-all states assuming its one candidate who does it. If that starts to shift among candidates, it means that the field might get narrowed but one candidate might not get enough.Also what pushes in the direction of a more competitive election is that the candidates having more money available because of the unlimited money spent by private individuals and groups, PACs and so forth, so theres more the money could be less of an issue unless the candidate runs out of money for his or her daily day-to-day operations. So I would argue that I actually thought the prospects werent bad, or good, or however you want to talk about it, in 2008 and 2012 with regard to the Democratic Convention getting possibly going to the convention and the Republicans possibly going to the convention. I think the chances are higher this time that the Republicans will go. On the Democratic side, I dont see it. I think there will be a breakout. Somebody will start taking the lead by the time of South Carolina, and certainly by March 1st. And whether that will, in fact, be Clinton at this stage, given Clintons support and so forth, I mean, the nomination is still hers to lose. QUESTION: Thank you. My name is Anna Guaita. Im with Il Messaggero; its a daily in Rome. My question is about districting and how strong a role it has on the lock on Congress, and if there is any possibility that it will become more flexible again in the future.MR SHAPIRO: Thats a very good question. Theres been a lot of debate and dissent and fighting about the problem of congressional this is were talking about the drawing of the boundaries of districts for the House of Representatives. And the favored phrase used is a phrase called gerrymandering, where the where within the states the process shakes out in such a way that the districts were drawn to the advantage of one of the political parties. Now, both parties are fighting on this.In the states right now, one key factor kind of drawing attention to that is that the state governments in the United States are disproportionately
dominated by Republican legislatures and governors that are involved in the rule making. And the big question one question has been is the Republicans lock on Congress, or the difficulty the Democrats have taking it, an artifact of the fact that there that the Republican vote is basically districted in a more efficient way so that they have they dominate in a lot of places where by small by margins that are big enough but not enormous so that they can take hold of the congressional districts, whereas the Democrats tend to win a lot of congressional districts by huge votes but are less competitive in a lot of other places. And the question is how much is that due to redistricting, the drawing of boundaries, or how much of that is due to where people choose to live. And political scientists have studied this, and the best studies to date suggest that part of this is, in fact, due to redistricting. Thats contributed. But the biggest factor is well, the finding is that even without redistricting, in terms of alternative scenarios for drawing boundaries, just based on where people live and drawing reasonable I mean, to give the Democrats more of an advantage youd have to draw even youd have to gerrymander even odder districts to give the Democrats an advantage. Its more a function of where people are living than redistricting.So redistricting contributes, but the bigger problem is simply the distribution, which means for the Democrats they have to widen their appeal in terms of the range of voters that they get to vote for them, which means attracting more white voters. Sure.QUESTION: Well, in that case, todays New York Times has an op-ed on voter ID in Alabama, and it says these laws have proliferated around the country, nearly always enacted by Republican-controlled legislatures, at the expense of minorities, the poor, and other groups who tend to vote Democratic. Do you think this is going to have a further effect?MR SHAPIRO: Thats a different and very important question. Now, the relevant rules here are basically these are laws these are voting rules that are decided by the states, by the states, not by the federal government that is, they set their rules in terms of eligibility of voters. Thats become a very highly partisan issue. Its clearly the case there were a certain number of outrageous statements by Republican state legislature and so forth basically saying that the intention really is to do this for political reasons. This began this became visible after 2000. I know the TV networks I worked at ABC News on election night for a couple presidential elections, and they always had a legal team on basically on the set ready to talk about the effects of basically voters being deprived of the right of vote, not showing ID. It hasnt played a role yet. It could potentially play a role. It could also backfire for the Republicans in the sense that what the response might be is that the Democrats and the more progressive