Debate Now The 2016 Campaign, Election and Aftermath

[320 Years of History]

In my opinion those who are able to vote and who choose not to vote deserve whomever they get for leaders. So they deserve no consideration at all in this discussion.

We don't elect the delegates or many others in power in the Republican party. So if our votes don't matter, and those at the convention will discard the votes and choose who they want to be the nominee, why have us vote at all? A terrible waste of time at a horrendous price.

Red:
Agree.

Blue:
Republican voters' votes do matter, provided Republican voters are able to agree enough to give one GOP candidate a majority of pledged delegate votes that must be cast in accordance with voters' indications during the primary voting process. If GOP voters cannot stipulate via their ballots in their primaries what candidate they like enough to give him/her a majority of pledged delegates, the delegates will take the first vote in accordance with voters' indicated preferences and to show that the voters failed to identify a clear majority preference. Once that's done and there is winner on that first convention ballot, the delegates, as given by their state's guidelines, may become free to choose a nominee using their judgment.

What you are griping about, whether you know it or not, is the fact that it appears this election cycle, GOP voters will not have indicated a majority preference among the options given to them, and that the fallback in such cases is not that the party go with the plurality preference. Well, okay. You can gripe about it, but, frankly, that is a waste of time in multiple ways:

• your gripes rightfully fall on deaf ears within the GOP
• GOP party members could have looked into how their party does things before committing to the party.
• GOP party members have had ample opportunity to
  • choose a different party,
  • create a new party,
  • abstain,
  • consider that the "party power elite" may have a point and in light of that potentiality, objectively investigate their claims about Trump to find out if they "hold water" rather than behaving (voting) in a way that equated to "I'm going to vote the way I want to because I can and because I want to vote against those establishment folks, and it doesn't matter whether what they say about Trump may be true."
• Trump could have mollified the vitriol of his rhetoric and he could have shown more integrity in the remarks he made.
• Trump could have "boned up" on the substance of the major political topics in play this cycle so that he'd have had more substantive to say than "It's going to be great. I'm gonna fix everything. "So and so" is an idiot. I'm the best. 'This' and 'that' is a disaster," and the whole range of other empty and unsubstantiated claims he's made and continues to make.
• Trump could have realized that in the boardroom a CEO need only articulate a vision and a cadre of subordinates will act to effect it regardless of how well that CEO knows about how to implement that vision, but that in campaigning for political office, the vision is a good start, but that one must be able to back it up and show that it's implementable, why it's the thing to do instead of other things a nation might do, etc.
• Trump could have realized that outside of military (quasi military) organizations and privately and closely held companies like his, fiat by the CEO doesn't happen or work, and that collaboration is what makes things happen and happen effectively and efficiently. He could have too realized that politics is way, way outside of and different from those types of organizations and that the "leadership via formal authority" model doesn't work there.
• Cruz could have, with far less ideological hubris than he's exhibited, considered whether he should even have run for President given how extremely right-wing are his positions and concluded that for him to be President, he'd need to govern in a more centrist way than might he want for personal reasons.
• Marco Rubio could have "grown up."
• All the other GOP candidates could have hired comedians to give them "one liners" to combat Trump's and thereby grab the news cycles for themselves, peppering their "one liners" with substantive messages, and in doing so show they could play Trump's puerile games, but that they also had some degree of gravitas greater than he.

But none of of those things is what any of those folks did. And here we are as a result and you, Trump, and other voters are crying the blues. Where's my finger violin? I wonder if I still know how to play "My Heart Bleeds for You?"

​

 

[Foxfyre]

So setting aside the criticism of the candidates which, though legitimate for this thread, is irrelevant to the point I have been making--misses it completely in fact--would anyone else care to comment on my question?

If none of the candidates receives 50% of the delegates during the regular primary process, and therefore will likely not receive 50% of the votes on the first vote at convention, should the convention bosses then be able to disregard that first vote and assign the delegates to the candidate of THEIR choice?

350years says we are not a direct democracy but rather a representative democracy. But what is suggested, If I understand the process that could happen at the GOP convention, we won't even be a representative democracy in this process. The party bosses will disregard and dismiss any plurality expressed and will simply install the candidate of their choice as the nominee.

