Thanks to everyone who came up for the debate meet-up! We had about ten people there. The bar was super-crowded, applauded every time the Donald spoke, and occasionally yelled “Trump!”. (I like to think that I helped lead these cheers.)
I was amazed by what a good job the moderators did. The questions were tough, and the follow-ups were very good.
Predictions are hard, especially about the future, but I think this debate may hurt Jeb a fair amount. As I see it, you have three candidates who come across as non-assholes — Jeb, Rubio, and Kasich — and I think that of these three, Bush clearly did the worst. Kasich and Bush probably both sounded too much like Democrats — Kasich with all his talk about “those left behind” and Bush with too many nuanced policy details (e-verify, Common Core, etc.) — but Kasich came across as more hopeful and energetic.
The other seven seemed to be competing to be the biggest asshole, with Trump obviously winning.
My view is that the Republican primary voters want an asshole. Sure, Romney was probably a RINO at heart, but he was also an asshole. I wonder if Jeb will step up the asshole quotient in the next few debates.
srv
And there you have it people.
Any objective watcher could clearly see the Ailes/Rove agenda at work.
MattR
Everyone survived OK without a trip to the emergency room?
CONGRATULATIONS!
Kaisch was the only one who sounded remotely like a serious politician. He cannot win the primary. The GOP wants a raging asshole who will tell the uppity niggers to get back to the fields, and I think The Donald is about as good as they are going to get.
Not a strategy to win a national election, but they’re all just in this for the grift this cycle so far as I can tell.
ETA: oh yeah, JEB! is fucking done. That was the most pathetic performance I’ve seen out of anyone in a debate since Stockdale, who at least had an excuse.
WereBear
Mmmm. Good point.
Chris
Yep. I think “asshole” overrides all other considerations.
japa21
Where’s Right to Rise, crowing about how Jeb! cleared out all the opposition last night? I have not seen a single pundit or snap follow-up giving anything but negative marks to Bush.
As to Kasich, he actually did not stray off the reservation too much. Medicaid expansion is actuality a good thing to many GOP voters, even if their governors and legislatures are against it. And on SSM, he had the right answer, “I’m against it but the courts have spoken.”
Otherwise, he was pretty much with the base, but in such a toned down way he won’t scare the small but still siomewhat influential non-insane part of the party.
Trump can never damage his brand. If he really screws up, he’ll just talk about being the victim of the liberal media or the party establishment and the more rabid base will continue to support him.
the Conster
Like someone said on FB, the winners of the debate were mental patients everywhere, who woke up this morning all like “people think I’m crazy? at least I’m not a crazy asshole!”
Hoodie
My immediate reaction is that Mitt might want to reconsider his choice not to run and, who knows, maybe he’s sitting back waiting until after the Trump wave crests and drowns the 9 dwarves on stage with him. None of those guys is going to out-asshole Trump, especially Jeb. When he wasn’t sounding like a nebbish county commissioner, he was nearly incoherent. Christie was probably the only one with a fighting chance in an asshole contest, but he’s an asshole and a loser, e.g., at least Trump was smart enough to leave the investors (loved the “killers” reference) holding the bag when his Atlantic City casino went under, while OJW doubled down on Revels. Republicans love assholes but they hate losers.
Peale
@japa21: Jump start Fridays.
JGabriel
DougJ:
I concur. And if the primary comes down to a Biggest Asshole Contest then Trump wins, hands down. Which is why I think Trump has a really good shot at winning the primary.
Since everyone else besides Kasich is competing in the Biggest Asshole Contest, Kasich will probably win the Not An Asshole Contest by default.
That’s not an endorsement. I think Kasich would make a crappy President, mediocre at best, but he’s also the only GOP candidate who acts like he’s honestly interested in governing, as opposed to trolling liberals and basking in the jeers.
Belafon
The Stop Hillary PAC ad that showed up here asked who won the debate and showed pictures of Trump and Christie. I didn’t click on the ad to see if you could vote for all of them or just the ones listed, but I find it interesting that they portrayed it as a choice between those two.
srv
Trump is literally Reagan and mainstream Republicans and Democrats are terrified of that fact.
Everyone else gets it.
