Democratic party frontrunner keeps issuing actual statements about policy.
Republican party frontrunner keeps issuing Megyn Kelly insults.
— Daniel Drezner (@dandrezner) August 10, 2015
Reuters/Ipsos post-debate poll:
Trump: 24%, unch
Jeb: 12%, down from 17% pre-debate
Clinton still trounces Trump
http://t.co/SbzELWjsLB
— Felix Salmon (@felixsalmon) August 10, 2015
When your enemy is drowning, throw them an anchor. From the Washington Post:
EXETER, N.H. – Donald Trump’s remarks about Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly are offensive, but the rest of the Republican field is equally offensive, Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday.
“What Donald Trump said about Megyn Kelly is outrageous, but what the rest of the Republicans are saying about all women is also outrageous,” Clinton said. “They brag about slashing health-care funding, they say they would force women who have been raped to carry their rapist’s child,” and fail to put forward proposals that would help women earn equal pay…
“When one of their major candidates, a much younger man, the senator from Florida, says there should be no exceptions for rape and incest, that is as offensive and as troubling a comment as you can hear from a major candidate running for the presidency,” Clinton said. “The language may be more colorful and more offensive, but the thinking, the attitude, toward women is very much the same. It just is delivered in a different package.”…
In New Hampshire, Clinton also said Trump is “having the time of his life,” and that his political showmanship amounts to “entertainment.” She laughed off her attendance at Trump’s 2005 wedding, saying she was supposed to be in Florida anyway, and decided to go to the wedding “because it’s always entertaining.”…
Trump deserves the backlash he is getting, Clinton said.
“But if we focus on that, we’re making a mistake. What a lot of men on that stage said in that debate was offensive, and I want people to understand that if you just focus on the biggest showman on the stage, you lose the thread here.”…
which will get more coverage in next 24 hours: Trump's poll numbers, or Hillary's college affordability plan?
— Peter Hamby (@PeterHamby) August 10, 2015
***********
Apart from remembering to keep our eyes on the prize, what’s on the agenda for the evening?
Baud
I’m in moderation for my block quote, I think.
My comment was: Interesting that she called out Rubio and not Walker.
ETA:
Here is the quote. I think it was the i-word that did it.
When one of their major candidates, a much younger man, the senator from Florida, says there should be no exceptions for rape and incest, that is as offensive and as troubling a comment as you can hear from a major candidate running for the presidency,” Clinton said.
Schlemazel
Whoda thunk? The BLM team that disrupted the Sanders rally turns out to be a Sarah Palin supporter & tea-bagger
http://reverbpress.com/politics/black-lives-matter-seattle-protestor-is-a-former-tea-party-palin-fan/
Schlemazel
BTW – great job by HRC to point out that the GOP and T rump are the same side of the same coin. This is a line of attack that can have teeth all the way down the ticket – MOAR PLEEZ
Peale
@Baud: I find that comment offensive in a post about Hillary. You had to go there.
Baud
@Peale:
;
BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: PBO’s got Walker.
Baud
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Did I miss some news about PBO and Walker?
trollhattan
@Schlemazel:
Yes, she’s saying precisely what needs to be said. Good for Hillary and team; keep all their damn feet to the fire, including Carli(tm), who’s contorting herself into a pretzel to have it both ways here.
trollhattan
@Schlemazel:
Well, well, well….
srv
Why have one collge debt bubble when you can have two?
The Speech Every 2015 College Grad Needs to Hear
Schlemazel
@trollhattan:
One thing the Clinton team always seemed to do well was to hit the goopers with counter punchers more damaging than the initial punch. I miss that & wish the Senate & Congressional Dems would watch & learn.
Schlemazel
@srv:
Unless he wants to teach an advanced course on molesting squirrels there is nothing that empty gasbag has to say to college students.
kindness
@Schlemazel: I saw that yesterday on the web but wasn’t sure whether it was truthful or not. What I saw said she was an evangellical Christian and against all abortions as well.
False flag?
Mr Bula
@Schlemazel: I think the most effective way to gain visibility and effect change for BLM would be for them to have a democratic primary candidate: someone like John Lewis.
trollhattan
@Schlemazel:
Hate to pick on her but the party seems rudderless under DWS, or at least as punchless as you describe. Don’t want a Grayson but I want a clever fighter with street smarts, not someone afraid to ruffle Wall Street sensibility or so help me, angry Cuban exiles.
Schlemazel
@kindness:
Could be or it could be a group so angry they can’t think. Their stated goal is to defeat all Democrats. Now its true the Dems have not always done the most they could have but these guys apparently are incapable of envisioning what ‘defeat all Dems’ would really mean for them.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: A few weeks ago PBO visited WI and had some rather cutting remarks about Walker.