In Colorado they party bosses did just that. They didn't bother to have an election but just assigned the delegates to Cruz, not because they wanted Cruz, but to deny Trump a majority of delegates. It is a near certainty that Cruz will be dismissed just as Trump will be dismissed at the convention if the party bosses are in control of the process.

If they can do that, why do we bother to go to all the time and expense of having primary elections and having the people vote at all?

 

[320 Years of History]

350years says we are not a direct democracy but rather a representative democracy. But what is suggested, If I understand the process that could happen at the GOP convention, we won't even be a representative democracy in this process. The party bosses will disregard and dismiss any plurality expressed and will simply install the candidate of their choice as the nominee.

In Colorado they party bosses did just that. They didn't bother to have an election but just assigned the delegates to Cruz, not because they wanted Cruz, but to deny Trump a majority of delegates. It is a near certainty that Cruz will be dismissed just as Trump will be dismissed at the convention if the party bosses are in control of the process.

If they can do that, why do we bother to go to all the time and expense of having primary elections and having the people vote at all?

Red:
In a representative democracy, the elected representatives are free to vote using their judgment. Only rarely do they even have enough direct input from enough constituents to even know what most of them want, that is to act as delegates rather than as trustees.

To be sure, on the first round of voting in GOP national convention, delegates must act as delegates. On subsequent rounds, most of them become free to act as trustees. That only makes sense seeing as were they, without exception, required to act/vote only as delegates, nobody would gain the nomination in situations where there is no individual who has a majority of support.

The GOP itself (the RNC) defined/determined that a majority rather than a plurality is what is needed for an individual to get the GOP nomination for President. Were the GOP's guidelines altered so that no candidate needed a majority and a plurality were all that's needed, there'd be no need for a GOP convention. Everyone'd know who the nominee is merely by observing who got the most votes/delegates in the primaries and caucuses.

Now here's the thing about the GOP/RNC: it can, at its discretion, change the rules and/or invent new ones, at any point that it wants to. Does it's ability and authority to do so seem democratic? Well, frankly, no, it doesn't. But then it doesn't need to actually be democratic because the GOP/RNC is not the government itself. It's a private organization, and as such it can create, revise, discard, structure and conduct its processes and rules for them whatever way it wants any time it wants to do so.

One need not like how it works in the GOP, but neither does one need to join the GOP. Most especially, Trump, with his $2B no less, didn't need to run as a Republican. He could have, and IMO should have, stuck with his initial approach of running as an Independent and focusing his vast resources on getting himself on state Presidential ballots and publicizing his platform. Ross Perot ran as an Independent and got ~20% of the vote. Comparing Trump's popularity with Mr. Perot's and perceiving it as being even greater, Trump would, IMO, have had a good shot of winning as an Independent.

Lastly, the direct primary has been evaluated critically. Research into its impact found that it largely had very little impact, with one exception.

Green:
For all the capriciousness the GOP may display at the national level, the "Colorado issue" is a state one. The fact is that each state (and each state's political party organizations) has complete control over how it chooses delegates to the respective party conventions. Colorado's GOP announced its approach to selecting 2016 election cycle delegates in August 2015.

• How Do Caucuses Work In Colorado?
  
• Colorado Republicans cancel presidential vote at 2016 caucus
  
• 16 questions and answers about the 2016 GOP delegate fight
  
• Super Tuesday leaves Colorado GOP guessing

In Colorado, a caucus is held to elect delegates to county assemblies and the county assemblies elect delegates to state and district assemblies where the delegates to the RNC (37 of them) are chosen. That is how it has worked over the past four presidential cycles, and it is nothing new for this year.

• Coloradans voted for those delegates on March 1, 2016.
• Coloradans knew that's what they were voting for, or at least should have seeing as they cast votes. (Individuals should have, if they had any integrity, abstained from the vote if they didn't understand what they were voting for. Note: "should" is not the same as "must.")
• Coloradans knew that the alignment of their chosen delegates would be determined at the Colorado GOP Convention.
• Coloradans knew they were choosing delegates who would be free to act as "trustees." They knew this because their March 1st vote didn't indicate how the delegates would be assigned to candidates.
• What Mr. Cruz did was lobby the chosen delegates to align with him, and he was very successful at getting them to do so.