KG
@srv: Trump is literally Donald Trump. Ronald Reagan is literally Ronald Reagan, who is literally dead and entombed. In other words, the GOP needs to get itself figured out because Ronald Reagan ain’t walking through that door.
MattF
Kasich was the only one who left me with the impression that he had a mind, a personality, and maybe even a conscience. But, I suppose that makes me biased.
For the record, Trump’s hairdo did not appear to be sentient, rumor notwithstanding.
Kay
I’m pleased Walker came off so dull and empty-eyed. There’s something slack in his face that is just horrible. You get the impression his mouth is slightly open even when it’s not.
One at a time :)
Walker was once considered the threat and before that it was Christie. I personally think they over-estimate the appeal of governors outside their states. Kasich is better than the others because he was in Congress and after that he was a FOX media personality and had some patronage job in the finance industry, but he’s rambling and weirdly inarticulate on a regular basis in Ohio, so that will show up. I can’t put my finger on why he’s a poor speaker. He has too few words to call on- a small vocabulary? He’s also a bit of a hot head, so look for that.
Cacti
Reading the recaps from the right wing chattering class, the desire to kneecap Trump is palpable.
They look at him and see 2016 Barry Goldwater.
Mike E
The Troll Factor! Trump’s new Fox rival show, classy and huge!
DougJ
@srv:
This is probably your best comment ever, from the misuse of “literally” to the idea that mainstream Democrats are scared of Trump.
Pithy Pseudonym
What? Dysentery?
Kay
What a pleasure to watch Chris Christie tank, too! He may actually have to punch a teacher in the face to get attention next week. Either that or start threatening pensioners with cutting off their Social Security checks. He needs a Bold Move. I hope it gets more humiliating for him from here on out.
gf120581
@Cacti: Problem is, not only is he harder to kill then Rasputin, if provoked enough he may well go the third party route and kill their chances. He openly threatened them again in the debate last night. He all but said, “Make me the nominee and I won’t have to torpedo your hopes in November.” It’s like having a strong arm extortionist in the race.
Pithy Pseudonym
Fixed it for you.
DougJ
@Kay:
Christie is done.
Cacti
@gf120581:
I think they figured the loyalty oath question was a clever “gotcha”. But I’m near certain it will have the opposite effect with the true believers.
RSA
@gf120581:
It’s like one of the governing parties saying, “Give us what we want or we’ll shut down the government.”
Kind of funny when that same strategy is being applied to that party’s nomination process.
Kay
@DougJ:
And has been done for a while. But what’s great about it is he doesn’t know it! It may take him months to find out, and he’ll have to keep suiting up and enduring all kinds of indignities and slights.
Joel
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Remember when everyone thought Obama blew it in the (much later, more important) debates? We’re not getting rid of Bush that easily.
Cacti
Trump is the alpha jerk that the Teabaggers have been longing for as their Presidential candidate.
He’s going to be in the race for a long time.
skjellyfetti
Indeed
Paul in KY
@Kay: That will be great to watch & savor!
beltane
There’s been lots of talk that Trump did badly last night, but I’m not so sure. This morning, my husband felt compelled to watch Trump clips from the debate over and over again, sort of the way people do while watching natural disaster videos. While my husband is a Democrat who would never vote for Trump, there is something about him that is like catnip to white, middle-aged man-children.
Paul in KY
@Joel: Agree. Not ready to stick a fork in him yet. he has loads & loads of money & we haven’t hit a primary yet.
Would say that if he does badly in NH, then I may begin thinking he is done.
JPL
Kasich appeared to be the sane one last night. What a scary thought that is?
My son and his SO, watched the debate and cheered for Trump. His candidacy does shine a light on the republican party and not in a good way.
MattF
@Cacti: And all the others are beta jerks. I like that model for the Republican party– it explains a lot.
Roger Moore
@gf120581:
It couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch.
gene108
@Kay:
I love the fact they threw Christie’s record as governor in his face. He’s been utterly useless for NJ.
They tried that a bit with Walker, but unfortunately the 2009, 2010 governors came in on the right side of the post-Great Recession recovery, while their predecessors got stuck with the fall out of the greatest economic disaster in 80 years.
