I can’t find anything about this yet on the NBC site but now that five or six people have tweeted some version of this, it must have been on MTP this morning:
Post-Debate Poll (NBC)
Trump 23%
Cruz 13%
Carson 11%
Fiorina 8%
Rubio 8%
Bush 7%
Walker 7%
That's quite a 1, 2, 3…
— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) August 9, 2015
@JoeNBC @NBCNews @chucktodd oh my….. pic.twitter.com/IVgNXSDR45
— Richard Wilson (@rwwilmington) August 9, 2015
I’m not surprised by Trump, but Cruz and Carson? Cruz came across as the assholic law nerd that he is, and Carson….in a night filled with disturbing moments, the most disturbing moment was when a successful neurosurgeon suggested that tithing — not a variant of tithing set at 23.8% with earned income tax credits or whatever but actual tithing in the strictest sense — should become our new tax system.
It may be something as simple as the fact that no one else talked about the Bible that much, so Carson is just picking up that portion of the electorate.
Update Great watching the wingers whine about this poll. Actually, methodology of poll might be weird.
Baud
Carson is a shocker. He did not seem that strong. Didn’t Huckabee talk about the bible?
So much for Kasich’s attempt at being the “serious” candidate.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’m not a doctor, man!
h/t David Koch
HinTN
They’re so easy.
Gimlet
But… But… Kasich won. I heard that from a number of pundits.
beltane
@Baud: Republican voters do not want a serious candidate. They want a candidate who reflects their values.
Halcyan
There are loads of people who think a flat tax rate of 10% would be good. But these are not bean counters, who know better. A “Flat Tax” would have to be in the neighborhood of 20-25% to be feasible. And Carson wants this to be a “consumption tax” – aka Sales Tax. Well, who among us consumes nearly if not all of their income? The poor. The wealthy put their money in banks, in stocks and bonds. They spend a fraction of their income. This is what we refer to as a regressive tax, rather than our current income tax which is rather progressive. That they can sell this to the GOP base is another instance of the rubes voting against their own interests. The GOP base – in numbers – is not the rich people.
oldster
Okay, but are you quoting Yeats directly, or some pop song that re-used Yeats for lyrics or a title?
I note that Joni Mitchell’s version changed the phrase to, “And the worst are full of passion/ Without mercy.”
I only ask because I count on you for the most amazing references to pop lyrics.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
also not a scientist, man!
beltane
Where is R2R to tell us that this is good news for Jeb!.
cmorenc
Trump is like the broomstick in Disney’s classic “Sorcerer’s Apprentice” segment in Fantasia – set loose by apprentice Mickey borrowing some magic from his master’s giant book of sorcery to do his nasty work for him, but Mickey unfortunately discovers that once unleashed he has no clue nor ability to halt or destroy the broomstick once it crosses over into destructive excess.
Amir Khalid
Well, the Republican party base does admire assholery; so it might not be surprising that an asshole like Ted Cruz has risen in the polling after the first debate.
More significant, maybe, is that Jeb’s starting to sink. It must be concerning for the party establishment that their guy has been such a feeble candidate so far.
Baud
@beltane:
Send a memo to MSNBC.
Davis X. Machina
@Halcyan:
Think of it as an anti-poverty plan. Pigou’s idea was that if you want less of a negative externality — carbon emissions, cigarette smoking, poor people — you tax it.
So a swingeing consumption tax, falling hardest on the poorest, will reduce the number of poor people!
This could be the biggest anti-poverty legislation since the original AFDC, or EITC!
Gimlet
Christie must step up his game in the next debate. If being obnoxious is what it takes, Christie must unleash “the beast”.
Capri
Washington Monthly’s blog has it right – the Republicans don’t want a presidential candidate, they want a new rebel leader
MattF
Well… you could add up the last four and say that the Establishment Candidates together are (roughly) tied with Trump, as are Cruz+Carson+Huckabee. The remaining 25% are rejecting everyone, IMO.
indycat32
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He should tell that to Savita Halappan’s widower.
Doug R
So Fox’s promotion of Carly “outsource” Fiorina worked. As pointed out by Ed Kilgore, via Smartypants: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/fox-news-control-over-gop-debates
beltane
@Gimlet: Christie’s brand of obnoxious is not what the GOP base craves. He may be Huuuge! but he’s not a successful billionaire like Trump. Does Chris Christie have a men’s cologne named after him? No? Well, he’s a loser then.
smintheus
I’d have said the most disturbing moment of the debate was when Carson announced that it was nobody’s business if we torture prisoners. At least in a sane party that would count as the most disturbing.
PeakVT
The candidates the base AND the leadership deserve. I expect to do a lot more of this before the primary is over.
Schlemazel
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
But he would happily destroy millions of jobs based on a theory that has been proven to destroy jobs but is popular among morons who vote GOP.
Trentrunner
The headline is Fiorina’s rise.
She’s the only one who rose significantly out among the 5-7 candidates in <5% obscurity.
So she's in the next headliner debate, will share the stage with Trump, and be the only woman candidate in an atmosphere of "bleeding wherever" and Hillary.
Gimlet
@beltane:
You wait.
He’ll score big points when he tears that forelock off Trumps head and throws it to the howling crowd.
beltane
@Trentrunner: Trump will be very happy to point out Fiorina’s abysmal record in business. She’s just another LOSER!
beltane
@Gimlet: But how can Christie compete with this: http://www.fragrantica.com/perfume/Trump/Donald-Trump-22530.html
The reviewers say it is “long lasting” and “enormous”.
Warren Terra
I wonder if a Republican who had no actual preference might find Carson to be a sort of safe answer, someone they can name to show their ideological purity and lack of racism without expressing a preference for an actual serious candidate.
Schlemazel
@beltane:
Ha! THAT would be a great debate – which one has the biggest business failures. They could go at each other fou ours.
beltane
@Warren Terra: Maybe there are some Republicans who are afraid to admit to liking one of the quasi-sane candidates so they go with Carson.
Gimlet
@beltane:
Sissy stuff. Real men just wear sweat.
After he shears Sampson, he’ll boast that he’s built bigger and worse casinos than Trump in Jersey.
Kropadope
Cruz and Trump on top? So much for the theory that they’re drawing from the same pool of voters.
Wait, they’re at a combined 36% in a spread out field. Republicans are half the electorate. Perhaps they are drawing from the same pool, the famous 27% of the electorate which, if entirely comprised of Republicans, would make 54% of the Republican vote.
MattF
@Warren Terra: Seems more likely to me that Carson is in the Xtian group, as is Cruz.
Karen S.
