The Day After: Republican National Convention Edition

Time to move this mess to Philadelphia

It is now official. Donald J. Trump is the official Republican Party nominee to be President of the United States. I never thought this would happen. Even today I am filled with confusion and apprehension. The ascension of the New York businessman, and reality television star, to being one of two assumed choices for President is a story for the history books. For four days in Cleveland Ohio, the country got to witness what the Trump Republican Party was all about. Last night, for over an hour, candidate Trump had the attention of the nation all to himself. No more debates with ten or more people. No more primaries or states needing to hold a caucus. No more wrong media analysis. The GOP of 2016 has been solidified, and now onward goes the campaign for victory on November 8th.

The 2016 Republican Party National Convention was feared by many, and hoped by some, to be one of chaos and fighting. There was an expectation of political fisticuffs in the convention hall, and real violence from protesters who had descended on Cleveland. The Never Trump movement had one more chance to derail the nomination. Stories of the 1976 Republican Convention, and the Ronald Reagan supporters trying to block Gerald Ford's nomination by changing the rules at the last minute, were being linked to what may go on in Cleveland. The Cleveland police were requesting help from other cities. Public officials wanted to suspend the right to open carry firearms. The nominee himself was promising an exciting and non-traditional list of speakers. I for one was not looking forward to the violence and hate, but was intrigued by what a showman like Donald Trump could pull off. The 2016 RNC was going to be unlike anything we have ever seen in American politics.

The reality is that the 2016 Republican National Convention was a bit of a letdown. Thankfully we did not have any horrible violence in the streets of Cleveland. The protests were typical for any political event. Flag burning, yelling, and being drunk while political, typical protester stuff. Inside the convention halls, nothing much happened. The Never Trumpers tried, and failed. They failed in a spectacularly quick manner. The speakers were nothing to be that excited about. Typical Fox News republicans like Rudy Giuliani, Newt Gingrich, and Chris Christie did the same tired act they have been doing for years. An endless parade of actors and sports figures most of us have forgotten about would take the stage and yell about how horrible President Obama and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton are as Americans. Vice Presidential nominee Mike Pence put a lot of America to sleep. Speaker of the House of Representatives Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell made their expected speeches, and both men were not welcomed with open arms. The Trump children were the only speakers that garnered any bipartisan praise. Possible First Lady Melania Trump stirred up some non-news by possibly plagiarizing a 2008 Michelle Obama speech. It was a dumb story kept alive by an underwhelming convention. 

Then there is Texas Senator Ted Cruz. The 2016 Presidential Primary contest was one of the most personal, and drawn out, contests in American history. Senator Cruz and Mr. Trump were both trying to run as outsiders, and Mr. Trump came out as the eventual winner. To the surprise of no one, Trump used personal insults and general bullying to gain voters. Florida Senator Marco Rubio tried to use Trump's tactics against the New York blowhard. Rubio was out of the race a few weeks later. Senator Cruz and his family were prime targets for Trump. It was ugly. By giving Senator Cruz a Wednesday speaker slot at the convention, many Republicans thought the Texas Senator would move past the primary, and endorse Trump to show party unity.

That did not happen. Senator Cruz instead used his time to take a passive aggressive swipe at his own party's Presidential nominee. Why show up and do this? Marco Rubio and John Kasich, who both have ambitions in four years, were smart enough to stay away and not take a chance at ending their national aspirations. The only reason I can see Ted Cruz going this route is that the man must be crazy. He has an irrational want to be the GOP's next Ronald Reagan, and maybe his speech was supposed to start an inter party revolution like Reagan's 1976 convention speech. The thing that the Texas Senator seems to forget is that the Gipper did not try to undermine the nominee, Reagan endorsed Ford and worked to try and get the incumbent President reelected in 1976. Cruz has tried to undermine his party and has used shady tactics in every campaign the man has ever run in. He attacks Republican and Democrats alike. The only reason Cruz could last as long as he did in the 2016 primaries is by being shady and because the Republican party on the national level is a mess. By allowing so many people to run in the primaries, Reince Preibus doomed any hope of a moderate Republican from emerging. Ted Cruz, and Donald Trump, should have been done in January, but incompetence at the RNC allowed their fringe campaigns to survive. By not supporting Trump, Senator Cruz has given up any chance of ever being the Republican Party's Presidential nominee. He is not a smart man who has shown everyone that the only thing that matters to Ted Cruz is Ted Cruz's own political ambition. The end of Senator Cruz's Presidential dreams is one good thing to come out of the Republican National Convention.