Additionally, for all Trump's griping about the Colorado process for assigning delegates to the candidates, the fact is his campaign goofed in multiple ways.

• On Saturday, Trump backers passed out flyers at the convention site with official campaign slate of 13 delegates and 13 alternates accompanied by their three-digit number position on the 600-plus person ballot. Seven of the names, however, directed people to the wrong number and one delegate's name was misspelled. Other candidates did not have errors on their slates.
  
  In one case, an erroneous number corresponded with a Cruz supporter. A second flyer handed out by the Trump campaign contained four mismatched names and numbers.
  
  
• One Trump alternate, Jerome Parks, was not on the numbers-only ballot at #379 — instead the ballot listed #378 twice.
  
  
• On Thursday, a Trump slate of three names in the 7th Congressional District convention contained two that weren't listed on the ballot. The campaign's state director, Patrick Davis, said they failed to pay the necessary fees to qualify.
  
  
• The Donald Trump campaign inadvertently guided its supporters to vote for a delegate pledged to support Ted Cruz.
  
  
• The Trump campaign hired its Colorado state director on Tuesday before the convention, leaving them "play catch up" in the 11th hour in an effort to organize in Colorado.
  
  
• At a congressional district convention, the Trump campaign handed out slate cards that featured two candidates who were not listed on the ballot.
  
  
• Trump didn't show up for the Colorado Convention, even though he knew his organization was in utter disarray there. What exec, principal or manager does that? Not one that I know of, at least none that hope to "right the ship."

One of Trump's own supporters attested to the poor quality of the Trump campaign's preparation for the event saying, "We could have had some things going, but the campaign decided to not put resources here." Their having done so, along with the other observed mistakes Trump's campaign has made, provides evidence of what I've said several times: Trump is not running his campaign with the same degree of professionalism it seems he uses to run Trump Organization, his company. The dichotomy in management approaches is one of the noteworthy reasons I grew to oppose Trump. I was "all for" Trump when his candidacy was in the prospective stage. This is just a speculation on my part, but I think Trump is trying to run his Presidential campaign "on the cheap," starkly contrasting with the way he appoints his properties.

As goes Trump and his "Colorado was rigged" cries...well, I'd be willing to be somewhat more sympathetic than I am (which is not much at all right now) were he routinely to have offered something other than unsubstantiated bombast. I honestly cannot say that I've seen him once so much as attempt to present cogent and credible arguments or evidence in support any of his claims.

All I've yet to hear from Trump is one claim after another, all of which are predicated on my agreeing with it before he utters it. Thus his statements are of little value for, assuming I agree with them "from the get go," I sure didn't need him to tell me I'm right and that's it. And what he needs to do is present a good case that "we/he" are right in order to convert open minded and objective opponents. That approach just doesn't work for me because someday, he'll say something I don't agree with, and then I'll among the folks needing to be convinced, and the way Trump attempts to do so -- largely on the strength of his own word or worse, as an ad hominem plea based on himself -- just isn't going to do it.

Sidebar:

That approach doesn't work for me no matter who uses it. I'm not requiring more rigor just from Trump; I require it of everyone, no matter how important or irrelevant they seem to be.​

Objecting to another's support for a position and objecting to their poor argument for it are two totally different things. Personally, I welcome the former and am unwilling to applaud the latter, even when it's presented in concurrence with my own stance. Acting any other way would compromise my objectivity, and that in turn compromises my integrity. I can't have that, even if costs me another's aid or encouragement.

End of sidebar.

Blue:
Do you have any firsthand experience of a time when so-called party bosses didn't control the process (bossism)? I cannot recall any time in my life when that wasn't how "things" were done.

• political campaign Facts, information, pictures | Encyclopedia.com articles about political campaign
• Machine Bosses, Reformers, and the Politics of Ethnic and Minority Incorporation
  
• THE INITIATIVE TO PARTY Partisanship and Ballot Initiatives in California
  
• Rainbow's End: Irish Americans and the Dilemmas of Urban Machine Politics, 1840–1985

I'm not entirely sure that their rule and the accompanying apparent corruption (political, not economic) is even a bad thing overall. I know what that statement sounds like, but read the article to which it's linked and you'll understand my ambivalence.