@Trentrunner:
Agreed. I do wonder, though, if someone (Trump?) starts pointing out her abysmal business “leadership” record if GOP voters will pay attention. I mean, they supposedly worship businessmen (and women). Right? Although I guess it doesn’t matter if they’re actually successful at business, just as long as they mouth the right platitudes about business.
JPL
Although, I watched MTP, I missed both the Rubio statement and the poll. I tuned in to hear Trump talk about his good looks and tuned out when Hewitt started to speak.
Librarian
…but Rachel said that because Fiorina was in the kids table debate, her candidacy should be over. I guess Rachel was wrong. (Snark)
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
My top moment in the debate was when Huckabee told us that under his tax plan, whores, pimps, drug dealers and other assorted scumbags would also be paying taxes. I think he was just excited that he got to talk about whores in a presidential debate. I think his whole life had been leading to that.
beltane
@Karen S.: Unlike Trump, Fiorina was actually FIRED!!!
Schlemazel
@Warren Terra:
I would picture Ben going the way of Herman Cain. Dave and Chuck would be speaking in the bathroom while Ben/Herman smokes a joint in a stall.
Chuck: Now, what are we going to do about taking Scotty back and returning Ben to the ghetto?
Dave: I don’t want Scotty back, after what he’s done.
Chuck: You mean, keep *Ben* on as candidate?
Dave: Do you really believe I would have a *nigger* run our family business, Charles? Of course not. Neither would I.
Botsplainer
@cmorenc:
As I said in the last thread, he’s Leroy Jenkins, hurtling in to do battle on behalf of the GOP base id, consequences be damned, all while the dorks of the GOP establishment say “godDAMN, Leroy, you moron”.
Peak Wingnut is here. Savor.
Mike E
@beltane:
/Cleek’d
Kropadope
@Schlemazel: Apparently Kasich didn’t hear the news that cap and trade programs to reduce CO2 pollution create jobs and save people money.
beltane
Donald Trump is the wingnut liberation candidate. They will be silenced no more!
jl
Not surprised that Jeb! didn’t help himself in the debate. I could not figure out what some of his word salad answers and statements meant. I guess he was trying to be inspirational. Jeb! spit out word salad of a conventional sort that is not criticized as much as the Palin more dramatic sort, but that means just as little.
As long as the most unelectable rise in the polls after the debate, I figure that it was a job well botched by all involved, and will hope for a repeat performance next time.
bystander
@beltane: Now that will be must-see teevee. I love it when Trump insults them when they’re standing 10 feet away. My hope is that he expands on why she was such a lousy CEO by characterizing Fiorina as some affirmative action CEO. That way he can work misogyny into his insult, but still avoid another unfortunate reference to menses.
Kropadope
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): If that means that Huckabee wants to legalize personal vices in order to tax them, I’m all for it.
Wait, he was talking about a sales tax wasn’t he…?
Baud
@Kropadope:
He heard. He doesn’t care.
Schlemazel
@Kropadope:
There is no profit in it for him to hear that so, no, he never heard such a thing
White Trash Liberal
Months ago I was lambasted for my prediction that Cruz is the one to look out for. He went after McConnell over not going to the mat over babbies. That was the front line of the recent outrage wars. He is the one fighting the good fight against the establishment.
There’s rhetorical red meat and there is action red meat. That element of showmanship is what makes Cruz dangerous.
Even when he screws through dumb maneuvering, he gets credit for being a fighter and a believer. I’m still firmly thinking he will get the nomination.
Brachiator
Interesting point. The Tea Party Republicans are not quite the same as the religious fundamentalists (they overlap over the issue of abortion).
And for many fundamentalists, the Bible is a combination history book, medical guide, and economic text, so their view of taxation is never much more sophisticated than the idea that theocracy is always good, and if the Bible says you should tithe, then that there’s your tax system.
Elsewhere, I heard some commentators suggesting that Fiorina had broken out from the kid’s table, but some GOP weasel on ABC was insisting that Rubio had done well. I guess for now, he is the GOP backroom alternate to Jeb!, who hasn’t risen above being bland.
With a relatively huge viewership, it is interesting to see that Trump hasn’t risen much. He probably cannot rise higher than 27 percent, the nutjob standard.
Gimlet
@Kropadope:
He was upset there were people in America not paying their fair share of taxes and making the tax burden so high for the “good” folk.
jl
Trump might be the rich white himbo Evita Peron candidate. How can you beat that?
gogol's wife
@White Trash Liberal:
I think that would be wonderful. He’ll never be elected president.
Kropadope
@White Trash Liberal: Republicans do love them some empty symbolic gestures.
Kropadope
@Gimlet: Right, I get that, but I’m more concerned with the mechanism.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
DougJ, if you see this, can you send me an e-mail? The “contact an author” thing isn’t working for me.
Schlemazel
@Kropadope:
That might explain why they support so many empty cymbals clanging in office
beltane
@jl: That’s who he reminds me of a bit. His supporters aren’t even concerned with pissing off liberals anymore, they just want to scream at everyone and everything, especially the conservative establishment that has bamboozled them for so long.
Perhaps Donald Trump represents the first punk rock candidacy. Ever Get the Feeling You’ve Been Cheated could be the theme of his campaign.
Amir Khalid
@bystander:
My understanding is that Fiorina was a perfectly competent COO at Lucent, which earned her the gig as CEO of HP, but proved out of her depth in the top job.
WaterGirl
I missed the debates and pretty much missed all political news for the past week or two, so can I talk about the weather? We are having the most delightful rain this morning. It was a light rain for a few hours – the kind where it seems you can hear each raindrop falling – and now that the ground is wet and actually able to take up the rain, we are getting a nice downpour. My rain chain is a bit overwhelmed at the moment, but my garden and I are very happy.
WaterGirl
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Here’s his email address, which I will delete within the 5 minute edit window: it’s goppatriot50 on gmail.
MattF
@WaterGirl: Beautiful day in my neighborhood. Mid 80s, breezy, not humid. Mostly the same predicted for the rest of the week, maybe no more semi-tropical 90s, one can hope.
jl
It does bother me that the GOP candidates get away with crummy economic proposals that I at least never see criticized in the corporate media. Christie’s proposals for means testing and benefit caps for social security won’t save diddly unless you test and cap far down into middle class income, around 40 K. There is nothing inherently regressive about the idea of a consumption tax, but the GOP pass off versions that are very regressive and never get called on it.
Watching them peddle BS, and never being called on it by our intrepid corporate journalist class infuriates me, one of the reasons I find following GOP primary infuriating. This year the prospect of disaster for them makes it a little easier, though.
El Caganer
But where’s Everybody’s Favorite Brogressive, Rand Paul?
ArchTeryx
@Schlemazel: The Duke Brothers were nasty pieces of work. Who knew that life would imitate art and give us the Koch Brothers in response? The Koch’s bet a dollar they could impoverish the entire *country*.