Finally, late last night, Donald Trump ended his speech and officially became the flag bearer for all Republicans this November. I for one was really looking forward to seeing the Trump acceptance speech It was going to be unlike any political speech in my lifetime. Unfortunately is more of the same from Trump, just louder and longer. I went to bed feeling a bit let down. It was boringly typical Donald Trump. America is a hellhole of crime. Illegal immigration, pointless war, and free trade have led us down a dark path. Hillary Clinton is incompetent, a crook, and dangerous to all Americans. President Obama has failed for almost eight years. The only thing that can save Lady Liberty is the awesomeness of Donald Trump. There was no actual solutions to these problems, just the awesomeness of Donald Trump is the only cure needed. Oh, and for the first time ever a Republican Presidential nominee said we should be nice to the LGBTQ community, and he was applauded. That was weird.

The balloons dropped, confetti fell, and my brain is still trying to accept that Donald J. Trump is on the ballot as the Republican candidate for President of the United States. The entire Republican National Convention felt like a big letdown. No grand solutions, only problems. The action on the convention floor did not seem to be well planned. Most of the speakers did not embrace their nominee. Many people gave rambling, or over the top, speeches that only incited the fringe of the right wing. Conspiracy theories were being given more time than actually trying to court new voters. From my perspective it seems like the RNC has given up on the Presidential race and is going to rely on Democratic Party incompetence in the down ticket races so the GOP can hold onto everything below the executive office. That is probably the party's best path forward. Donald Trump's new Republican Party had its star shine bright, and dim with the four days in Cleveland. 

RD 

RD Kulik is the Head Editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. We are looking for people to talk about the 2016 election from their local point of view. Have something to say? Come write for SeedSing.

2016 and the End of the 1968 Political Revolution

I am the one who makes American Great

The Presidential primary election is usually a boring, anticlimactic, process the country goes through ever four years. There are a few legends of divided presidential nominating contests. In 1800 Thomas Jefferson handily beat incumbent John Adams in the election for President, yet due to some quirks in the process of electing the executive, the victorious Jefferson had to fight it out in the US House of Representatives with his own running mate, former Senator Aaron Burr. The electoral stalemate was broken only when Jefferson's rival, former US Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, threw his support behind the Democratic-Republican candidate from Virginia. Jefferson went on to become President, and Burr killed Hamilton in a duel a few years later. The second Republican Party convention of 1860 famously saw relative unknown former Illinois Representative Abraham Lincoln go from a third place finish on the first ballot, to winning the nomination on the third. The 1948 Democratic Party convention ended in a split within the the party when the pro-segregationists left to form the Dixiecrats. Other infamous political icons like South Carolina's John Calhoun, Nebraska's William Jennings Bryan, and New York's Horatio Seymour have at times made their party's nomination contests somewhat of a circus.

Not one of these historical episodes compares to what happened to the Democratic Party in 1968. Incumbent President Lyndon Johnson choose to not seek the party's nomination due to increasing public dissent over his administrations role in escalating the war in Vietnam. Senators Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota and Robert Kennedy of New York were challenging for the nomination by running on an anti-war platform. With President Johnson out, the establishment of the Democratic party was rallying behind Vice President Hubert Humphrey. In the lead up to the convention in Chicago, the nation was in the grip of never ending tragedy and violence. On April 4th, civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis Tennessee. June 5th, shortly after claiming victory in the Democratic Party's California primary, Robert Kennedy was assassinated by a lone gunman. Many cities across the United States were experiencing riots due to the discord in the country. The baby boomers were beginning to reach voting age, and many of them were tired of seeing their family and friends coming back from Vietnam injured, mentally damaged, or dead. They wanted their concerns to be heard, and the politicians was ignoring their voices. The Democratic Party Convention in Chicago was marred by constant protests and violence in the streets. Things were made even worse when the party nominated the pro-Johnson Humphrey over the anti-war McCarthy. The nomination of Hubert Humphrey was seen as a manipulation by party leaders because the sitting Vice President had not even competed in a number of state primaries, and the anti-war McCarthy, with the primary votes won by the recently deceased Kennedy, had garnered over three quarters of support from actual Democrats. Party insiders had gone directly against the will of the people, and nominee Hubert Humphrey was destroyed in the general election by Republican Richard Nixon. 