Dave
I can’t believe I’m asking this: has Megyn Kelly reacted to the ongoing Trump absurdity? Curious, I checked her Twitter feed; she’s been silent there for 3 days, which I’m guessing is unusual for a media personality. Has she commented on it? Is she laying low?
goblue72
@srv: A speech by a right-wing bloviator (George Will) trotting out the usual shibboleths of the RWNJ (libtard colleges let you get degrees in Transgender Political Correctness Studies – harharhar), as sponsored by an unaccredited online “school” (Prager University), founded by another RWNJ (Dennis Prager)?
Yeah, riiiiiiiight….
JPL
@Baud: If a republican were to win the election, I’d rather it be Trump. As awful as it would be, it would be devastating under another nominee.
jl
WaPo story not very good, it is hard to evaluate it. Works through fed incentives to state governments to fund tuitioin, funds it with closing tax loopholes not a new financial transaction tax, and comes with an accompanying college quality initiative. it costs $350 BILLION!! (Over what time period, can’t find over what period in the story).
HRC likes complicated program proposals.
Clinton proposes a $350 billion plan to make college affordable
WaPo
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/08/10/clinton-proposes-a-350-billion-plan-to-make-college-affordable/
Schlemazel
@trollhattan:
DWS endorsed a Republican in a Congressional race in FL . . . yeah, I’d like someone better than that & it wouldn’t take much. While the GOP works top-down & rigidly enforces message discipline the Dems can’t organize a one car funeral when it comes to messaging. I actually miss LBJ, he could kick asses & take names.
jl
@goblue72: Now, don’t misrepresent it. Will chuckled at little at his own wit, he never went ‘har har’. OK?
BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: She doesn’t seem to like to offend, a party leader needs to be willing to offend the other party.
SatanicPanic
That’s a great comment by Hillary. Good for her, I am more glad than ever to vote for her
SatanicPanic
Here’s an interesting question for me. Let’s say Trump goes third party and Republicans lose big. Does Trump turn around and say “I played all you Republicans like suckers! I was a Democrat all along!”? Cause I can see him doing that if he thinks it makes himself look crafty.
Schlemazel
HRC is getting time on NBC news with exactly the right message!! She is now hammering Rubio and the GOP on women. We could use more of this
goblue72
@jl: Ok, ok. I take back the “har har har”.
The rest of the derp stands, though.
beltane
@SatanicPanic: I don’t think that’s his style. He’d be more likely to hammer the Republicans as the Loser party and leave it at that.
Gimlet
Guardian – Nurses opt for Bernie, not the woman running.
(posted on the dead thread also)
National Nurses United, which has 185,000 members nationally and is the profession’s largest representative, announced its backing for Sanders at a rally with him in Oakland, California.
The decision of its executive council to announce a formal endorsement follows a poll of members said to show widespread backing for his more radical policies on healthcare and social inequality.
Although the union is well-known as one of the more leftwing labor groups, its leaders claim to be surprised at the depth of support among their largely female membership given Clinton’s chance of becoming America’s first female president.
goblue72
@SatanicPanic: Only if he tears off his face mask, revealing himself to be Bill Clinton.
I’d pay to see that movie.
SatanicPanic
@beltane: or call American voters losers? I could see that
trollhattan
@SatanicPanic:
It would be crafty and classy and yooooge! Kind of like if Big Dog actually coaxed him into the race to begin with.
gelfling545
@Schlemazel: I imagine all organizations that are in the public eye attract people trying to make a name for themselves at least for their allotted 15 minutes. As BLM is more a movement like Occupy rather than a structured organization many things will be said/done in their name. Then you have to get into the avowing/disavowing etc. & really who’s to say? The fact that one has or has had some weird political opinions on other matters does not discount one’s position on this matter in particular.
Chris
@SatanicPanic:
I would fucking love it if he did that after the election.
Sorry, wingnuts, your McCarthy really was a Manchurian Candidate all along!
White Trash Liberal
I’m loving this pugilism. I’m enthused.
EmanG
I’m off to read more about Bernie pulling in 28k people in Portland!
Brachiator
@JPL:
A rank political amateur with anger management issues, problems with women, no apparent knowledge (let alone experience) of foreign policy, who has insulted two of our biggest trading partners, Mexico and China. Yeah , a Trump presidency might be pretty good. Neither Republicans nor Democrats in Congress would have anything to do with him.
Trump is the straight-talking empty slate into which people who like him can find anything that they want. There’s not enough “there” there to know what his presidency might be like.
Aside from the fact that it might be huuuuuuuge.