They can all say their predecessors lost “x” number of jobs, while Walkers and Christies can say they did relative to their predecessors.
A few follow up questions would point this out, but the MSM usually does not do follow ups, so they can get away with the talking point.
mike in dc
As poor a performance as Romney had leading up to the actual primaries, I don’t think he slipped below 2nd in the polls, did he? I would expect Jeb! to drop to 3rd after this, and wouldn’t be surprised if he slipped further down to 4th or 5th if he has another bad debate performance like this one.
JPL
@Kay: Christie received a standing ovation at the Red State Convention, so that helped boost his ego.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
Last night when Trump said he gave money to almost all of the other candidates, one piped up and said, “Not me!” It got a laugh but I couldn’t see who that was. Could someone tell me?
raven
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne):
During the Fox News debate, Donald Trump repeatedly bragged about having given his opponents campaign money in the past. At one point, several chimed in to say that they’d never gotten those checks.
Trump: “Most of the people on stage, I’ve given to, a lot of money.” Rubio: “Not me! Not me! To be clear you supported Charlie Crist”
Omnes Omnibus
Walker gave the kind of charisma-free assholsh performance that I expected of him. He is not able to stand out in a group – not even with his viciously appalling abortion answer.
OTOH, I don’t think Cruz hurt himself with the GOP base. I know that he is repugnant to any remotely decent person, but, in this race, that might be a feature not a bug.
Kropadope
@KG:
…and if he did, you would collectively decide he was a commie.
raven
@Kropadope: Or a semi-colon.
shell
I beg to differ.I think that title was a toss up between Cruz and Walker.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@raven: Thanks. I was wondering.
srv
People here may be in denial, but Americans are hungry for change:
schrodinger's cat
@srv: People love to watch a train wreck in progress.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@shell: Three-way tie.
Observing Walker’s dead eyes and slack jaw, I can’t imagine that he was elected in the first place, let alone winning three elections, especially the latter two when considering his performance.
Kropadope
@srv: I, as an American, am hungry for a change. If the change comes in the form of those Republicans, however, I’ll go hungry.
BTW, wouldn’t that just be a change back to when things were abysmally bad?
OzarkHillbilly
@srv: You seem to be unable to distinguish between ‘political change’ and wanting to watch something other than another Flintstones rerun.
Randy P
Heh. I had a glasses ad just below this thread (as it appears on the front page). Is that triggered by Perry?
When I expanded to read comments, the ad switched to dentures. Or rather “say no to dentures”. Oh wait, the smart-person-glasses ad is still there in the margins.
So mostly I’ve been crowing with the rest of you about how wonderful it would be if Trump were the GOP candidate and how he’d be bound to lose by at least 150%. But suddenly today, out of the blue, I was hit by a poke in the gut by the Nagging Finger of Doubt. What if, demographically, the kind of blustering assholes who go for Trump turn out to be a majority of voters after all?
(I’ve never gotten over the fact that Romney got a majority of ANY demographic group, and not just in the south. It erodes my fundamental optimism)
They’re not, right? Somebody talk me down.
Belafon
@srv: This is why FOX severely limited the ways to watch it online. Forcing as many people as possible to watch on TV boosted the ratings.
schrodinger's cat
Didn’t watch the debate, don’t get cable. Even when I had cable I would never turn to Fox, since I am not into self inflicted pain.
singfoom
@srv: The only conclusion one can wring from that datum is that 16% of US TV viewers watching at that point were watching the debates.
Merely watching the debates does not say whether one is interested in voting for any of the people on the screen or even part of the party in question.
People sure do like to watch the Donald Donald. Whether that means that people will turn out for him at the ballot box is an open question.
So what are people here in denial about?
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@srv: No, 16% of homes with a Nielsen box.
Besides, who doesn’t love a good train wreck? My grandfather, a professional photographer, supplemented his income from portrait-sitters by selling reprints of disaster photos, the wreck of the Eastland being the most famous.
Gin & Tonic
@Kay: “Bold move” may be the fact that additional subpoenas were issued to David Samson this week. Wildstein must be singing up a storm.
Christie is toast.