WereBear
It’s only embarrassing if one is capable of shame.
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
So you are saying that at a job where she had someone to check her results and possibly a good staff working for her, she did OK. Not good, not bad, OK. Then she moves up and totally screws up everything. Hard to believe that in one step up she flew that many miles over her Peter Principle limit. And at warp speed.
Liberal With Attitude
@Capri:
Which fits right in with it being the Party of the Confederacy.
MattF
@El Caganer: Good question. I’m thinking that Paul’s mildly anti-war stance puts him on the same side as Obama on an issue, and that’s just not done.
Ruckus
@WereBear:
This.
The entire field of the right lacks so many things it’s far easier to just list their positives.
Nothing. ETA, zero, nada, zilch, the square root of jack
WaterGirl
@WaterGirl: And of course, FYWP wouldn’t let me edit my own comment. Nice “welcome back” from FYWP.
White Trash Liberal
@gogol’s wife:
I agree. He lacks that sunny disposition affablephoniness Reagan and Bush had. If he was somehow able to achieve that, I would poo my britches.
Suzanne
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): That was the biggest WTF moment for me and Mr. Suzanne, too. We went from talking about taxation and Social Security’s role in reducing poverty to pimps and whores fast enough to make my head spin.
WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAT.
Eric U.
Bush’s numbers are like a coiled spring! Ready to rebound
Ruckus
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
I think his whole life had been leading to that.
It certainly hasn’t been leading to anything else.
Baud
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
I missed that part of the debate. I wonder what Grover would say.
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
I love Balloon Juice racists. You can’t admit it, so you project it onto the Republicans.
You can’t be bothered with trying to explain Carson’s rise in the polls, so you dredge up an offensive reference from “Trading Places” to explain why he won’t ever be the candidate.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
Speaking of projection……..
jl
@White Trash Liberal: Thanks, I forgot that Cruz went after McConnell at the debate. Gave the corporate media divas the vapors! Probably that is what gave him a boost.
Another good sign is that the GOP seems to have forgotten about ACA or HRCemailBengazigate!!! for the moment to concentrate on Planned Parenthood as the bogeyman outrage machine. But the PP flap is even more transparently BS than the other two, and more popular with general public than the GOP, or ACA or HRC, so I hope the GOP continues to make that kind of progress on the PR front.
Josie
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): I lol’ed at this. It sums up Huck so perfectly.
jl
@Ruckus: You forgot ‘zip’, but thanks for reminding us of a handy and concise lexicon to describe the GOP field. I’ll keep it in mind from now on.
Amir Khalid
@Ruckus:
No, not quite. A chief operating officer, as you know, is in charge of daily operations — running the shop, making sure stuff runs on time. Fiorina was good at that as Lucent’s COO. I think where she failed at HP was in having the business judgement and the diplomatic chops that a CEO needs in addition to operational competence. And that a POTUS needs as well.
Ultraviolet Thunder
I wonder to what extent the statistics nerdism and performance analysis matter. I wouldn’t be surprised if the nominee is the one behind whom the largest number of billionaires line up rather than the largest number of voters. In that case it’s likely to be Jeb! no matter how many rakes he steps on. He’s the Corporatist candidate, the Romney of ’16.
Ruckus
@jl:
Zip
jl
@Josie: I was waiting for Huck to show us how to cook grits and gravy with the barrel of a machine gun, as have many others I am sure. I guess Huck aint figured it out, so he had to work hookers and blow into his pitch big time to make up for it.
jl
@Ruckus: thanks.
feebog
@Kropadope:
No, I think they are drawing from the same pool of voters. Look at it this way; if Republicans are 48% of the electorate (based on the last two presidential elections), 36% equals 16.9% of the total electorate. In other words, Trump and Cruz have about 17% of the crazies, and the other 10% are still backing other candidates.
Eric U.
@Ruckus: what about ‘bupkis’?
Kropadope
@jl:
But will it stay that way with the GOP beating the war drums? Say what you will about the GOP; whatever else they are, they’re effective agitators.
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
If you have an actual point to make, try to do so.
On Fiorina: She severely upset the HP corporate and engineering culture and failed to deliver when the PC market was beginning to decline.
jl
I warn those here who are trying to decipher the roller coaster ride of GOP primary voters’ preferences: that way leads to sorrow and madness. Remember the last two presidential election cycles. It is a mystery wrapped in an enigma. Only the GOP Id and Brain Stem know.
SiubhanDuinne
@WaterGirl:
And to think there are still those who claim DougJ doesn’t troll.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator:
Nice try but no. I was not disparaging either Cain or Carson, I was disparaging the Kochs and the mouth-breathers who can’t handle a black man as President even if he is in their party. Its nice of you to intentionally misunderstand that & try to misrepresent what I was doing. I mean, you must be doing it intentionally, nobody can be that stupid and still manage to breath without instructions
A Ghost To Most
@Amir Khalid:
Why is it that you understand America and the way things really work here better than the majority of Americans do?
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
In a very round about way, what I was getting at.
I doubt very many at the second rung don’t have aspirations for the next step and she has shown she has those in abundance. And I can not imagine that someone with those aspirations could run the day to day without gaining some knowledge about the next rung up the ladder. Don’t have to imagine, we have an example.
I’d also say that I can’t imagine that the board who hired her didn’t do a better job of searching for a CEO but I’ve worked for a company whose board hired someone so bad that any random group of 6 people off the street could have done a better job. Either as the CEO or the board.
Gex
I thought it perfectly clear why Carson rose. He told a cohort of white people who think that black people are the real racists that it’s basically the only kind of racism there is, that they are good and it is actually black people who are bad (with some exceptions, that’s what the phrase ‘you’re one of the good ones’ is for).
I believe the only message that would please the base more is if someone announce Zombie Reagan was entering the race.
Kropadope
@Eric U.: Too many synonyms for zero might itself constitute more positive traits than the GOP actually has.
dmsilev
Look, it’s quite simple. Trump is the modern-day reincarnation of Samson. If you want to stop him, shave off his hair.
Ruckus
@Eric U.:
OK this could go on for a while.
But just to be fair
Bupkis.
Schlemazel
@A Ghost To Most:
I’m guessing because he pays attention, as opposed to most Americans who can’t be bothered.
Joel
Windrip 2016!
Elie
Its hard to know where this show is going to go. So many aspects of it are alarming, startling, titillating like watching a tornado rip up the countryside. No matter how one hears this is “entertainment”, it is to me, very very disturbing that in a two party system, one party considers these kind of candidates a responsible answer to US world leadership. Can you imagine what European, South American, Middle and Southeast Asian leaders, etc are thinking when they see this show? Is it a surprise that ISIS, Boko Haram, use extreme behavior to get attention? That so called elected leaders in Africa decide its ok to appoint themselves leaders for life? My question is who is influencing who?