Mr Bula
@SatanicPanic: I am not under the illusion that Trump has any beliefs other than his own profit and self-aggrandizement, but I think such a move would cost him his newly won legions of gullible idiots (who will be buying some overpriced product of his in the near future…)
beltane
I could easily picture Trump sitting in the VIP seats at Hillary’s inauguration, the television cameras zooming in on him every so often.
Mr Bula
@Brachiator: As crazy as the country has gotten, I don’t think Trump will ever be president. However, I would point out he is the most progressive of the GOP candidates, in that he has at least pointed out certain truths that others won’t acknowledge: that Bush was awful; that money influences politicians, etc…
gogol's wife
@SatanicPanic:
Me too.
JPL
@Brachiator: Now do the same things with the other candidates.
I don’t think Trump destroys, health care. I don’t think Trump would use abortion as a litmus test against potential candidates. I don’t think he would enact prayers in schools. As far as destroying Iran, they all will.
SatanicPanic
@Mr Bula: True, but he has been known to blow up his own businesses for reasons that don’t make a ton of sense to the rest of us.
Tree With Water
“When one of their major candidates, A MUCH YOUNGER MAN, the senator from Florida..”.
I would have been willing to donate $100 to her campaign, had Hillary been willing to refer the Florida twit instead as a “callow youth”.
Schlemazel
@gelfling545:
Like Occupy, BLM appears to have diffused leadership and decentralized management. Thats fine, it has its own advantages as well as disadvantages. However, any subgroup of that whose stated goal is to defeat Democrats deserves to sit in the corner and be ignored just like the morons who thought electing W would be the bestest thing ever for the left. It is stupid on the face of it and leads to more pain for a longer time. I understand anger that the Dems are not moving far enough or fast enough but if your plan to fix that is to elect more Republicans you need to seek immediate medical help
lgerard
@Mr Bula:
True this
i would rather have Trump then any of the other 16 dwarves.
At least we would be entertained
JPL
@lgerard: Although I said the same thing, I do feel the need for a shower.
Vince
Sorry, I must be out of the loop here. Who or what is DWS?
indycat32
I wish Hillary had pointed out that they would rather a woman die than have an abortion
Schlemazel
@Vince:
debbie wasserman schultz
She is a Florida congresswoman & chair of the DNC
White Trash Liberal
@Schlemazel:
This bullshit smear job is making the rounds and get airbrushed with each iteration. This is the softest rendition yet, and it still amounts to analyzing her countertops.
That FB post could just be self deprecating young and dumb humor. The rest is in no way harsh and is in keeping with the history of black agitation and, honestly, all protest movements regardless of color or creed.
The Patheos piece posted in an earlier thread is blatantly racist and ignorant.
Liberals should be better than this. Even if she was a dyed in the wool worshiper of Baphomet and wears her underwear outside her pants, she is trying and succeeding in elevating the danger of being black in his country.
When activists are posting that they are not suicidal so don’t believe the cops if they die in custody, this kind of smear job is evil. Evil.
David Fud
@Schlemazel: Could be some Cleek’s Law playing out with eleventy dimensional chess here. (really). So, what if she is calling him out so that the conservative base coagulates around him? I wonder if her polling is telling her that Rubio is the weakest candidate and giving him recognition and scorn would actually help him with the Republican base.
Seems a bit much, but then again, if the Big Dog really got Trump into it, this certainly wouldn’t be beyond them either.
Certainly seems like a clever way to lead the bull around by the nose.
OzarkHillbilly
@Schlemazel:
I have always missed LBJ.
White Trash Liberal
@Schlemazel:
That’s not what she said. She said the party, especially black democrats, must change or be defeated. That’s common rhetoric in a typical post at DKOS.
sigaba
@lgerard:
Obligatory Maximus-in-the-colliseum line here.
Schlemazel
@White Trash Liberal:
so you didn’t read the whole story, how the group’s stated goal is to defeat Democrats? So maybe it is not a Republican ratfuck, maybe they really are this stupid. thats better how?
Cervantes
@Schlemazel:
If she supported Palin or the Tea Party, how old was she at the time?
lgerard
@JPL: @lgerard:
I just spent a few minutes at Breitbart….I need to be steam cleaned.
They are mad for Trump over there, and want Cruz for VP or Senate Majority Leader.
As if Cruz could get even 2 other Senators to vote for him. The Breitbots have no conception of reality
RandomMonster
@Schlemazel: I brought up this same story in a previous thread here today, and got a few nasty comments from an individual that were of the “yeah, and what are her countertops made made of” variety. Which is pretty insulting, since all I was asking was Who does this woman represent?