Is 2016 shaping up to be another 1968? The two parties are getting ready to nominate candidates who have extremely high disapproval numbers. The primary process itself has been marred by political insiders trying to subvert the will of the voters. The parties are ignoring the millennial voters and their concern about economic security and opportunity. There has been more talk about convention rules and superdelegates than there has been about the will of the voters. Violence has been erupting at events associated with Presidential candidates. The anger and fear of the younger generation of voters is being ignored by the establishment candidates. The summer of 2016 is starting to look like that of 1968. What has happened to bring us back to this point almost 50 years later?

The road to the nomination for New York businessman Donald Trump mirrors the 1968 Democratic Party nomination. In 2016, like in 1968, the party was divided along many different ideologies. The insane number of Republicans who competed in the early primaries caused a fracture in the central GOP philosophy. Voters were split and would gravitate towards candidates based a few issues. No consensus candidate could be rallied behind. Trump emerged as an alternative to the establishment Republican ideals by speaking directly to the fears and anger of the Republican voters. Unlike in 1968 when the Democratic establishment was able to force their preferred candidate to the nomination, the republican voters of 2016 were able to elect their man. The incompetence of the Republican National Committee, and the cheerleading from the press, led directly to the embarrassment that is Donald Trump's candidacy. The dangerous and un-American  rhetoric from the New York businessman is leading us into a summer of discord. The Republican Convention in Cleveland is getting ready for 1968 Chicago levels of disruption.

The eventual nomination of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton by the Democratic party has more in common with the ascension of Richard Nixon to the GOP nomination in 1968. Nixon easily won the nomination in 1968 because he was the party's most reliable national figure. The former Vice President had been around Washington D.C. for decades. He was a well known commodity for a party that did not have a strong bench of nationally renowned figures. Nixon was mildly challenged by an upstart in California Governor Ronald Reagan, but no one in the Republican establishment were taking any of Reagan'a new conservative ideas seriously. The former Vice President also devised the "southern strategy" during the primary season to make sure that core republican voters were solidly in the Nixon camp. Richard Nixon was not a popular choice, but he was the best the party could do. Plus, with  the problems in the Democratic Party, Nixon could be presented as the sensible choice for President. 

Secretary Clinton has been presented as the "next person up" since she announced her candidacy is 2015. The Democratic Party insiders have done their best to smack down the different ideas of the Bernie Sanders campaign. The primary plan for Clinton has been a bizarro southern strategy where the former Secretary of State has secured the support of minorities who tend to be traditional Democratic voters. Her campaign uses these tactics to drown out and ignore the disaffected millennials. Clinton may not have secured the nomination with the same ease that Nixon did, but her inevitability followed the same path.  The Democratic party have already adopted the GOP 1968 talking points by insinuating that Hillary Clinton is the sensible choice for President in 2016. Core voters, establishment support, and being the most acceptable person available, that is how Hillary Clinton won the primary.

As the Primary season ends, and the party conventions just around the corner, the United States is living in a new era of public frustration. The Republican Party is being fueled by anger and violence, while the Democratic party is catering to the establishment while it ignores its younger voters. The nomination process of 1968 fatally injured the Democratic Party, and cut a small wound in the GOP. Both parties were forever changed by what happened. Forty-eight years later, 2016 has seen the Republican Party fall to pieces with the Democrats starting to accelerate their demise. Donald Trump will hurt the entire Republican Party in 2016, like Humphrey did to the Democrats in 1968. Hillary Clinton will easily win the Presidency in 2016, following the same path the fates set for Richard Nixon. Many voters on both sides of the political spectrum will feel left out. The discord and anger in the country will get worse. The election of 1968 started a political revolution that lasted for almost 50 years. How long will the revolution of 2016 last?

ed note: The original article misspelled Senator Eugene McCarthy's name. We have corrected the mistake.