Our hope resides in having a strong and responsible Democratic candidate who can deal with going against this kind of sickness… with a clear enough vision of how to pull us through. This will be an extremely stressful compaign and this person, whoever he/she is, should acknowledge that a significant proportion of the US electorate are quite disturbed and that their looniness is being amplified by being catered to by not just Trump, but in varying degrees, most of the Republican candidates. Anyone that has dealt with people acting out, knows that playing to it just makes things worse — there is no way that it calms down over time once that is unleashed.
Amir Khalid
@A Ghost To Most:
I’m an omniscient genius. But I don’t like to brag about it.
Ruckus
@Schlemazel:
Are you sure?
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Brachiator: I wonder if the gushing over Rubio winning has more to do with the hope that he (or JEB!) will win FL if they’re on the ticket, and they need FL to win. They figure they’ll get TX either way, so they don’t care about Cruz. They need OH so that’s Kasich’s trump card (so to speak), but he doesn’t inspire the base (especially after approving Medicaid expansion).
It’s still terribly early. And summer. So 90% of the population (and almost every sensible person) isn’t paying attention in a meaningful way. But the politicos have to show they’re earning their keep, so they’ll spin out anything to show that their guy/gal is moving up!
JoeMentum!!11
Cheers,
Scott.
Calouste
@Amir Khalid: Well, except for that small detail that Lucent started missing all their estimates the first full quarter after Fiorina left and that “it was later revealed that it had used dubious accounting and sales practices to generate some of its earlier quarterly numbers”.
Which seems to imply that Fiorina, as COO, was cooking the books, although maybe not on her own.
Mandalay
Getting Rubio to clarify his position on abortion is like nailing jelly to the wall.
In the debate last Thursday he opposed abortion in the cases of r*pe and inc*st. But today on Meet The Press he said this:
So now he supports terminating pregnancy after r*pe. He wants to have his cake and eat it too. His new shtick is that he personally opposes all forms of abortion, but he still supports legislation that does otherwise because “a lot of people want to see those exceptions”.
Good luck explaining that nuance to the rabid Goopers, because it makes no sense to me.
Kropadope
@jl:
What are you talking about? It’s easy. The GOP, despite their assertions that the media has a liberal bias, is actually finely tuned to the vagaries of political media coverage. Increases in poll numbers correspond to one or both of two things. The first is a rise in media coverage. This coverage doesn’t necessarily need to be positive, but rather show the candidate in a light the base approves of. The second is when they distinguish themselves somehow. True, this could be attributed the news coverage aspect, but that leaves out the possibilities of a stand-out debate performance or a particularly hard-hitting commercial.
shell
This asshole would probably think an ectopic pregnancy is still viable.
ruemara
Well this seems stupid so I’ll post pictures instead. Fig & goat cheese rolls. Not bad. The challah is very soft and good. The fig filling is nice, but I can add more lemon juice and zest to cut the sweet. Also no one ever died from having more filling. All set for tomorrow’s office b’day.
Hal
Carson’s appeal is rooted in white conservatives insistence that it is democrats like Obama and people like Al Sharpton that are the real racists. Combine that with the desire to entirely dismiss Obama as anything but capable or intelligent, reducing his political success to white liberal guilt, and you have a recipe for success for black conservatives. Look! I’m willing to vote for a black guy. I can’t be racist!
This is also why people like Cain, West, Palin and Jindal were all at sometime popular possible candidates. Just make sure to tell your white audiences that you are one of the few minorities not brainwashed by the evil liberal media and you’ll do just fine.
Kropadope
@Elie:
I’m sure no country is without its compelling charlatans.
Amir Khalid
@Calouste:
Okay, maybe I’m not so omniscient.
Hal
@Gex: Oops. I didn’t see your post before posting the same thing.
DCrefugee
@Schlemazel: And where’s the dollar you owe me?
Rand Careaga
@Davis X. Machina:
This puts me in mind of a couple of lines from a John Updike story from the late fifties:
srv
Perhaps if you read the bible you’d understand why it serves as a basis for historical economics and usury.
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
There’s a difference between what you thought you were doing and what you actually accomplished. And instead of stepping back and reconsidering what you wrote, you instead try to play mini-Trump, which only reinforces your error.
So Carson rises in the polls, but instead you want to talk about why the GOP will never accept him. And you pick a movie reference in which you equate him to someone who was plucked out of and can be tossed back into the ghetto. And you also pick a movie reference which you think freely gives you the opportunity to throw out the N word.
But it’s the GOP, not you. Right.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Salon did a round up of debate reactions from B list conservative pundits (Coulter, Tim Carney, etc), and they don’t seem too fond of Kasich.
With everything so far away, any kind of speculation is pointless, but if Trump lasts through a few primaries, or all the way to the convention, it’ll be interesting to see how many write-in votes Trump eventually gets. (edited)
Splitting Image
Cruz said that he talks to God every day.
Carson said that the country needs to move beyond race, which is to say that n—–rs need to shut up. More importantly, he said this in answer to the God question, when the intended audience sat up and took notice.
Rubio made the most extreme comments about abortion.
It’s not really surprising that these three moved up as much as they did.
Amir Khalid
@shell:
I presume Marco Rubio has no female friends, has no female relatives — no mother, no aunts, no sisters etc., has no wife, and does not know any obstetricians whom he could ask.
oldgold
Although I am enjoying the GOP’s current position, this old piece of cautionary wisdom concerns me. “When the gods are angriest, they answer our prayers.”
Davis X. Machina
@Splitting Image:
By itself, that’s no problem — but If God talks back, a complete neurological work-up is called for.
SRW1
@beltane:
Doubtful dude will be seen for at least a week or two.
I also suspect nerves are fraying somewhat at the RNC and Koch HQ.
Kropadope
@Davis X. Machina: Psychological too, just to be safe.
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
Those of us from CA probably just can’t forget the demon sheep ad and how anyone could have thought that was in any way positive. It tends clarify your vision of the entire Carly shit show.
Iowa Old Lady
@shell: He doesn’t see women die from pregnancy complications because they have access to abortion. It’s like how the states under the VRA didn’t enact racist legislation, ergo, says the SC, we no longer need the VRA.
rikyrah
This is my laugh of the morning, Cole.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
and at least one gin bottle is empty on a veranda at Walker’s Point, and the domestiques are hiding in the pantry and ignoring the bell
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
What color is the sky in your world?
Kropadope
@Ruckus: Are we taking bets? I’m guessing…grey.