Brachiator
@jl:
I’d rather see the money used to support K-12 programs, and to refine Obamacare. And maybe expansion of some infrastructure programs. The economy is not that strong, and announcing new costly programs is not necessarily a crowd pleaser.
I like it that Clinton is taking it to the Republicans, but this:
Sadly, the Republicans have no problem owning this. But hopefully, Clinton will be able to fire up Democrats who oppose this.
Schlemazel
@RandomMonster:
Yeah I am getting that too. Apparently asking about the motivation of people attacking a candidate and preventing them from speaking is beyond the pale. We all should be working diligently to defeat Democrats for the betterment of us all.
If she shows up at a Walker, Bush or Cruz rally and does this I might reconsider but it seems significant given she has chosen only one candidate for this treatment.
Cervantes
@RandomMonster:
Not to worry. Just make a mental note of who that individual was and act accordingly.
Oatler.
I’m in favor of Democrats issuing more insults instead of policy statements. Or is 2016 a practice game?
Brachiator
@jl: Crap. Got moderated. Maybe this will stick.
I’d rather see the money used to support K-12 programs, and to refine Obamacare. And maybe expansion of some infrastructure programs. The economy is not that strong, and announcing new costly programs is not necessarily a crowd pleaser.
I like it that Clinton is taking it to the Republicans, but this:
Sadly, the Republicans have no problem owning this. But hopefully, Clinton will be able to fire up Democrats who oppose this.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
Before things get nasty again, I think we should all stop and notice that Democrats are fighting over how to solve police violence and include the voices of black women in particular, and Republicans are fighting over who can kill more women with their abortion restrictions.
Mandalay
@Baud:
I think she’s going after whoever was perceived to have done well in the debate, and the Villagers had anointed Rubio. She’ll go after some vulnerability of whoever “wins” the next debate as well. From Clinton’s perspective she wants to maintain the current situation for as long as possible: a misogynist clown at the top, and then a bunch of his rivals around 5% to 10%. She knows she can beat Trump, and if he doesn’t get the nomination the eventual winner will have been beaten up a few times along the way.
Also, Clinton wants to win Florida, so going after Rubio and/or Bush at every opportunity makes a lot of sense.
Many (including me) have criticized Clinton for her low profile, but it is smart campaigning for the long term. Her only utterances are to attack her opponents, while they all hang themselves with their absurd policy positions.
White Trash Liberal
@RandomMonster:
That was me, and I stand by it. If you come away reading just what was cited without the explanation kindly offered by the writers of these pieces and they don’t ring ratfucker bells. It’s nonsense. And stop whining about getting push back for posting hit jobs and concern trolling.
MomSense
@Schlemazel:
TWIBprime is interviewing her right now. No, she is not a teapartier. Her parents are and as she described she went to college and changed.
OzarkHillbilly
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Amen.
Mandalay
@trollhattan:
moveon has started a petition to replace her with Howard Dean. I can’t stand her (nor can Clinton or Obama reportedly), but I’ve read that her saving grace is that she is good at raising money.
Regardless, I don’t like the idea of having someone in Congress as chair of the DNC. As a practical matter I don’t see how there are enough hours in the week for anyone to do both jobs well.
And if DWS votes against the Iran deal she surely has to step down.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@White Trash Liberal:
Sadly, if there was some rodent fornication going on, she’s already succeeded beyond her wildest dreams. If, as MomSense says above, her parents were Tea Partiers, it makes sense that she might not have a great grasp on political actions that don’t involve shouting people down even if she has switched sides.
White Trash Liberal
@Schlemazel:
You are even playing the irresponsible not to speculate card.
Bernie is a grown ass man running for President. He doesn’t need conspiracy mongers defending him by smearing protestors for what button they had on their backpack 8 years ago.
Schlemazel
@MomSense:
I’ll wait to see what they have to say but it sure as hell is convenient
Schlemazel
@White Trash Liberal:
or the stated goal of her group to defeat Dems – HOW DARE I QUESTION HER!!!
and if you can explain how looking at motivation is the same as examining countertops I’d love to hear it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Steve Kornacki has a deputy campaign manager for Romney on to discuss the horrors of Trump. Will he mention that Willard embraced Trump precisely because he was a birther three years ago?
She just credited Willard with the line “politics ain’t beanbag”.
Brachiator
@JPL:
The other candidates have actual records in elective office (except Carson), and can be evaluated on what they have actually done. Trump is a Fantasy League candidate.
Also, a while back I posted an essay from the London Review of Books which looked at the major GOP candidates at the time, and detailed their weaknesses. Ann Laurie later front paged it if you want to go back and look for it.
Trump has already done a flip/flop on health care and abortion. Here he is as bad as Romney. There is no idea as to what he would do if elected.