Randy P
@srv: You’re aware that a lot of BJers and their ilk were part of those ratings numbers, right? You were here last night.
To put it more plainly, watching trainwreck != voting for.
schrodinger's cat
Its truly appalling that birther Trump is the frontrunner for the Presidential nomination of the Republican Party. The party of Lincoln has sure come a long way.
mai naem mobile
Jeebua, I think that old fox(animal not channel)William Jefferson Clinton is behind the Trump phenomena. Seriously awesome move. This is even better than all the eleven dimension flying jujitsu chess that Obama’s pulled on the GOP. Not sure if Trump has realized he’s just a pawn or not.
Paul in KY
@OzarkHillbilly: I think the debates big rival was a Big Brother episode! Not much going on, on a Summer Thursday.
dedc79
@srv: The debate was popular the way “Man getting hit by football” was popular.
Paul in KY
@Randy P: Can you imagine a Trumpnaguration ™?!?! It will be yuge!!!
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
I just can’t imagine him beating any sane/competent Democratic nominee.
Amir Khalid
@mai naem mobile:
If it was indeed Hillary’s husband who persuaded Trump to run for president as a Republican, that was worthy of a place in the Ratfucking Hall of Fame, and might even be the Mother Of All Ratfucks.
srv
You people probably think NASCAR fills huge stadiums because people like to see car wrecks.
It’s an interesting expose on the gliberal mind, someone should study that.
Paul in KY
@Amir Khalid: Only if The Donald does not win Presidency.
Praise not the ice until it has been crossed.
Randy P
@Paul in KY:
Trump would probably move the government to Trump Towers for the duration. Or delegate it to VP Fiorini on Day 1 and then go back to losing money in his casinos.
On 9.5 days out of 10 I agree with you that this idiot can’t win. Even with Unlimited Corporate Cash! Still I hope the Dems don’t take the election for granted.
I don’t have the personal animosity that many people have for Hilary. I heard her in a small setting in the 2008 campaign and found her warm, engaging and humorous. And nothing has shaken that impression. I think she has a great smile, as well as being no-nonsense and capable of eviscerating The Donald with one hand without breaking a sweat. Those are qualities I *like* in my leaders.
Calouste
@mike in dc: Romney seldom slipped below 20% in the polls, even when he was in second. Jeb hasn’t been above 20% in any poll that also had Trump in it, and not in many others.
Randy P
@Paul in KY: Dang, my comment is in moderation because I mentioned certain chance-based entertainment establishments in connection with Donald.
MattF
@mai naem mobile: I don’t think Trump’s brain is physically capable of that realization. It would implode into a black hole.
Central Planning
@srv:
Do they mean homes with TVs or homes with cable/satellite? I have a TV but was unable to tune in because Fox was not broadcasting on local affiliates (i.e. no cable or satellite – OTA and OTT FTW)
ETA – dammit, clearly I’m not the only one who had that thought
Hungry Joe
One thing I have learned from watching debates is that my impressions of how candidates “did” are almost invariably wrong. I seem incapable of putting myself in the general public’s — much less GOP voters’ — minds.
That said, I felt that the winner last night was Fox News. From the very first question (paraphrase: “Any traitors on stage tonight?”) to the post-debate comments, it was clear that the objective was to deflate Trump — and they pretty much succeeded. If they didn’t destroy him, they certainly took him down a notch or three. I bet there were a lot of high-fives at Fox HQ.
dmsilev
@Amir Khalid: I seriously hope it’s true. The political equivalent of lobbing a water balloon filled with skunk oil into the middle of the republican field.
sharl
@Kay:
This is exactly what I’ve been pushing for! Punching one or several public school teachers – History’s Greatest Monsters™ – can only help his cause, no matter what the haterrz say!
But I think he should also talk more about his sex life. The People™ can’t get enough of that! When he did that – TPM reported on it, but Wonkette did a much better job writing it up (no surprise!) – I don’t think it had any negative impact on his polling numbers. Smells like VICTORY! to me!
JPL
@srv: Watching the Republicans debate, is pure entertainment. It’s not often that you can watch a program and listen to a candidate wanting to tax hookers.