RD

RD Kulik is the Head Editor for SeedSing and the host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He wants to know how in the world Hillary Clinton will not win the 2016 election. Come on and tell us.

The Days After: I Give Up

In the beginning I had a plan to look at every single Presidential primary / caucus result and try to use my education and work experience to give the good people out there on the internet my own personal views of what the results meant. Things were going well for a while, and then the mid-March primaries made me lose interest in the whole process. Why? Because it is an incredibly undemocratic, hateful, and pointless exercise. So today I decided that the primaries do not deserve any more of my attention, because they do not respect the will of the people. Recapping the days after countless show elections, I give up. 

Elections are incredibly important. When people do not show up to vote, the results can be disastrous. No matter how toxic the process has become, we must get out and vote. Your town council decides how safe, clean, and valuable your neighborhood is. Many neighborhoods do not even offer recycling because their local officials would rather not deal with the expense and hassle of trying to clean up the planet. Your school board is directly responsible for determining how your children, and all of their friends, will be educated. Science teachers around the country are being forced to give lip service to non-science because of uninformed religious zealots being elected to the school board. Most of our judges are elected and not appointed. These judges are being swayed by private interest to send more people to jail. These jails are constantly being sold off to private companies because the governors we elect need to plug gaps in their respective state budgets. Access to good healthcare is being dictated by members of your state legislature. Most of these state lawmakers have more extreme views than anyone we see on the Sunday morning political shows. What I am saying is that elections are extremely important. You should always get out and vote.

The highest voter turnout is always during the US Presidential election. I have personally never thought the election of the President of the United States is that big of a deal. My ambivalence to the Presidency is probably directly related to the men who have held the office in my lifetime. Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush I, Bill Clinton, George Bush II, and Barack Obama - that is a pretty mediocre run of Presidents. Ford pardoned Nixon and told America that the President is above the law. Carter was listless and allowed his opposition to weaken his Presidency, Reagan destroyed the economy, bankrupted social security, ignored the AIDS crisis, and represented only the rich and religious interests in the country. Bush I started the destabilization of the Middle East. Clinton embraced republican economic ideals and weakened the social safety net for our most vulnerable citizens. Bush II was one of the top five worst presidents in US history represented by his disastrous foreign and economic policy decisions. Obama has been filled with empty promises and policies that only go half way in addressing our true problems. This run of Presidents is comparable to the weak, ineffectual, and political hacks that occupied the White House during Reconstruction (without looking it up on the internet, try and name three Presidents in order between Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt, not a memorable group). Why should I care about who is the President, when ever single man who has been in office the last forty years has been there to represent a very small group of rich political donors. Every four years I vote for the President, and it is the least important vote I cast.

The 2016 election has already been one for the history books. We may have the first woman to sit on top of the ticket for one of the two major political parties (we will). The first candidate of Hispanic descent could be the nominee for the Republican party. The first Jewish presidential nominee. The first brokered convention in generations. There is a lot of history being made, too bad the people making the history are uninspiring and self serving. The modern media, and the two major political parties, have given the American people the most deplorable slate of Presidential candidates.

The Republican Party has little to no chance to ever win another national election with the current state of their party. Decades after Richard Nixon's southern strategy, the Republican Party has enhanced their platform of fear and hatred. Anytime there is a push to suppress voter turnout, it is the Republicans. Any effort to redraw congressional district lines into a gerrymandered atrocity, it is always the republicans. Blame the poor or a minority group for all of America's problems, you better believe the Republican Party is creating the talking points. The modern Republican Party has been built to not grow voters, and to make sure that voting is as undemocratic as possible. The nation has taken notice of how unamerican the Republican Party has been when it comes to elections.