Has he even been questioned about school prayer or Iran?
My biggest problem with Trump is that I think he is unstable. And a lot of shit that he got away with as a businessman would be fatal if done by a political leader. His thin skin and need to lash out at minor insults would make him a danger to himself and to the nation. BTW, I also think that Ted Cruz is mentally unfit to be president, as well as a right wing nutjob, but that’s a story for another day.
There have been businessmen who have stepped out of the shadows and become mayors. Bloomberg in New York, Richard Riordan in Los Angeles. But they had a documented political track record that had been reported on, even if it had been of interest only to political junkies.
But Trump is a tabula rasa. He seems strong and assured, he’s got some strongly expressed ideas. And this explains a lot of his appeal. But who knows? Right now the only thing that anyone could do would be to hope and pray that his shock and awe would not really be shuck and jive.
White Trash Liberal
@Schlemazel:
Because you can’t glean her actual motivation from those hatchet jobs. FFS. I’m done.
MomSense
@Schlemazel:
She is impressive and she talks about her motivations, family, faith, and politics in her own words.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He didn’t, of course. One of the Republicans, I think he’s Santorum’s ex-muckety-muck, asking why nobody went after Trump’s “ridiculous” answer on health care. Trump wants to replace it with “something terrific”, not a substantive answer like Rubio’s and Bush’s “replace it with a patient-centered plan”, which is like mad detailed and shit.
RandomMonster
@White Trash Liberal:
I’m not smearing the protester. I don’t know anything about her. If you were honest, you’d admit you don’t either. You’re just an uncritical reader.
Cacti
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
That’s nice to think about, re: democrats fighting over how to solve police violence, but it’s not really true.
At various lefty political blogs, I’ve seen BLM referred to as: bullies, thugs, terrorists, antisemites, Republican plants, etc.
And this from people in the next breath who swear they’re BLM’s “allies”.
Brachiator
@lgerard:
I can only imagine.
One of the local talk radio stations here in Southern California is picking up a turd dropped by Breitbart and going through the police blotter to find heinous crimes allegedly committed by illegal immigrants.
God only knows what other sewage they are swimming in.
Tom Q
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: “She just credited Willard with the line “politics ain’t beanbag”. ”
She’s only off by about a century with that attribution.
jnfr
The more she takes the fight to them, the more Hillary wins me over.
I’m still sending money to Bernie though.
Phil Perspective
@trollhattan:
Obama won Florida twice and you’re still stuck in the 1980’s? Yes, DWS is awful. The Democratic Party is a complete mess in the South and DWS is doing nothing to fix it.
Phil Perspective
@Mandalay: I can’t stand her (nor can Clinton or Obama reportedly), but I’ve read that her saving grace is that she is good at raising money.
And where do you think most of that money comes from?
MomSense
@RandomMonster:
I just listened to her talk about her beliefs, motivations, family, political evolution in her own words. One of the interesting tidbits I learned is that TWIB’s Elon James White is the only person who asked her for an interview. The people who are writing about her saying she’s a Palin supporter and worse haven’t made the effort to speak with her.
I recognize that the BLM Sanders “thing” has made a lot of us uncomfortable and defensive but this really could be a moment when white progressives, myself included, learn something and grow in our compassion and understanding.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Laura Ingalls is running for Congress
Kerry Reid
@White Trash Liberal: I also hear she had pot in her system.
Jay C
@Schlemazel:
Minor edit for clarification.
Kathleen
Good for Hilary for calling them out. She knows the score.
RandomMonster
@MomSense:
I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt — like I say, I don’t know anything about her. Where did you hear this interview?
Edit: Oh, I see that you did say TWIB. Thanks.
MomSense
@RandomMonster:
She is impressive. I hope people listen to her interview and consider what she has to say.
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
There is a bit of irony here. Melissa Gilbert is running as a Democrat. Laura Ingalls’ daughter, Rose Wilder-Lane, is one of the founding mothers of the American libertarian movement.
I didn’t know that Gilbert was married to Timothy Busfield. The last time she was in my entertainment radar, she was married to Bruce Boxleitner.
White Trash Liberal
@Kerry Reid:
Bingo.
ABL and Elon have been getting smeared by progressive radio too. Apparently, the word has gone out to bring out the knives and discredit BLM via insinuation.
In the meanwhile, protestors are being arrested in Ferguson for blocking courthouse steps.
Kay
I like the straight regulatory parts of the plan but I’m wary of “incentives” to states. It depends on who runs it and what they’re trying to accomplish with the incentives, but it could end up like the higher ed version of Race To The Top and I’m not a huge fan of RttT. I just hope they don’t go bonkers with carrots and sticks and “data-driven” run-education-like-a-bidness efficiency drives, like they tend to do with K-12. They have to kind of temper the technocrats striding around with clipboards with some messy, complicated human concerns :)
Balance. They lack balance.