Bossism is most closely associated with big cities, but bosses have also controlled political party organizations at the state level as well as in suburban and rural counties. Harry Flood Byrd, for example, dominated the Democratic Party in Virginia from the 1920s to the 1940s. Boss power has occasionally been exercised in presidential politics, too. A group of big city bosses helped secure the nomination of Harry Truman for vice president at the 1944 Democratic convention, and Richard Daley's support was considered critical to John F. Kennedy's election in the close 1960 presidential race.

The conditions for bossism were most widely present from the 1860s until World War II, with the waves of immigration that marked that period. Political machines and their bosses provided immigrants with jobs, small favors, and a sense of ethnic solidarity, forging personal relationships with new voters. In exchange, voters loyally supported machine candidates. At the turn of the twentieth century, Progressive reformers and many newspapers successfully attacked the inefficiency and immorality of the big city bosses. Civil service legislation forced bosses either to reform or have their candidates turned out of office.

The decline in machine strength after World War II has been attributed to changes in immigration policy and big city demography, the spread of federal social welfare programs, and the decline in voter loyalty to party organizations. In addition, the rise of media such as television and radio allowed individual candidates to reach voters directly, thereby undercutting the need for political clubs and other boss-controlled institutions to "deliver the vote" in a primary election.

Academic evaluation of the phenomenon of bossism is riddled with ambivalence. In the early twentieth century, academics heaped scorn on bosses and big city political machines for perpetuating corruption and inefficiency, and called for civil service and electoral reform that would drive bosses out of power. As the power of the more prominent city bosses began to wane in the 1950s, revisionist historians pointed to the class bias and nativism of the reformers as a counterbalance to the admitted faults of the bosses. In the late twentieth century, scholarship focused on such matters as the widespread machine practice of electoral exclusion of minorities, the collusion between machines and the economic elite, and the stalled economic mobility of ethnic groups closely associated with political machines.

I'm not suggesting party bosses don't act to maintain the status quo re: their power. I'm just saying that their doing so isn't unsurprising and that thinking himself an outsider, Trump should have been well prepared strategically for it. He certainly, unlike the average citizen, has access to the resources needed to both be prepared and counteract the bossism.

 

[Foxfyre]

In the representative democracy that is the United States of America, the representatives of the people are supposed to be bound by the letter and intent of the Constitution that both spells out the authority they are given and limits the authority they have. If they set aside that same Constitution and do whatever they choose to do, they are not representing the people.

So again, if the party bosses, most of whom none of us have elected, can set aside the will of the people as expressed in their votes in the primary elections and caucuses, where is the representation? If they can rig the delegates and the outcome to suit themselves, again why bother to go to the tremendous time and expense to have the people vote at all?

 

[Dhara]

In the representative democracy that is the United States of America, the representatives of the people are supposed to be bound by the letter and intent of the Constitution that both spells out the authority they are given and limits the authority they have. If they set aside that same Constitution and do whatever they choose to do, they are not representing the people.

So again, if the party bosses, most of whom none of us have elected, can set aside the will of the people as expressed in their votes in the primary elections and caucuses, where is the representation? If they can rig the delegates and the outcome to suit themselves, again why bother to go to the tremendous time and expense to have the people vote at all?

Doesn't it vary from state to state?

 

[Foxfyre]

In the representative democracy that is the United States of America, the representatives of the people are supposed to be bound by the letter and intent of the Constitution that both spells out the authority they are given and limits the authority they have. If they set aside that same Constitution and do whatever they choose to do, they are not representing the people.

So again, if the party bosses, most of whom none of us have elected, can set aside the will of the people as expressed in their votes in the primary elections and caucuses, where is the representation? If they can rig the delegates and the outcome to suit themselves, again why bother to go to the tremendous time and expense to have the people vote at all?

Doesn't it vary from state to state?

I'm not talking about the state primaries. I'm talking about the state primaries not amounting to diddly squat if the party bosses change the rules or do whatever they want to put the candidate of THEIR choice up as the nominee. In other words who we the people voted for won't matter if no candidate gets the required number of delegates before the convention starts. And they are pulling every string in the book to make sure no candidate does.

 

[320 Years of History]

In the representative democracy that is the United States of America, the representatives of the people are supposed to be bound by the letter and intent of the Constitution that both spells out the authority they are given and limits the authority they have. If they set aside that same Constitution and do whatever they choose to do, they are not representing the people.