The three remaining Republican Presidential candidates perfectly represent a party of feudal lords. Ohio Governor John Kasich, the moderate according to the national press, embraces all the bad ideas of the GOP. Under his leadership Ohio has added a lot of low paying jobs, and lost a whole lot of jobs with good pay and benefits. The religious right, with the help of Kasich, has put Ohio near the bottom of the country when it comes to women's health. The public education system is being gutted by "moderate" Kasich so his charter school donors can get rich off of the taxpayers. Bad businessman Donald Trump is filled with hate and has no meaningful ideas to actually make America great again. His campaign has been an embarrassment to the entire country. The press keeps egging Trump on because they care about money and have killed the concept of journalism. Texas Senator Ted Cruz is a crazy person, surrounded by crazy people, and has some very antiquated crazy ideas. People like Glenn Beck paint Cruz as some kind of religious savior, and Cruz plays the part. The Texas Senator is so ineffectual and unpopular that a large majority of his own colleagues refuse to endorse Cruz for the Republican nomination. All three of these bozos can not win a national election, no matter how bad the Democratic nominee is.

Speaking of how bad the Democratic nominee will be, Senator Sanders and former Secretary of State Clinton have their own laundry basket full of issues. Bernie Sanders has captured a lot of the millennial imagination, but that really doesn't matter when half of the millennials will not even vote in the election. What really bothers me about Sanders is that the Vermont Senator is not even a member of the Democratic Party. It seems to me that Sanders is using the infrastructure of the Democratic Party for his own personal gain. With Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee has thrown all of their resources behind a candidate who has economic values equal to those in the Republican Party. Under a President Clinton, Wall Street will continue to run unregulated. When the big banks sink the economy again, Hillary Clinton will make sure that US taxpayers bail out the 1% again. It continues to trouble me that scandal and bad PR follows the Clinton's everywhere they go. Benghazi may be a show trial, but it never ends. Hillary's hubris keeps it around. Former President Bill Clinton whitesplaining his administrations horrible record on race and crime, that is another unfortunate event that seems to keep happening.  A Hillary Clinton Presidency would be a whole lot of the same we have seen the last 25 years. Endless war in the Middle East, Wall Street giveaways, and weakening of the social safety net. That sure looks like Democratic Party values.

In my eyes we have five self absorbed, power hungry rich people fighting with each other to win the pageant called the US Presidency. Like a beauty pageant, the US election is not be decided by the American people, it is being decided by a select group of judges. On the Democratic Party side we have the super delegates. Hillary Clinton only needs to win a few states, not even half, and the super delegates will giver her the Democratic Party nomination over Bernie Sanders. In Wyoming, Senator Sanders won over 50% of the popular vote and still only took under 40% of the states delegates. DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz has altered the rules constantly to only favor Clinton. The Democratic Party does not care at all about the voice of the people, they only care about the rich and connected. 

Somehow the Republican Party is a bigger undemocratic mess than the Democrats. Donald Trump is a horrible choice for President, but so is the rest of the field. RNC chairman Reince Priebus and the Tea Party created this fractured hateful Republican Party to win local races, and now their hate is on full display for the nation. By making your base feel like they are always under attack from terrorists, minorities, the poor, social justice warriors, children, martians, whoever, then your base will flock to biggest strongman. Kasich is not filled with enough pure hate, Cruz is a creepy fellow with very few friends, someone had to lead the angry white man. Trump is a master of marketing, and he knew that his hate filled rhetoric would inspire the very vocal persons who believe in white christian male victimhood. These people demand someone pay for their insecurities, Donald Trump has promised them restitution. No wonder they are so upset that the RNC has tried to remove Donald Trump from the Republican field. The Republican Party has been advocating Trumps positions on immigration and women's health for decades, they just soften the hate with terms like conservative principles. The base has rejected these code words and wants action. Trump promises action, and the establishment is now trying to silence the voice of the people. Trump is the reflection in the mirror of the modern Republican Party, and the party does not like what they see.