Brachiator
@Mr Bula:
I don’t consider any of this progressive, but your mileage may vary.
He calls anybody he doesn’t like a loser; this is not the same thing as cogent criticism. I do like that he upfront says that money buys politicians, and that he has bought them. But this comes down to saying that the richest man in America should automatically be appointed president, since Trump is saying that since he is already rich, he doesn’t need to be bought. But this does not mean that he would do what’s best for the country, only that he would make sure that his own interests were taken care of first.
Greg
I was inside the Bernie Sanders rally in PDX. He did not say, DID NOT SAY, one negative thing about Hillary. He did not say, DID NOT SAY, one negative thing about any specific Republican candidate. He criticized the Republican platform, that’s it. He did not say anything vile, or insulting, or condescending, or derogatory about anybody who was running against him. Instead, he put forth his vision for America. He did not promise anything. His speech was professional, well-rehearsed, well-written and showed me what a true politician should be. I have serious doubts about his viability as a candidate. So I am on the fence. In a perfect world, he would win in a landslide. But I live In America, the next great third world religious theocracy, so I am torn.
rikyrah
she is absolutely correct..
but, they’re saying it in Frank Luntz-Approved language.
but, she’s absolutely correct in the pure anti-female policies, from top to bottom, of the ENTIRE GOP field.
Kay
@Greg:
I was around some college students last weekend and they all seemed to love him. It’s by no means scientific or anything and these people were all already to the Left of Democrats so it’s not like he’s pulling them Left, but I was surprised how they seemed to glide right by his age- I thought they would be wary of someone that old, quite frankly. It didn’t seem to matter at all.
I also have serious doubts about his viability in a general so am also on the fence.
Belafon
@Greg: Vote for your favorite candidate in the primary, and vote for the Democrat in the general election. You’ve got 6+ months to decide on your primary candidate.
Shaun Appleby
@lgerard: FWIW internal leaks allege Brietbart in payola relationship with Trump’s campaign. Warning: Buzzfeed.
The right-wing has been lit up like a Christmas tree since Thursday; Fox fought the Trump and the Trump won. Erick Erickson has had the worst weekend of his life and Megyn Kelly has been thrown under a bus by Ailes himself. With a triumphant Donald standing atop the polls amongst the wreckage. Good Lord this is entertaining!
And Bush is about to miss the boat; all cashed up and nowhere to go, tanking and asphyxiated.
Baud
@Shaun Appleby:
I feel like someone should declare a holiday.
Anne Laurie
@MomSense:
Good for EJW, and I hope he includes that interview in his next post here.
Chris
@Kay:
I keep saying that on this issue, I’d really like someone (in the Bernie Sanders variety given how far out there it is) to come out in favor of blanket forgiveness for student debt. Picture the amount of money that’s going down the black hole of student loan repayment that, in a previous age, would have been spent on putting down money for a house, buying a car, buying an apartment, or any number of other things that, y’know, actually inject money into the economy.
Shaun Appleby
@Baud: Except that the whole unwieldy, shameful juggernaut is careening our way. Call it a guilty pleasure but I just can’t look away; it seems more like a tasteless disaster B-picture but mesmerising nonetheless.
Mandalay
@Shaun Appleby: You’re linking to a Buzfeed article which is a thinly veiled book promotion that cites only anonymous sources making an allegation that has been explicitly denied.
In other words, the author’s got absolutely nothing.
You make me feel dirty for defending breitbart.com but I’m so tired of nothingburger stories masquerading as scoops.
Baud
@Shaun Appleby:
Ok. Two days.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: Back in the great ’08 flame wars, there was a Clintonite, a man in his sixties, who kept saying we O-Bots were children (I was forty) who were naive to trust the polls because Macomb County and the Bradley effect! I don’t know if I’ve become that old coot, but I don’t see Sanders as viable. But it’s up to Clinton to excite people if she doesn’t wanna get Gored.
Shaun Appleby
@Mandalay: Well, you were warned. I cited it as an example of the kind of internal dissent which seems to have infected the entire right-wing; Fox personalities among themselves, Ailes vs Murdoch. Poor Erick and so forth.
This is rich stuff:
Who knew?
Anne Laurie
@Kay:
As someone who’s rapidly sliding into that demographic, I can say there’s a tendency for some young people to regard Us Olds as “cute”. When people their parents’ age say something they disagree with, it’s because “You people just don’t GET it.” When people their grandparents’ age say something very similar, it’s “Oh, jeez, update your memes already, granma.” It can be infuriating, but I think Bernie’s smart to take advantage of it.