WereBear
@Amir Khalid: Then again, maybe he’s a low IQ type, and he’s just being honest about not being able to think…
gene108
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Could just as easily be talkin’ about gravity man…still a theory…still so much we don’t know yet…
But we still manage to take what we do know and fly airplanes, launch missiles, program GPS satellites, etc.
Also, too there’s so much we do not know about the human body…doesn’t stop us from using what we do know to do medicine stuff to sick people…
A Ghost To Most
@Schlemazel:
@Amir Khalid:
These days, just paying attention can make you seem omniscient to the herd, I suppose.
Liberal With Attitude
@Davis X. Machina:
As a person of faith, I think its commendable that someone speaks to the Deity every day.
What isn’t so commendable, is that his Deity urges him to be such an asshole.
SRW1
@srv:
Also, too: If you really study the bible you realize that abolishing slavery kindda was a mistake.
Jeffro
@Kropadope:
Wasn’t Trump at 37% or more going in? Scratch a Cruz voter and half the time you’ll find someone who wants Trump, but is starting to think about electability…
Patrick
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
In Europe, jobs are being created, not destroyed, as industries are trying to become more green.
And I guess Kasich doesn’t have grandkids, who will be paying for Kasich’s narrowmindedness.
SatanicPanic
My first thought was that Cruz won the debate. I guess I am more in tune with my inner asshole than I’d like to think
Amir Khalid
@Liberal With Attitude:
In Cruz’s case, I think that tells us who his real Deity is …
Jeffro
@White Trash Liberal:
I can’t see the Kochs or the Establishment wing in general lining up to support him, not at the top of the ticket. The VP slot, in exchange for all that base support Cruz obviously brings to the table? Yeah, unfortunately I can see that.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Amir Khalid:
There were lots of reports that her success at Lucent, and Lucent’s success in general, was vastly over-stated due to accounting shenanigans. Like, IIRC, booking revenue when a product shipped rather than when they were actually paid (and kinda ignoring the mountains of stuff that they shipped but had to take back a few months later). They had to pay a $25M fine to the SEC for actions in 2000. (She went to HP in 1999.)
I wouldn’t
putpoint to Lucent as an indication that she was a good manager, at least not a manager that wouldn’t bend the rules to the breaking point.FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
Yep, this could be it. The GOP power base, including the Kochs, really seem to love Jeb! and Rubio, and as you say, will win Texas anyway.
Kasich was on the ABC Sunday show offering himself as a sane moderate, which probably makes him a target to the conservative Republicans.
Mandalay
@Brachiator: You just tagged someone who posts here all the time as a racist, That’s pretty much the worst accusation one can throw at anyone on BJ, and now you are (sensibly) conceding that there may have been no racist intent.
If you disagree with someone else’s post then explain why it can be viewed as offensive, but don’t immediately accuse them of being a racist.
DougJ
@oldster:
It’s just Yeats. For a time I tried to do Yeats, Dylan Thomas, and the romantic poets as well as pop lyrics.
The Other Chuck
@shell:
Assumes facts not in evidence.
Really, when’s everyone else going to figure out that the sounds emanating from the mouths of these candidates bears no relation to reason or logic, let alone anything they might be capable of thinking beyond “me make noise, noise make people clap, noise make liberal frown, noise good”. You cannot reason with someone who has deliberately discarded reason.
Jeffro
@Brachiator: Rubio is young and Hispanic, which the powers that be probably feel will do their outreach for them (without having to change any actual GOP policies). He will also most certainly do whatever he’s told by the Koch’s and GOP Establishment. No wonder Fox threw him softballs all night.
Kropadope
@Jeffro: Maybe, but the highest I remember seeing for Trump pre-debate was mid-20s. So, I’m thinking there wasn’t much change in his support level.
Schlemazel
@Ruckus:
Yes, very sure. In the movie, Valentine was not the bad guy, he was actually hard working & very smart when given a chance. It was the Koch Brothers, playing puppetmaster that were the ones being made fun of & being exposed for what they were – sociopathic scum. My comment made the exact same point and was no more insulting to Carson/Cain than anything in the movie was insulting to its black lead. The only way to miss that would be to willfully do it unless you were also struggling with the complexities of Cat In the Hat.
WereBear
@Jeffro: He’s got Token Veep stamped all over him.
trollhattan
@Jeffro:
One president in my lifetime with a personality as vile as Cruz has been elected: Nixon. He was a commie by today’s Republican standards and benefited by an odious opponent in Humphrey.
I don’t foresee Cruz surviving the primaries.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator: see my earlier comment. Valentine is not the bad guy & neither are Cain nor Carson. They are simply being used and when the time comes Carson will get dumped just like Cain & it will be the money boys that do the dumping.
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
Give it up or turn it loose.
Fiorina seemed like a good choice, and there are people who defend her. But she pissed off the board, including the son of one of the beloved founders, and her too many of her strategic decisions (such as the merger with Compaq) were just bad. In some ways, she is much like Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer.
Amir Khalid
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
I agree: that kind of book-keeping jiggery-pokery should never have made it past the auditors, internal or external. But Fiorina was still a competent COO by Lucent standards, even if there was more slack in those standards than another corporation would have tolerated. As it was, once at HP she wasn’t going to be sacked there until she’d made a whole new batch of screw-ups. Which, in due course, she did.
Amir Khalid
I have been moderatered. Hallp!!
Ruckus
@Schlemazel:
Wasn’t asking about the movie reference, just your last sentence.
Mike J
@Brachiator: Balmer had the industry change around him and didn’t know how to react. Fiorina was just flat out incompetent and ran two great companies into the ground. Yes, she doubled revenue, but profits were 1/3rd what they were before.
I was conslutting for both companies at the beginning of the merger. Everybody on both sides hated it.
mike in dc
Bush in 6th already, after 1 debate. Yikes. Rmoney is giggling in his car elevator. All of that war chest is going to have to be deployed just to keep Jeb! viable until the voting starts.
I still think Carson sounded high during that debate.
Kropadope
@Schlemazel: Don’t you know never to juxtapose “black” and “weed?”
Mandalay
@Schlemazel:
You have my sympathy – that is the biggest cancer on BJ. A few here regularly deliberately misrepresent and distort the views of others. Their interest is not discussion but oneupmanship.
Sadly, we’re no different to the Sunday morning talk shows in that respect.
Gex
@Hal: Hey, always happy to have people agree with me!
Liberal With Attitude
The Wall Street wing of the party obviously has a dilemma on their hands, but in the end, they WILL have to thrown their billions behind someone, and they are smart enough to want that someone to be one who can win, which means, if current trends hold, they will throw in behind whatever Barabbas the base chants for loud enough.
I suspect that in their minds, it doesn’t matter who wins as long as he can do as told.