The candidates all stink. None of them care about actually fixing anything. Sanders may want to deregulate the big banks, but he still believes guns deserve more protection than people. Clinton could break the gender barrier, but she will bend over backwards to protect the richest Americans. Kasich may not seem crazy, but embraces all the same backward ideas of his colleagues. Trump may be a true outsider, but he wants to make sure we are a country of hate and fear. Cruz is, well there really is not anything nice I can say about Ted Cruz. His children are adorable, there I said something nice. The brokered Republican Convention may bring a new, or old, face to the race. It doesn't matter, the next President will be another in a long line of political hacks who care very little for the problems facing our nation.

So I give up. The Republican and Democratic Parties refuse to let the people have a say. The fact that we keep talking about super delegates and brokered conventions means that the primary elections of 2016 mean nothing to the political party elites. The election of our next President does not need the will of the people. Why should I care what the RNC and DNC think, they do not care about me. No more primary updates, it has been over a month since the last one. I have nothing more to say on a process that deserves no more words. We will continue to talk politics here at SeedSing. Our goal is to give the non wealthy and connected a voice. I am not going to waste time on the primary dog and pony show. I give up. We will talk about this electoral mess when the mud clears, or when the mud consumes us all. 

Please do not forget to vote. Our voices will only gain meaning, and the political parties will lose their power, if we ALL vote in EVERY election. Get out and vote.

RD Kulik

RD  is the Head editor at SeedSing and the host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He may think the US President is pointless, but every other race needs your attention. Donate to the National Campaign Training Committee today and support your local candidates.

The Day After: New Hampshire Edition

Here they come Nevada and South Carolina

Well, that is finally out of the way. The New Hampshire primary has cleared up the entire 2016 Presidential campaign. Donald Trump and Senator Bernie Sanders will get to face off in November for the White House. The internet and national media won, their chosen candidates have emerged victorious. This circus is finally over. Will you "feel the Bern" or is it more important to "Make America Great Again". November 8th will be here before you know it. Let the national campaign begins.

Once again, I wish this was true. New Hampshire tried to clear things up way more than the Iowa Caucus. The first in the nation primary has always been the freal true test of determining who can win their respective parties nomination. Iowa is all about a candidate's ground game. Fringe candidates, especially Republicans, can use local political bosses to help sway voters away from their personal choices. The Iowa Caucus is all about the work a candidate puts in on the ground. The New Hampshire Primary allows people to vote their own preferences. Party bosses can not look you in the face and make a person change their vote. The mob can not sway the individual. In 1988 then New Hampshire Governor John H. Sununu famously said "The people of Iowa pick corn, the people of New Hampshire pick Presidents". History has mostly proven Governor Sununu's words.

So that means Donald Trump will win the Republican nomination? Today is the first day that I actually started to accept the fact that Trump may incredibly be in this race until the very end. I have never believed in Trump's viability as a credible candidate for the U.S. Presidency. He does not represent the presented core philosophy of the GOP. He does however represent the ugly hate and class warfare cultivated by the Republican intelligentsia. Donald Trump is more like the zealots of the party who get relegated to being the Vice Presidential nominee (i.e. Sarah Palin, Paul Ryan and Dick Cheney).  The National Republican Committee has been very successful at getting rid of the most unelectable members of their field in years past. The Bachmanns, Santorums, Jindels, and Huckabees may have been treated as credible candidates by the incompetent media, but the less offensive John McCains and Mitt Romneys would always comfortable win out and become the party's nominee. The New Hampshire Primary is where the accepted candidate of the National Republican establishment would take control and coast to the eventual nomination. Donald Trump is not the accepted national establishment candidate. He should have stumbled in the face of the moderate Republican hopefuls.  Trump just destroyed the RNC's saviors. 

But what about John Kasich you ask? He is the RNC's hero who will slay the evil Donald Trump. That is the latest narrative of this unpredictable primary season. The national Republicans are so desperate for a "moderate" candidate that they keep promoting anyone not named Trump or Cruz. Last week, after a third place finish in Iowa, it was Florida Senator Marco Rubio. The short time in the spotlight did not do Rubio any favors. He was horrible. When the people of New Hampshire voted, Rubio was not their choice. Now with a surprising second place finish in the Granite State, the RNC will rally around Ohio Governor Kasich as their chosen one. I hate to close down this new love fest for the Ohio Governor, but John Kasich got less than 16% of the total vote. He did come in second, but it was a far distant second. If we want to anoint Kasich as a viable alternative to Trump, then you need to also consider Senator Ted Cruz and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush. Their margin of defeat is a whole lot closer to John Kasich than Kasich's margin of defeat is to Donald Trump. I would also argue that Trump supporters second choice for President would be Ted Cruz and vice-versa. Looking at the New Hampshire results that way gives the Trump / Cruz block just under 50% of the vote. Add in other non establishment candidates like former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and the established RNC friendly candidates polled below 50%. John Kasich, along with the rest of the "acceptable" republicans lost, and they lost bad.