It’s an old folklore trope — the rising generation perceives the fading generation as allies in their mutual war against the generation currently in power. And I think that’s part of Bernie’s appeal, for “college kids” who’d otherwise be ambivalent about supporting Hillary because she’s One of The People Who Got Us Into This Mess. (She’s only a few years younger than Bernie, of course, but she had & has so much more influence in the political world.) Some of them would be flirting with third parties, Libertarianism, or gawdshelpus Trump, but supporting Bernie over Hillary is sticking it to Tha Man, man!!! As long as Bernie can shepherd them to vote for the Democratic nominee in 2016, goddess guide him!
Joel
@kindness: Just a weak spot in anarchic “Occupy-style” movements. Joseph Conrad nailed this one some time ago.
Baud
@Anne Laurie:
I agree.
Brachiator
@Greg:
I’m still not quite seeing the point of all the Bernie love, but I look forward to finding out more.
Kay
@Chris:
Be careful, though, Sometimes I think the most important word in this country is “fair”. A lot of people have been paying a lot of student debt for decades and they might perceive that as unfair. I’m almost sure they would. I think part of the reason we didn’t get better relief for people who were underwater on mortgages after the crash was people thought it was unfair to give one group of people paying mortgages a way out when a lot of people were barely making theirs.
The most common question I got in the law office about the ACA was not from uninsured people, but from people who were lower income and paying a portion of their employer-provided health insurance. They wanted to know if they would be paying 150 a month while people with their same income would be paying nothing. They thought that was unfair, and they’re right. It is unfair. They wanted the ACA to put the uninsured on equal footing with them, not better. These aren’t rich people resenting poor people. They’re all the same people- they’re all low wage, insured and uninsured.
Has to be fair! It’s just essential to the politics of getting it done :)
Steeplejack (phone)
@Baud:
Red Thursday.
Joel
@MomSense: That would put her somewhere in her early twenties?
Anne Laurie
@Mandalay:
That’s not really fair to McKay Coppins, who is probably best known for his 2014 article “36 Hours On The Fake Campaign Trail With Donald Trump“. I believe I front-paged that article, back in the day, and I intended to post about the new one if TimF hadn’t beaten me to it.
Coppins reports that it is widely rumored, even among Breitbart staffers, that Trump has some monetary or other control over what Breitbart will publish about him/his many ongoing feuds. I’ve been collecting stuff for more Trump-vs-the-RNC posts, and over the weekend Erick Erickson complained that Breitbart staff had been “directed” not to write anything about RedState the Gathering without management approval. (At least one tweet from the Breitbart editing staff was later withdrawn.) The story is not whether Trump actually has a piece of Breitbart’s financial action, it’s that he’s convinced so many people among the RWNJs that he does. As with all Trump stories, it’s probably 80% bullshite and 15% overinflation… but it’s that 5% nugget that’s got the Dimbart survivors jumping at their own shadows and parsing their own words!
Kay
@Anne Laurie:
Well, they were cute because they were like “what is going on with Donald Trump?”
It was all women and they were just horrified. “Tell us this won’t really happen!” :)
He’s a cartoon to us but to them maybe he’s just repulsive.
I think i’ts great they’re so open to Sanders. There’s something really generous about it, that they’re not reducing him to an age or the scary “s” word but are ready to hear him out.
Anne Laurie
@Joel:
Said it before, will say it again: For all I sometimes resent missing out on the progress we’ve made in the last forty years, I thank goddess at least once a day that my own youthful indiscretions happened well before interconnectivity was everywhere!
MomSense
@Joel:
I think she said 24.
Chris
@Kay:
1) It’s why I said “someone like Bernie Sanders” – it’s unimaginable in our climate, but as a goal to strive for, I’d at least like it to be out there.
2) Well, I’m sorry about the people who were paying student loans before this hypothetical reform, but if this is the argument, then we literally cannot make any progress ever, because it’s not “fair” to the people who faced the same problems before the progress was there to help them. People who made it to their sixties after FDR instituted Social Security had a net to rely on that people who made it to their sixties only ten years earlier did not, and they had to save more money for their old age; is that “fair” to these people? No, it’s not, but I’ve really had my fill of the crab bucket “everyone needs to suffer exactly as much as I have and for exactly as long and exactly in the same quantity, or it’s not fair!” line of argument (see also people now bitching about the fast food workers who earn $15.00 an hour).