Schlemazel
@Kropadope:
No but apparently someone thinks because I quoted a scene from a movie that exactly symbolizes the GOP thinking on candidates I am racist because it uses a certain word. I guess this is how we can tell that blacks are the real racists because they use that word too.
@Mandalay:
Its the easiest way to win an argument, create a strawman by misrepresenting a position or thought and then beat the strawman to death.
Kropadope
@Schlemazel: It’s like Obama said and I will paraphrase; racism isn’t about a word, it’s a systemic problem.
Does that work better?
larrybob
Survey Monkey? c’mon, this is an internet poll, with absolutely no history to back it up. Not that Trump probably still is top dog, I just wouldn’t put any weight on this poll result.
JPL
@Amir Khalid: On climate change, Republicans are doubtful, because they are not scientists. On abortion, they know more than obstetricians. They do follow the same thinking on all sorts of issues. Jeb Bush said that the fact that Paul Krugman disagrees with me, warms my heart. Jeb knows more about economics, than Krugman.
Davebo
@Jeffro:
I think Trump was closer to 24%.
? Martin
Ignore the polls. We’re in the meta phase of the election. Nobody is really measuring these candidates as president, they’re measuring them for what they will bring to the process of choosing a candidate. Bernie is not popular because people really think he’d make a great president (they may, but that’s later), they like him because they think he’ll drag Hillary left and because they’ll force at least some of the conversation onto topics that the GOP candidates don’t want to talk about. Trump is popular for similar reasons. Many on the left don’t support Clinton primarily because they want to send a message that dynasties are not desirable, but that’s not really a measure of whether they support her policies or not.
Remember in 2007 when Clinton had all of the african american support and Obama had basically none? Same kind of thing, except black voters were worried that Obama being black would distract from the process. Once we got onto the actual primaries and the meta election was winding down, everyone started looking at the candidates as actual candidates and that loyalty shifted very rapidly.
Trump leading in the polls is good entertainment and will do a certain amount of damage to the party, but it’s not indicative of support as we get closer to actual voting (not counter-indicative either, should note)
Kropadope
@? Martin:
For me, it’s not a matter of dynasties and, on certain important issues, I may agree with HRC’s policy stances more than Bernie’s.
The problem is she’s a creature of the toxic media environment. This has cultivated in her what appear to be a hardened “us v them” mindset that painfully reminds me of the Republicans. This mindset prizes confrontation and empty gestures over accomplishment. I don’t want to go down that road.
divF
@Kropadope:
Sorry, that ship has sailed. The next president (assuming a Democrat) will be dealing with a Republican party bent on destruction, and the environment will be too poisonous for good-government bipartisanship.
Brachiator
@Mandalay:
I was absolutely clear as to what my objections were, including racist intent. And yet the response has largely been denial and insult. I would expect a bit more from someone who, as you note, posts here all the time.
@Schlemazel
I saw your earlier comment. I don’t disagree with your review of Trading Places. And it is clear that you think that Carson’s rise in the polls is irrelevant, that somehow it is just window dressing, because a black man could not possibly appeal to any Republican. Do you think the same of Rubio and Cruz?
And when you write:
Is that how you view Carson?
Perhaps you didn’t intend the condescension, but you still stepped deep into it.
? Martin
@Kropadope:
That’s exactly what I mean by a process argument. And I think it’s fine to show that support at this stage – after all, there’s no downside to sending the message. But when it comes time to pull the lever, the policies will matter a lot more, as will the viability of that candidate in the general. You may not change your position, but a lot of people will. And that’s okay – perhaps the mission will have been accomplished.
Trumps problem in the debate is that he fell down on his answers. He should have taken the ‘support for candidates’ question and turned it into a full defense of campaign spending – and used that against his opponents. He was buying influence. He should state that clearly. He should then ask the other candidates what they owe their billionaires now that they’ve been bought. GOP voters would have loved that. That would have landed like a meteor on that stage.
The other answer he missed was the bankruptcy one. That was a great opportunity for a full-throated defense of capitalism, that the interest rate he pays on those loans is based on the banks determination of whether they’ll get paid back or not. It’s insurance, and in this case it was needed. But bankruptcy really is part of what makes America great because it allows us to take risks, and if we fuck up we aren’t doomed forever. It’s a guarantee for a 2nd chance – not a free 2nd chance, but one nevertheless. You can recover and try again. And he should have gone straight after Scott Walker and noted (as an example) that the 27% interest rate he’s paying on his $10K of credit card debt is the banks indication that they don’t think he’s trustworthy to pay that debt off, and so they are demanding that Walker pay for that insurance. That too would have landed like a meteor on that stage.
Trump is good on his feet, but not good enough.
TriassicSands
@Halcyan:
RE Regressive taxes: there are two features that tend to characterize the most regressive tax structures among US States. First is having no personal income tax (Washington State, Florida, Texas, and South Carolina — the 4 most regressive tax states in the country all have no personal income tax.)
Second is having a flat tax. All the idiots who think they want a flat tax (this doesn’t include the wealthy, since they are smart to want a flat tax) will be very unhappy should the US move to that tax structure. First, the percentage needed, as you point out, is much higher than the bozos think will do the trick. Once in place, the disparity in wealth in this country will grow dramatically. If the percentage chosen is too small, the social safety net programs will have to be gutted or we will see deficits like we’ve never seen before.
@Kropadope:
Oh, he heard it, but he’s a Republican and you know how they feel about icky things like facts (and science and evidence, etc.)
Kropadope
@divF:
So, is the answer to also have a Democratic party bent on destruction?
Kropadope
@? Martin:
This has always seemed like a curious idea to me. I understand it in principle, but doesn’t the higher interest rate also make it more difficult to pay it back?
The Golux
@Warren Terra:
Two words: Putney Swope.
Brachiator
@Mike J:
The industry changed around HP as well, especially with respect to PCs, but you are probably right that Fiorina was much worse than Ballmer.
divF
@Kropadope:
No, the answer is to have a Democratic party that is realistic about having an opposition that has no interest in governance. I believe that Hilary is realistic. Obama has been since the 2014 election.
askew
I am really surprised to see Cruz and Carson up there. Both got very little time to speak during debate and were off-putting when they did speak.
I expected Rubio to jump significantly in polling. I thought he was far and away the best candidate during the debates.
Not surprised to see Walker, Bush, and Paul fading. Bush looked like a deer-in-headlights most of the time and Walker/Paul came across as dweebs in way over their heads.
Mandalay
@Brachiator: Oh do fuck off. Seriously. Just fuck off. You were just spoiling for a fight. This is the start of your post:
Your opening gambit was to accuse someone of being a racist instead of asking them to explain their post.