So what about the nomination for the Democratic Party. It looks like Bernie Sanders, right? Not exactly. The Democratic Party's New Hampshire results were not surprising. Ever since Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders entered the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination, most people expected him to easily win the Granite State. It seems like the Hillary Clinton campaign did not even put up a fight in New Hampshire, and this allowed Sanders to have a decisive victory in the primary. The Clinton campaign has seemingly unlimited resources, the near full support of the Democratic Party establishment, and a lot of states yet to vote. They did not waste time, money, or talent where they did not need to. Senator Sanders has been using his cult of personality to get great press coverage, and make the Clinton campaign sweat. That will be coming to an end very soon. The Nevada Caucus and the South Carolina primary will truly show if the Bernie Sanders campaign has any credibility. Both of those states look to be easy wins for Hillary Clinton, but Iowa also looked to be an easy win. With the money and effort saved by not contesting New Hampshire, Hillary Clinton looks like she will still easily win the Democratic Party's Presidential nomination. It was fun having Bernie Sanders around, and he brought up some important issue, but the ride may have ended in the Granite State.

That is what everything looks like on the day after New Hampshire. Donald Trump is starting to pull away and unbelievably become a major parties nominee for President. I know the establishment of the Republican Party has to be scared. I also have a feeling  that the RNC is considering some radical steps to protect their overall electoral chances in 2016. I would not be surprised if some people of influence in the Republican Party supported a third party candidate. The Democratic Party did not change course at all due to the results in New Hampshire. Senator Bernie Sanders had a nice little win, and Hillary Clinton is ready to start dominating the primary process with Nevada and South Carolina on the horizon. I may not "feel the Bern", but just yesterday I was telling people Donald Trump has zero chance to be a nominee for President of the United States. Maybe in two weeks I will have a new outlook for the Independent Senator from The Green Mountain State. I doubt it, but you never know. See you in a few weeks.

RD Kulik

RD is the Head Editor for SeedSing. He encourages your voice and donations to keep SeedSing free from big money influence. Follow us on twitter and make sure to like us on Facebook.

The Democratic Party is Hurting Voter Turnout

The average democrat on election day

Once again we have another fringe republican beat the polls and win a major election. The good Democrats across the nation point the blame squarely at low voter turnout. If people do not vote, bad people get elected. We have seen so many people talk about this phenomenon. When people do not vote, their own interest suffers. When republicans win, it is because democrats do not vote. This has been the conventional wisdom for decades. Democrats lose, blame the voters who did not vote. Democrats win, it was a great get out the vote effort. The same story election after election. If voter turnout is the only way for Democrats to win, then elections that experience low voter turnout must be the fault of the Democratic Party.

Once upon a time the modern Democratic party cared about elections in non-presidential years. Throughout most of the 20th century the Democratic Party had a stranglehold on the US Congress, and the majority of state governments. The platform of the democratic party fit well with the humanity of the electorate. The great Reagan electoral slaughter of 1984 saw the Democratic party maintain control of the House of Representatives and gain seats in the US Senate. The media will tell you that everyone loved Reagan and the Republicans in 1984, but that is just not true. When the Democrats won presidential elections, they controlled the entire federal government. In 1992 Bill Clinton won the White House, and the Democratic Party had solid control of both chambers of Congress. Two short years later the Republican Revolution of 1994 saw the GOP take control of the US House, Senate, and many state governments. Since 1994 the Republicans have gained more and more control of state governments, and they have increased their hold on the US Congress. Near the end of 2015 31 state legislatures are completely controlled by the Republican Party (8 are split control, leaving only 11 state legislatures run by the Democratic Party). The Republican party has 32 State governors (they will take control of Kentucky in 2016, and may lose Louisiana later this year). Things are getting better for the Republicans, and much worse for the Democrats. 