Randy P
@srv: No, dingbat. We think that people who said “I’m a Democrat and I’m going to watch to enjoy the trainwreck” are Democrats who intended to watch to enjoy the trainwreck.
Nobody is speculating about unknowns here. Except you. I guess you’re claiming that anybody who watched, no matter what their explicitly-stated motivations, is secretly a Donald groupie. Is that it? Wonkette, BJ, the Guardian, all secret Trump-heads?
Cacti
@Calouste:
Trump hasn’t been in a head to head poll with Hillary where he doesn’t trail by double digits, and he has the highest name recognition of any GOPer along with Jeb.
That’s why the RNC/Koch/Murdoch establishment is mortified.
OzarkHillbilly
@srv:
I for one haven’t got a clue as to what could possibly get thousands and thousands of people to spend hundreds upon hundreds of dollars to sit crammed into hot, hard, cramped seats with a hundred thousand sweaty bodies and watch cars drive in circles for a couple hours.
Why don’t you clue me in?
Fair Economist
Trump is the overwhelming winner of every online poll I can find, as well as the Google search index (which, interestingly, gives about the same rankings as the online poll.) In terms of influencing watchers, he seems the clear winner.
From the Google search index, Walker was the loser. He dropped through the debate and ended up out of the top 10 (replaced by Fiorino). Apparently people watching the debate were uninterested in him. He’s just in the pack in the polls, but that’s probably loyal supporters.
the Conster
@Fair Economist:
You’d think the Kochs could pay enough people to freep all the polls.
trollhattan
Is there a handy-dandy chronological list of Republican front-runners from 2012? I expect it’s hard to have a definitive one given the many polls and their yoooge accuracy variation, but maybe a more reliable one such as
Rasmu…Pew.Seem to recall it was like someone pinned them to a wheel and spun it, with a new leader every eight days.
JPL
@Fair Economist: How did Jeb do in the polls. I thought his performance was pretty blah.
It’s unfortunate they didn’t ask the candidates to show their weapons, that would have added to the entertainment value. Maybe CNN will promise fights, in order to improve their ratings.
dedc79
@srv: You didn’t mean in it in this way, but NASCAR is actually a pretty good comparison.
There are people there b/c they love car racing and want to see it live. There are people there for the spectacle of it (tailgating, boozing etc..) and there are others who ARE there to see something explode.
That’s probably similar to the debate audience breakdown.
wrb
@DougJ:
to the idea that mainstream Democrats are scared of Trump.
I fear I share the Reagan deja vu. I was smug in my certainty that this idiot who biggest accomplishment was being cast alongside a chimp could never be elected.
Fred
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne): I have always assumed that the slack jawed, dopey eyed look on Walker’s face that I’m familiar with was due to leftie editors picking those awful shots. After all the comments I’ve read about just that I’m beginning to wonder. I’ll have to look up some video to see if he really looks so stoopid in action.
Gex
@the Conster: The entire point of their existence is to make sure the plebes don’t get any of their money. It’s one thing to hire sycophants to start astroturf movements to fool the plebes into supporting them, but paying the plebes is never an option. Defeats the purpose.
schrodinger's cat
@srv: DougJ sock puppet or understudy?
trollhattan
@Fair Economist:
My take on Walker all along is he’s so vanilla and uninteresting so long as he didn’t make any big gaffes he might weasel through the process, since he’s basically a big ol blank screen on which any low-information Republican can project their pet interests. Evidently this only goes so far, as there’s bland and there’s BLAND. His pro-bidnez/anit-worker credentials are so reliable that he’d harvest all the moneys were he the candidate.
JPL
@trollhattan: Real Clear Politics..
trollhattan
@wrb:
Reagan actually crafted a coalition while Trump believes he can bluster and/or buy what and whomever he needs. Reagan could also switch on the oh-shucks charm whenever it suited him. Big differences there.
scav
I’m still laughing. Mainstream Republicans terrified of Reagan! Oh that tattered rag of a stereotyped iconic misremembering of a crafted actor’s role, reduced to being used as a chew toy in a tug of war between wings of his own party.
trollhattan
@JPL:
Oooh, better than I’d envisioned. Thanks, that’s yoooge!