You are a really small person.
Cacti
A little late to the party on this one.
But not surprised about the poll.
The inmates are fully in control of the asylum this time. They’ll not settle for anything but one of their own in 2016, and Fox News/The RNC is in a stone cold panic.
Plausible deniability has flown out the window for how retrograde and reactionary their philosophy has actually become.
Tom Q
The main takeaway from this poll is, as we all intuitively knew, the press analysts are completely clueless.
Trump DIDN’T crater. Of course, this days-after controversy may hurt him more, but, after so many silver bullets that have been supposed to take him down, I think we need to wait for empirical proof of that prior to discussing it.
Kasich, who they all thought went over so well, doesn’t register. Reminder: GOP primary voters are NOT like Beltway both-siders. (To be fair, during the years when Dems were the hopeless out-party, the press promoted people like Bruce Babbitt, equally reasonable and equally unappealing to primary voters.)
Rubio went nowhere — basically left with the same he rode in with.
Which is a whole lot better than Bush, who’s close to a fringe candidate in this poll. I guess you can’t knock the press here, since few of them thought Bush did well. But clueless Chuck Todd, with the rest of the MSNBC panel, was certain he’d held his own — something not supported by a drop to single-digits. I know there are many here who will claim to the end that the GOP establishment will ram Bush through, just like Romney. But Romney 1) never dropped this far down in 2011/12 polls and 2) had opposition who were abjectly without credentials: a pizza magnate, an obscure Representative best known for advocating something like a new Un-American Activities committee, a disgraced former Speaker, a Senator who’d lost his last re-election bid by 18 points. Rick Perry, on paper, was the only one fit to stand on the same stage — and he doubly disqualified himself by seeming soft on immigration (alienating the right) and displaying stupidity under the spotlight (losing the “sensible” crowd). Romney had the not-crazy/vaguely qualified field to himself — and still struggled.
Jeb!, conversely, has Rubio, Kasich, and maybe now Fiorina competing for that group. (Not saying these people aren’t crazy, but that they’ll get votes from the minority of GOPers — and those in the press — looking for someone who can pass for reasonable.)
In short, this is all bad news for Republicans.
Roger Moore
@Mike J:
And even at his very worst, Balmer managed to keep milking Microsoft’s two big cash cows, Windows and Office. Everything else he did was mostly fiddling around the edges.
? Martin
@Kropadope: Of course. It’s a signaling function that decades of not having Elizabeth Warren running the financial sector has made us immune from. If the bank says they need 27% interest on that loan, that you shouldn’t fucking take out that loan unless you are really goddamn sure that your return on capital will be at least 27%.
Every financial expert – which means every company, every bank, etc. only borrows money against some appreciating asset. If that new piece of equipment will allow you to expand production by 10%, then paying anything up to 10% is likely worth doing.
The problem is that consumers often don’t think that way. A car is a depreciating asset – you should never borrow for that unless it’s key part of your business that you can monetize (a real-estate agent, for example). A home is an appreciating asset. Your education is appreciating. Your health is appreciating (borrow for needed surgery, etc). Beyond that, the answer should almost always be no to borrowing.
So in theory, if you can get at least a 27% return on the thing you buy, then go ahead and borrow because it won’t be harder to pay back – it’ll be easier because you’ll be earning at least 27% on the thing you buy with that money.
That’s why college loans, even huge college loans, make sense for many students but not others. If you’re studying engineering, go for it because you’ll probably earn $20K a year more than a non-engineer and probably 100% more than someone without a college degree. Paying off a $100K loan will be annoying, but totally worth it over a 30 year career provided that the interest rate isn’t so high that it runs your annual payments over that expected increase in earnings or drag out the duration of the loan so that it covers your entire career. If you are looking to be a preschool teacher, you need to be a lot more careful because your earning potential is pretty terrible and your ability to pay off that money is much less. But we don’t have the same kind of dynamics in the college loan market that we do in other markets. If that college loan to study french poetry was 20% due to the expectation of repayment but 5% for the engineer, that would become a signaling function to students. An undesirable function from the education standpoint, but perhaps a beneficial one from the students standpoint.
Brachiator
@Tom Q:
Very interesting point. And it is bad for Republicans, as you note. Obviously, a lot can happen, but who do you think might be able to break out from the pack? And yeah, I’m one of those who think that the GOP will bend over backwards to tap Jeb!
? Martin
@Roger Moore:
The great thing about monopolies is that even the most incompetent person can’t fuck up making money off of them. That Ballmer lost one monopoly (Windows to mobile devices) and very nearly lost the other (Office to Google docs, etc) tells you just how bad he was.
Villago Delenda Est
@beltane: DING DING DING DING DING
And their values consist of rage, mostly unfocused, but what is focused is pure, unashamed racism.
J R in WV
@srv:
I’ve read it several times, and each time I find it a compilation of superstitions, inconsistent in every way, and obviously put together to try to sustain a primitive patriarchal society of goat herds.
When someone attempts to sound sophisticated and intelligent while at the same time using the Bible as an example of a guide to civilization they show that they can’t think at all.
You are a maroon, and will never be able to overcome that fundamental problem. Sugar paste for brains.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tom Q: Chuckles the Toddler actually has said that he thinks this is the strongest GOP primary field in 36 years.
That’s how clueless Chuckles the Toddler is.
Roger Moore
@Kropadope:
Yes, it does, but in principle even that is supposed to be factored into the calculation. Also, especially when you get to very high interest rates like Walker’s 27% on his credit cards, you can wind up making enough in interest that you’ve made a profit even if the borrower defaults and never pays back the principal. And, yes, you can get a spiral, where the risk premium drives up the default risk, increasing the risk premium, etc. until it’s impossible to get a loan at all. That’s part of the reason for credit limits.
Mike in NC
@TriassicSands: Maybe you meant South Dakota, because South Carolina most definitely has an income tax.
Roger Moore
@? Martin:
For most people, a car is an appreciating asset because they need one to get to their job. No car, no job, no money.
Tom Q
@Brachiator: I’m as clueless as anyone (the difference: I’m willing to admit it). I came into the season thinking Scott Walker had the best shot of uniting the far right vote, and his early poll numbers seemed to offer support for that, but his performance the other night (and now this poll) give me pause.
The best rationale for “it’ll be Jeb” is that it was McCain and Romney in successive cycles with similar circumstances. But both those guys benefited from having Not-Crazy-Land all to themselves (once Guiliani crashed, McCain was the sole perceived moderate; Romney had only the barely-there Huntsman as competition), while Far-Right-Ville stayed divided (Huckabee and, hard to figure now, Romney in ’08; Santorum & Gingrich splitting the field in ’12). The far right vote seems bigger this year (every poll I’ve seen, adding together Trump/Carson/Cruz/Walker/Huckabee/Santorum, you get about 60%), but still they’re going to have to coalesce at some point or they risk losing winner-take-all primaries. That’s Jeb’s best shot, but, as I said, he’s going to have to deal with Rubio/Fiorina/Kasich — and if they keep dividing this smaller part of the pie, they could cannibalize one another out of the race.