The interesting trend to look at is the election of Republican governors in states that Obama won in 2012. There are a number of states that vote for the Democrat at the top of the national ticket, and then tend to go for the Republican in state races. These states include Florida, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, and Wisconsin. The interesting thing to look at with theses states who are blue and red is that each of these states do not hold their governor elections on the same year as the presidential election. The Democratic Party invests heavily in these states during for the Presidential election, yet in the off years there is no financial or human capital remaining to mount a statewide campaign for the governor's mansion. The local party leaders are rewarded for winning the state for the president, yet they are never called to task for losing the state governments. It seems like most of the Democratic Party cares very little in trying to govern in they very states they value so much every four years.

Money is crucial to elections. Starting with the election of Bill Clinton in 1992, the DNC has funneled most of the campaign contributions to the top of the ticket. By 2012 the Obama campaign was hording money, while the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee was begging for funds. The funding for republicans in local elections is far larger than that of democratic candidates. Currently the Hillary Clinton campaign has a record amount of money raised, yet no local democrat is benefiting from this war chest. Who can blame the Clinton campaign, they are just following the accepted practices of the Democratic National Committee. They are telling democratic voters that only the presidential campaign matters.

This is not a new problem, it started in 1994, and the Democrats in Washington DC always have some response. In 2005 DNC Chairman Howard Dean implemented a 50-state strategy, and in 2006 the Democrats took total control of the US Congress. Many of the established class of Democratic party operatives disagreed with Chairman Dean. They wanted to continue and sink money into "winnable" races. These Democratic Party experts were the ones that left the cupboard bare to begin with. Unfortunately the Paul Begalas and James Carvilles won out, and Dean was removed from the chairmanship of the DNC after the 2008 elections. Under Tim Kaine and Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the Democratic Party has seemed to give up on any state race that is competitive. Giving up on these races allowed the Republicans to gain control of many crucial state legislatures in 2010, just in time for congressional redistricting. 2010 happened to not be a presidential election year. The Democrats still won the White House in 2012, and have continued to lose seats in US House, Senate, Governorships, and State Legislatures.

The DNC says they care about more than the Presidential election. They recently launched an effort to assist local races with Advantage 2020. The cynic may look at their plan and realize it coincides with a Presidential election year. Where is the plan for 2015 (already failed), 2016, 2017, 2018, or 2019. Social media allows us to lay the groundwork at a lighting fast rate. The truth is the Democratic party has ceded the states to the Republicans. Once they were handed over, the Republicans built a system to make elections difficult for the Democrats. Gerrymandering, voter id, right to work, all of these were implemented recently. All of these new policies push down Democratic voter participation. The DNC sat back, complained a little, and did nothing to strengthen the state parties. The Democratic Party wants to inspire only every four years.

That is the key word, inspire. People who vote democrat want to be part of something. They want to change the world. They need to be inspired. In Kentucky Jack Conway did not give anyone inspiration, and very few turned out to vote for him. He lost. In Ohio Ed Fitzgerald was as uninspiring of a candidate ever, and very few turned out to vote for him. He lost, badly. The Republican party has built in a method to turn out voters. Every election, no matter the office, the republicans get out and vote. They are inspired. 

The endless complaints about voter turnout, and people voting against their own interests, will never end. Complaining about the same things, will get you the same results. Democrats must want the same results, because they keep complaining about voter turnout, and they keep losing. Solve the voter turnout problem, then you can win. The Democrats have the White House locked up for many elections, it is time to win back the states. The voters are not losing elections for the Democrats. The lack of excitement, financial resources, and inspiration is keeping voters away. Stop complaining about low voter turnout. The Democratic Party is to blame for the fact people will only vote for them ever four years. Do something new. Be inspirational.

RD Kulik

RD is the Head Editor for SeedSing. He really wants to be inspired by you. Come write for SeedSing.