3) “Fair” cuts both ways. Here’s another thing that’s not fair: the fact that the students who are now facing daunting loan repayment prospects have to pay back so much more money than people who had the good sense to be born twenty years sooner and had the benefit of much cheaper college educations. Yes, the older you are, the more you would be to have had to pay back your loans in full… and also, the older you are, the less burdensome these loans were likely to be in the first place (that’s not even factoring in things like continually-stagnating-wages + continually-rising-cost-of-living). The march of time wasn’t fair to the people who’d benefit from this hypothetical reform either, which is why calls for major, major restructuring in everything from loan repayment to the cost of education aren’t going to go away.
maurinsky
Trump seems assured and confident?? I think he seems pathologically insecure and narcissistic.
MomSense
@Anne Laurie:
It will be on the podcast they release so hopefully he will release it here. If not, perhaps we can persuade one of our tireless FPers to link to the twib nation website.
muddy
@Greg: He never does negative campaigning. Never has, to my memory.
Kay
@Chris:
I’m completely sympathetic to younger people. I think you got a raw deal on college and the people who graduated into the crashing economy of 2009-11 are, to me, the modern version of Depression-era people. But I do think you have to be careful because you leave yourself vulnerable to that particular kind of outrage that is unfairness and horrible people will exploit that, like they did in the mortgage meltdown.
You might be able to sell it as a multi-generational benefit- young people have parents and their parents don’t want their grown children loaded down with debt. I just think you have to avoid the trap of THIS small group gets this benefit, because that’s deadly. I always think of it like defense- you have to put a large group of people in front of the smaller group who benefit to sort of buffer the rage :)
Mandalay
@Anne Laurie: I see where you are coming from, and I am not denying that the story may well be true. But it is still nothing more than an accusation without any supporting evidence – absolutely none – which is being made in the cause of promoting the author’s book.
We (rightly) get indignant here when smear jobs like this are done against people we like and support, and the only difference here is that we don’t like the person being accused – the article is still a smear job.
The headline of the article is:
Note the use of the word “believe”. Not only does Coppins have no evidence that Trump is paying breitbart.com, but the people making the accusations don’t either! And since the sources are anonymous we can’t know that Coppins isn’t making the whole thing up. It is just a “some say…” story. A more honest and accurate headline would be:
Some scoop.
Is that plausible?… Sure.
Is it true?… Who knows? But who cares even if it is true?
To be clear, I think Coppins is a good guy, and I would be astounded if he really had fabricated the entire story. But that is not the point, which is that the only part the story which is sourced is a very explicit denial from an executive at breitbart.com. As I said, without sources on the record, or other forms of hard evidence, the story is a nothingburger.
Well that may be your view, but I really don’t see that as being of any interest or importance – RWNJs having wrong or crazy ideas is hardly newsworthy. And even if Trump was paying breitbart.com it is still not illegal. Trump was paying actors to attend his speech the other day – a story that was proven true, but still barely registered with the media or the public.
Honestly, who really cares about “Money buys influence” stories any more unless a crime is committed?
Bobby Thomson
@kindness: Not a false flag. Just a seriously confused young woman who seems to be still finding her way.
cokane
lol hope trump burns this mf down
redshirt
Let them eat Koch.
J R in WV
@Kerry Reid:
Pot???
Oh my gawd!!! No wonder she died in custody, that stuff is lethal. Wait, no…
Pot, maybe the smell of it emitting from her pores intoxicated the officers, and in a pot-fueled rage they hung her with her trashbag!! Yes, that’s it.
No, wait… wait…
Pot in Texas carries a death penalty, and they had a trial, a bench trial, found her guilty, sentenced her to death, and hung her right there in the courtroom, aka cell.
What’s your point? What if she used pot a day or two before she was stopped, for land changing while black? Who cares?
Oh, you care. That excuses anything the jail staff wanted to do to her, the fact that she may have had pot in her system. Right?
Fuck you, asshole.
goblue72
@Kay: There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that reaction – a public policy position that changes a set of public benefits (which is what a student loan that is subsidized and/or insured by the Federal government is – and which has the result of favoring the late-comers over incumbents IS unfair. Those who have borne an expense – or “been responsible” – wind up being disfavored over those who merely had the luck of being borne later or who walked away. All of which incentivizes varying degrees of free ridership.
Those making the public policy would be well warned to create systems of transition from one benefit scheme to a new benefit scheme that is tilted in favor of the incumbent class over the latercomer class for the transition. If that means a system of student loan refinancings to a lower rate, it should involve incumbents paying a much lower rate for the balance of their loan term, while latercomers get a lower, but not nearly as low, rate to partially subsidize & offset the costs of the even lower rate for the incumbents.
Citizen Alan
@White Trash Liberal:
At this moment in history, anyone who works for the defeat of the Democratic Party (and by extension, the victory of the GOP) is my enemy regardless of race, creed, color or religion.