Think it’s lost on many that Perry, Gingrich, Cain(!) and Santorum(!!!) all led at times. Perry’s plunge immediately upon opening his yap is especially heartwarming.
Gin & Tonic
@trollhattan: Reagan was also elected Governor of California twice. Trump, obvs, has never been elected anything anywhere.
trollhattan
@Gin & Tonic:
True that. California still has a lot to apologize for :-(
the Conster
@trollhattan:
Reagan was a two term governor of a state that’s bigger than a lot of countries, and was runner up.to Ford. Trump has never had to ask anyone for anything, like their vote, and doesn’t know how. It shows.
rumpole
A couple of points: the moderation was good, but it was in no way fair. Fox was out to discredit Trump from the get-go. All of the candidates had told egregious whoppers before–none were asked about it.
And he still nailed the questions.
This is what the republicans have wrought. Self-funded campaigns (’cause money is speech, remember?) are by definition incorruptible. So Trump may be bellicose, arrogant, and ill-informed, but he can say things to the other guys that they can’t dare say to each other because no one is pulling his strings. And he doesn’t care. He is the ideal Citizens United/Davis/McCutcheon candidate. And to boot, he just ensured that whoever wins the nomination is going to have to kiss his ring.
And it’s still a grotesquely long shot, but I wonder if he could actually win the nomination. He is going to need to be prepared a little (lot) better if there are longer form answers in debates. Fox also is now and will be out to get him. Much of the conservative media will be as well.
(On a side note, I noticed for the first time that Rubio’s ears look like they were lifted off of a Mt. Rushmore sized Mr. Spock and glued to his head. Once I noticed that, I could not stop looking. )
ThresherK (GPad)
@Pie Happens (opiejeanne): Can you recommend a good book about the Eastland? I sorta like disaster books. (See the General Slocum, Peshtigo Fire, Iroquois Theater…)
Matt McIrvin
@trollhattan: HuffPo’s primary poll aggregation from 2012 was good:
http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2012-national-gop-primary#!estimate=custom&selected=Cain,Gingrich,Huntsman,Paul,Perry,Romney,Santorum,Undecided
You can see the Perry, Cain, Gingrich and Santorum boomlets there. (The Michele Bachmann one was earlier, off the left edge of the chart.) But Mitt Romney was always in a solid second place even when somebody else had peaked, and he always bounced back. It wasn’t like today where the non-Trump supporters are more fragmented.
srv
@Gin & Tonic: Trump is a better actor than Reagan was, all the evidence is he’d be just as good a leader.
Betty Cracker
@rumpole:
Me too! And Aqua Man is one of my senators, and before that the speaker of the house in my state, so it’s not like I haven’t had to look at his stupid mug for years. Don’t know how I missed those twin beige manta rays bracketing his jaws. Maybe he’s taking some experimental anti-baldness drug that has this weird side effect…
Bill
@gf120581: Trump: “That’s a nice party you’ve got there Reince. It’d be a shame is something happened to it.”
Paul in KY
@srv: Trump probably has more experience giving off-the-cuff answers while on TV. Reagan was good at playing genial uncle/grandfather parts.
Mike in NC
Starting to form an image of President-elect Trump on Inauguration Day, wearing a monocle and top hat with cape, throwing fistfuls of $20 bills from his open top limousine.
trollhattan
@srv:
The most inadvertently accurate statement you’ve made, evah.
Joel
@Mike in NC: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bnbogYyBiQc
Fair Economist
@JPL:
Way back in the pack – far enough that he’s mixed in and does differently from poll to poll. He did better in the Google index, coming 5th. The opposite of Walker, who did better in the polls than the Google index.
Fair Economist
@trollhattan:
Yeah, and apparently his campaign gets it too, because today they put out an out-of-the-blue press release talking up his “accomplishments” (in wrecking Wisconsin). I guess they’re trying to remind the big guys that he can beat up on the unions even if he bores the voters to tears.
Chris
@trollhattan:
Could Trump sit down and negotiate with America’s greatest enemy?
I don’t think any of them could.