That's your view of it. I guess one can call that a legitimate view of it, but one cannot say it's the sole legitimate view of it. That was the point of my providing the first link I did in the post above.

Apologies. I forgot about the rule asking for a link summary. If you want that, I'll provide it, but I'll have to put it in a separate post as my time for editing that post above has passed.

 

[320 Years of History]

So again, if the party bosses, most of whom none of us have elected, can set aside the will of the people as expressed in their votes in the primary elections and caucuses, where is the representation? If they can rig the delegates and the outcome to suit themselves, again why bother to go to the tremendous time and expense to have the people vote at all?

Were you to found a political party, who'd make the rules by which the party operates? If you and your closest friends make the, guess what, you're a party boss. If you and they find your party being, in your view, usurped, would you let that happen, or would you act to preserve what you think your party stands for?

 

[Foxfyre]

The party allowed the people to believe they were casting votes for the person they wanted to represent them as their candidate in the general election. Nobody matters at this point other than those who made the effort and went to vote in their state's primary election.

When they cast their vote, they had not been informed that their vote would not matter if they did not cast their vote for a candidate the party wanted to be the nominee. The party would instead disregard their vote and rig the delegate votes so that the person THEY wanted would be the nominee.

The rules currently state that only candidates who have won eight or more states will be eligible to be the nominee. Currently only Trump and Cruz have won eight or more states and the party is now pulling all the strings to make sure Cruz wins enough of the remaining ones to deny Trump the requisite number of delegates to make him the nominee. But the party doesn't want Cruz either.

Evenso, the two candidates who would be eligible to be the nominee under the current rules would be Trump and Cruz. After the first vote, the convention delegates should be casting their votes for one of those two.

If the party instead changes the rules rigs the delegate vote to go to somebody else--it was even suggested that somebody who wasn't in the primary process could be selected--Paul Ryan who has declined or Mitt Romney who has not declined--then the whole process was a sham. There was no reason for any of us to vote at all. Think of all the man hours and mega millions of dollars that could have been saved had they been honest about it from the beginning and we just skipped the primary process and went straight to convention.

 

[Foxfyre]

Sigh. The rumor now per AOL news this morning is that Ted Cruz, if he is the nominee, will likely select Marco Rubio as his running mate. Does anybody think two first term Senators, neither with any real management/administrative experience, would be a good idea? I really hope that the VP choice will be one of the governors who can bring that management/administrative experience to the ticket.

 

[320 Years of History]

Does anybody think two first term Senators, neither with any real management/administrative experience, would be a good idea?

I certainly don't, at least not as goes those two first term Senators.

 

[320 Years of History]

The party allowed the people to believe they were casting votes for the person they wanted to represent them as their candidate in the general election. Nobody matters at this point other than those who made the effort and went to vote in their state's primary election.

When they cast their vote, they had not been informed that their vote would not matter if they did not cast their vote for a candidate the party wanted to be the nominee. The party would instead disregard their vote and rig the delegate votes so that the person THEY wanted would be the nominee.

The rules currently state that only candidates who have won eight or more states will be eligible to be the nominee. Currently only Trump and Cruz have won eight or more states and the party is now pulling all the strings to make sure Cruz wins enough of the remaining ones to deny Trump the requisite number of delegates to make him the nominee. But the party doesn't want Cruz either.

Evenso, the two candidates who would be eligible to be the nominee under the current rules would be Trump and Cruz. After the first vote, the convention delegates should be casting their votes for one of those two.

If the party instead changes the rules rigs the delegate vote to go to somebody else--it was even suggested that somebody who wasn't in the primary process could be selected--Paul Ryan who has declined or Mitt Romney who has not declined--then the whole process was a sham. There was no reason for any of us to vote at all. Think of all the man hours and mega millions of dollars that could have been saved had they been honest about it from the beginning and we just skipped the primary process and went straight to convention.

Red:
From the GOP's 2012 Rules...the most current ones I know of, though they've been amended at least four times already since August 2012:

Rule 16:
Election, Selection, Allocation, or Binding of Delegates and Alternate Delegates
(a) Binding and Allocation.