It’s not out of the question no one goes into the convention with enough delegates for nomination. Normally, candidates who fail to win or place in early primaries drop out for lack of funds. But, with billionaire sugar daddies, more might stay in, with varying results state by state that simply leave a big muddle.
El Caganer
I thought it was kinda neat that Carson played the Alinsky card; references to poor old Saul have dropped out of the everyday wingnut pidgin. Maybe next he’ll get the base all sweaty with a Marx-bomb or two. I can see him being in for the long haul – as long as you don’t pay attention to what he’s actually saying, he comes across as far more composed and reasonable than a lot of the other bozos.
Brachiator
@Mandalay: Yep, I came on strong, but I presume that we are all adults here, and nothing precluded the other person from explaining their post. Both you and the other poster resort to insults, and dismissals, but I’m the one spoiling for a fight.
But I continued to be respectful, even to you, and took some time to elaborate my position, not because I was trying to win some debating point, but because you entered the discussion.
But I made my points and you made yours. Moving on…
Joel
@Brachiator: Carson’s rise to from 6% to 11%? What part of his platform is propelling this ascendancy?
stinger
@ruemara: Oh my goodness, but those look good!
Davebo
@Joel:
Unscientific online polling?
redshirt
Does Cruz count as a Hispanic? If so, if he gets the nomination, the R’s will convince themselves they’ll get the majority Hispanic vote. Will they?
feebog
@Brachiator:
Just curious, do think there is even a remote chance that the Republican party would nominate Ben Carson? Or Bobby Jindal for that matter? Given that a significant part of their base is made up of Confederate apologists and stone cold racists, there isn’t a chance in hell IMHO.
Brachiator
@Tom Q: One of the better discussions about the GOP muddle that I’ve seen in a while. I had not considered that Trump/Carson/Cruz/Walker/Huckabee/Santorum were fighting for a fairly big slice of the Crazy Pie.
I can’t see Fiorina going much further. I’m not too sure about Rubio, who has a big sugar daddy other than the Kochs, or Kasich, who seems to be trying to convince conservative Republicans that he is not that bad.
Or a sugar daddy might pull out, drop a candidate like a piece of bad fruit, and tighten the field. I think this happened with Newt or Huckabee in the last go round.
sneezy
@Amir Khalid:
Fiorina was never COO of Lucent. She was president of its global service provider division when she left for HP.
Brachiator
@feebog:
Here’s a question? How did Jindal get to be elected governor of Louisiana? He won 65% of the votes. Did the racists stay home?
But having grown up in the South, had you asked me a few years ago whether a person of Indian descent could be elected governor of a Southern state, I would have said hell no.
And obviously, the GOP has courted racists to join their little band, and have consistently sat back and let extremists fan the fires of racism since Obama’s nomination. Hell, I was saying this when some people were insisting that the shit that was being slung at Obama was the same crap that had been directed at Clinton and other Democrats.
Short answer, no I don’t think that Carson could be the nominee. However, I think his appeal to some Republicans, especially the religious fundamentalists, is real, and not just a fake out for liberals. Republicans are not that subtle as thinkers.
But Jindal won’t be the nominee because he comes across as a neophyte and a goof. If he were a stronger candidate overall, he would definitely be a VP candidate, and the money boys would make the Southern racists eat it.
Other short answer: the money boys who control the GOP are also largely racists. But they are also pragmatists, who will happily exploit race to their benefit. They don’t give a shit about the simple race hatred of the rubes.
Citizen Alan
@J R in WV:
My impression was that he was not complimenting the Bible by describing it as the basis for historical economics and usury, but I could be wrong.
The Lodger
@? Martin: That was a mindful discussion of capitalism, and thanks for writing it. However. Thursday night in Cleveland (or really, any GOP debate) would be an inappropriate place for that sort of thing. It would bomb with the audience, and none of the candidates (including Trump and Fiorina) have the attitude, knowledge or intelligence to deliver it.
Brachiator
@redshirt:
Of course Cruz is Hispanic. However, this doesn’t mean that he has a lock on the Latino vote, and the GOP is delusional if they think otherwise.
Heliopause
@Brachiator:
Read this from Cruz’s page on immigration. Cruz pretty much is the same as Trump, just substituting “child abusers” for “rapists”.
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt: What the Rs consistently fail to realize that Cuban does not equal Hispanic. Cubans are a subset, and a lot of Latinos have no use for them at all.
Brachiator
@Heliopause:
Hah! I get a warning message that the Cruz page is not a safe site. Probably for the best.
I wouldn’t be surprised that Cruz is a nutjob with respect to immigration.
I saw some nonsense on some other site trying to make illegal immigrants responsible for a large percentage of murders in the US. The scapegoating is despicable, but some Republicans eat it up.
Julia Grey
@TriassicSands:
South Carolina has a personal income tax. I pay it every year.
Nathan Tyree
any link to info on the methodology? I’m curious. Trump keeping the lead fits my prediction, but Cruz and Carson are weird results.
Doug R
@Elie: Still less radical than National Front or most other National hate the immigrants parties. Of course they tend to get less than 48% of the vote, but that’s usually your THIRD PARTY.
lol
@Amir Khalid:
Trump at next debate: “If I had a billion dollars for every job Carly *didn’t* get forced out of, I’d, well, I’d be Mitt Romney”
lol
@Nathan Tyree:
I’m kind of inclined to buy it. The demographics that SurveyMonkey is likely to have difficulty sampling are also the ones that aren’t Republican voters anyways. If you’ve got some basic demographics for participants, you can sample and weight appropriately and the relative homogeneity of the Republican base makes that a lot easier to pull off.
? Martin
@Roger Moore:
No, for most people it’s not because they buy too much car to do that job. A new car will cost you $20/hr it’s on the road (cost of acquisition, insurance, maintenance, gas, etc.) So the differential value of that job to justify the car is $20/hr.
If you need a car for a job, and you can’t buy one cash, and you can’t get by with mass transit, then you get a cheap beater, put as little money into it as possible, save your money, and when you can pay cash then upgrade to a nicer car, and repeat.
Almost nobody actually handles a car that way, though. Almost everyone should.
? Martin
@The Lodger: It only would have had to be a sentence or two – just enough to pivot onto Scott Walkers unbelievably irresponsible credit card debt.
Nathan Tyree
@lol: Good points.