Bill
@Fair Economist:
Speaking as a cheesehead, I can’t imagine what it is they think he’s “accomplished” in Wisconsin.
jl
Late to this thread, but just wanted to say that I think DougJ’s practice trolling here at this miserable lefty blog is coming along very well, and he will be fine form by next summer. Keep up the good work, DougJ!
trollhattan
@Chris:
You’d first have to lock them in a room to decide just who’s “America’s greatest enemy.”
They’d eventually agree on Obama.
White Trash Liberal
Not NASCAR. demolition derby. That’s a more apt comparison.
boatboy_srq
@rumpole: It was laughable a month ago. It’s a long shot today. How long before he’s leading in the polls AND has IA/NH/SC/plus under his belt? You’re quite right that Trump is absolutely not what the Citizens United plaintiffs had in mind; but then again the Citizens United case was tailored for Old Money and not New Money like Trump. The decision allowed Old Money to own the candidate – but it also (inadvertently?) allowed Money, New or Old, to be the candidate, and until now the GOTea and its backers missed that. All the mechanisms Old Money has built (AEI, ALEC, etc) are now outmaneuvered, cumbersome and horribly inefficient thanks to all the staff, workplaces, funded research and other expenditures that aren’t going straight into the campaigns. JEB!’s famous fundraising, aimed as it is at his RtR PAC, means exactly squat now because he’ll never be able to wring the efficiencies out of the finances that Trump will from his own coffers simply by being Trump.
James E Powell
@ThresherK (GPad):
Ashes Under Water by Michael McCarthy
I have a thing for shipwrecks, plane crashes, and engineering disasters, especially when, as here, the whole thing ends up in court.
Jeffro
@DougJ:
I think he is, too. Too moderate for the base, being all Obama-huggy and what not. And since there are plenty of abrasive, supposed truth-tellers running, there’s no rationale for his candidacy. Need someone to put Israel’s interests above the US’s? We’ve got that covered unanimously. Need a deficit hawk? Got it (x5). He does nothing for the religious right – those folks are covered by everyone but Trump, Paul, and Christie already.
Jeffro
@JPL:
YesBut: $100M+ in PAC money is nothing to sneeze at. Let’s see what happens when the Bush slime machine starts really taking whacks at the other serious contenders this December/January
cthulhu
So I put together this analysis on who “won” the debate yesterday:
https://www.facebook.com/reolmstead/posts/10204403287390383:0
Not that I expect post-debate averages of quality polling will change much next week.
ThresherK (GPad)
@James E Powell: Thanx much!
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@ThresherK (GPad): I haven’t read a book about the Eastland, but there are some articles online and my dad told me quite a bit about it even though it happened before he was born.
I found this: Ashes Under Water
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@ThresherK (GPad): Here’s one of the photos I found in my grandfather’s collection: Wreck of the Eastland: divers working to recover the bodies
David Koch
You are devil
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@James E Powell: Oh, you got there first. That’ll teach me to go out and play with the cat in the garden after lunch.
cmorenc
@Fred:
Walker looks uncannily like the younger Richard Nixon at about the age when he became Eisenhower’s Vice-President. Same underlying type of personality as well.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
If DougJ is reading this, the “write an e-mail to one of the front pagers” links aren’t working. You could e-mail me instead, if you see this. My e-mail is linked to my user name, I think…
KS in MA
@James E Powell:
If you like shipwreck stories–this one is about the USS Warrington, which sank in a hurricane off Florida in 1944.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Dragons-Breath-Hurricane-Sea/dp/155750153X
Evap
It was fun to meet fellow BJ folks last night and I enjoyed watching the debate with ya’ll. I’m sorry that Elizabelle couldn’t get in the door, it was really crowded and way too loud for comfort. Elizabelle, wish I’d seen your posts before I got home.
Citizen Alan
@wrb:
Dude, Reagan /was/ the governor of California for 8 years. And a relatively successful one. The people who dismissed him as the “Bedtime for Bonzo” guy were always deluding themselves. And while I love and admire Jimmy Carter, Hillary is probably not going to have to answer debate questions about the Iranian hostage situation and why gas prices are at historic highs.
James E Powell
@KS in MA:
Thanks for the tip, I will check that out.