1. Any statewide presidential preference vote that permits a choice among candidates for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in a primary, caucuses, or a state convention must be used to allocate and bind the state’s delegation to the national convention in either a proportional or winner-take-all manner, except for delegates and alternate delegates who appear on a ballot in a statewide election and are elected directly by primary voters.
2. The Secretary of the Convention shall faithfully announce and record each delegate’s vote in accordance with the delegate’s obligation under these rules, state law or state party rule. If any delegate bound by these rules, state party rule or state law to vote for a presidential candidate at the national convention demonstrates support under Rule 40 for any person other than the candidate to whom he or she is bound, such support shall not be recognized. Except as provided for by state law or state party rule, no presidential candidate shall have the power to remove a delegate

Additionally, I suggest you read Rules 32 - 42, most especially #42. They aren't new. They've been there since 2012. Perhaps if Trump had read them, along with the rest of the document, he wouldn't be crying foul now.

 

[Foxfyre]

I suggest you read my comments in context as what the rules ARE are irrelevant to what I have been arguing.

 

[Foxfyre]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

 

[320 Years of History]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

Who, in your mind, is "us?"

 

[Foxfyre]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

Who, in your mind, is "us?"

I tend to think of 'us' as common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government.

 

[320 Years of History]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

Who, in your mind, is "us?"

I tend to think of 'us' as common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government.

Well then, given that depiction of who "us" is, I'd say your ideas suffer from the faulty dilemma fallacy. If, however, you cogently show preponderantly that "common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government" do not see one of the other three candidates, along with abstaining from this year's Presidential election as options, I'd be willing to alter my assessment about the nature and existence of the quandary you've identified as "us" having.

 

[Militants]

Marco Rubio off course then it is John Kasich and Jeb Bush if one Democrat won this election off course 5-5 between Democrat vs Republican since 1980's when Reagan elected for the Republican early 1980 then George W Bush father in Gulf war.

 

[Foxfyre]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

Who, in your mind, is "us?"

I tend to think of 'us' as common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government.

Well then, given that depiction of who "us" is, I'd say your ideas suffer from the faulty dilemma fallacy. If, however, you cogently show preponderantly that "common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government" do not see one of the other three candidates, along with abstaining from this year's Presidential election as options, I'd be willing to alter my assessment about the nature and existence of the quandary you've identified as "us" having.

You define "us" as you choose.
I'll define "us" as I choose.
I don't intend to nitpick the definition.

 

[320 Years of History]

Say what you will about Bernie Sanders: IMO he would be disastrous as President. But he is a likable guy of admirable character.

That really puts us in a quandary doesn't it? To have to choose between a likable guy of admirable character who supports stuff most of us see as intolerable, or choose between a rather unlikable guy of dubious character who supports stuff most of us believe is good and right for the country.

Who, in your mind, is "us?"

I tend to think of 'us' as common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government.

Well then, given that depiction of who "us" is, I'd say your ideas suffer from the faulty dilemma fallacy. If, however, you cogently show preponderantly that "common sense reasonable people who are not ideologues or people worshippers and who don't idolize government" do not see one of the other three candidates, along with abstaining from this year's Presidential election as options, I'd be willing to alter my assessment about the nature and existence of the quandary you've identified as "us" having.

You define "us" as you choose.
I'll define "us" as I choose.
I don't intend to nitpick the definition.

Red:
Of course you don't; you gave it. I don't intend to nitpick the definition either, neither did I suggest there be something wrong with it; thus I did neither of those two things. My remark had to do with the conclusion you drew given the definition you gave for who you meant by "us."

If I were to define "us" for myself as , then I will know who "us" are in the context(s) in which I use it, but I won't know who "us" be in the context you use the term, which is why I asked you "Who, in your mind, is "us?" I accepted your explanation. In fact, I used it and nothing else to determine you're original remarks (pink italics) suffer from being fallacious.

Given your definition of what you meant by "us," you'll need to overcome the fallacy of the original statement you made (pink italics). Were I to have written your original statements and in turn was asked to clarify whom I meant by "us," I'd have said, "people who currently have narrowed their preference among the candidates to Mr. Sanders and Trump." Alternatively, I'd have retracted/revised the conclusion (pink italics) I presented and allowed "us" to assume its its typical and contextually implied meaning of "everyone who intends to vote in the 2016 Presidential election."