Dem odds of Senate takeover increasing by the day: 6 of 8 GOP candidates now polling worse than pre-convention: https://t.co/fYnnlMVUy2
— Susan Davis (@DaviSusan) August 16, 2016
Via front-pager Kay, from the NYTimes, “Early Voting Limits Donald Trump’s Time to Turn Campaign Around”:
Advisers to Donald J. Trump keep reassuring Republicans that there is still plenty of time to rescue his candidacy — nearly three months to counter Hillary Clinton’s vast operation in swing states and get Mr. Trump on message.
The Trump team had better check the calendar.
Voting actually starts in less than six weeks, on Sept. 23 in Minnesota and South Dakota, the first of some 35 states and the District of Columbia that allow people to cast ballots at polling sites or by mail before Nov. 8. Iowa is expected to have ballots ready by the end of September, as are Illinois and two other states.
The electoral battlegrounds of Arizona and Ohio are to begin voting on Oct. 12, nearly four weeks before Election Day. And North Carolina and Florida will be underway before Halloween.
Early voting has become a critical, even decisive factor in presidential elections: President Obama was sufficiently ahead in the early vote in Iowa and Nevada in 2012 that his campaign shifted resources from those states to others, according to former advisers, who also credited enthusiastic early voting in 2008 for his victory in North Carolina and elsewhere.
Nearly 32 percent of voters cast their ballots before Election Day in 2012, according to census data, compared with 29.7 percent in 2008 and 20 percent in 2004.
With Mrs. Clinton spending aggressively to try to dominate the early vote, Mr. Trump, who has repeatedly created distractions for himself in the past two weeks, is in jeopardy not just of being outmaneuvered but also of running out of chances to improve perceptions of him enough to win over undecided voters.
“When you have something as catastrophic as the Trump campaign is becoming, there aren’t enough weeks left to turn things around, and little ability to organize effectively and capture a strong share of the early vote,” said Mike Murphy, a veteran Republican strategist who worked on behalf of Jeb Bush during the primaries…
Longish article, but well worth reading the whole thing, especially if you’re nervous about media BothSider-ism.
Trump's Florida chief says a rally of his is "equivalent to 40,000 door-knocks" https://t.co/1oNiIkZoOF
— Elizabeth Titus (@emtitus) August 15, 2016
Trump needs 65 million or so voters. At 10,000 per rally, 3 rallies a day, 7 days a week, he will reach goal in six years.
— stuart stevens (@stuartpstevens) August 17, 2016
Ultraviolet Thunder
Oh, a Dem Senate would be sweet. I don’t dare to hope.
Cermet
Not just a Dem Senate and Presidency, but the remaining East Coast states are slipping away from thug control of national voting, at least. Once Georgia goes, SC is next and the gop party is basically dead as a national party. Texas will follow with the second or third presidential election cycle. Then the dem’s will need a lot of soul searching or break up into a corporate (the wall street whore party) and non-corporate party … the 0.001% and up, ALWAYS end up moving to the party that holds real power.
Schlemazel
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
If the DNC does a good job of GOtV and Trump keeps doing his best to depress the R vote it certainly is within reach!
I really thought the ’12 loss would send the GOP into a tailspin and lead to wholesale slaughter but it didn’t (unless you want to count this year’s campaign which I do) so I am reluctant to hope that they finally rip the party to shreds after this one. It does seem though that the owners have lost control of the party & it will be very very hard to recover
rikyrah
Good Morning ?, Everyone ?
rikyrah
Let us run up the score by GOTV! !
Ian
What scares me is that some slicker better packaged asshole will come around in 2020, 2024 with the same fascist schtick but a better personality and format that is acceptable to a majority of people.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
Pivot
Mustang Bobby
Meanwhile, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic:
I am running out of popcorn.
Kay
Just a quick fact check on Mr. Trump. Milwaukee has had school vouchers for 25 years and charter schools for 15. The tens of thousands of voucher students don’t attend public schools- they attend 115 private schools, the vast majority of which are Catholic schools.
They already have Donald Trump’s “education proposals” in Milwaukee and have had them for 25 years.
Also, just a reminder- Wisconsin is run by a (famous) Republican. If the cities are terrifying hell holes as Trump says Republicans might look to Scott Walker and ask him why.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
I guess Adam Sandler wasn’t available to run Trump’s campaign, so he turned it over to the Breitbarts
Mustang Bobby
@David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch: All in the timing, you and me.
PsiFighter37
So Manafort gets demoted by keeping his title and is superseded now by a Breitbart exec. What a joke / a great sign of Trump being Trump. Don’t actually demote people but let them have the same title and add someone with an equally or more important-sounding title to the mix. Management by chaos!
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
Patricia Kayden
@Cermet: SC would be a shocker if it went for Secretary Clinton. That would definitely be a sea change, so to speak. My fear is that the media will be actively rooting for Trump even more so than it was during the primaries as we get closer to November 8th. For example, today we’re going to hear all about how presidential Trump was last night when he addressed the hapless Negroes and pleaded with them to vote for him because he loves them so much and DemocRATS are the real racists. Sigh.
gene108
@Kay:
Scott Walker has no control in Milwaukee. It is run by the Democrat-thug-machine and has been for decades. If the people there would quit voting Democrat and work to get off the Democrat plantation things could improve. /wing nut.
gene108
@Patricia Kayden:
I can see Mississippi flipping first. It is 40% African-American. 90% of white people in MS vote Republican. Win a few more white voters and/or depress white turn out, while driving up AA voters and MS becomes a battleground state.
Kay
So Milwaukee has a kind of special place in the history of Republicans making stuff up about voter fraud. The Bush voter suppression team latched onto Milwaukee as the center of the conspiracy by black people to steal elections from Republicans. When the voter fraud conspiracy theory really took after the 2000 elections, they all centered on Milwaukee. It wasn’t Sean Hannitty either, back then. It was the editorial page of the WSJ.
Trump is lazy and he has no ground campaign and a good voter suppression effort would require lots of buy-in from locals, but if “voter fraud” is a central part of his message to white suburban voters that to me makes it a little more concerning. It’s a lie when Republicans say voter suppression isn’t mainstream in the GOP or is limited to the FOX News celebrities. Kris Kobach is a national leader on voter suppression and he’s a prestigious lawyer and Secretary of State. He was Mitt Romney’s consultant on voting and immigration until Romney distanced himself and claimed he was an “informal” consultant. It’s mainstream. Kobach drafts laws that Republicans in other states adopt.
Patricia Kayden
@Ian:
You meant that was acceptable to the majority of White people which is the norm for Republican candidates, who routinely get the majority of the White vote. I assume Trump will get the majority of the White vote this time around.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@PsiFighter37: Joe of the Morning and crew tell me that this is the big pivot and Kellyanne will be traveling with The Donald and keep him on message. He could get as many as 7% of the black vote with his new “Law and Order” message.
Kay
@gene108:
It’s just so funny to watch them dance around the GOP governor thing. It happens in Ohio too. Republicans have to say Cleveland is terrifying and a hell hole to make their “plantation” argument, but Kasich objects, because Kasich wants credit for Cleveland now.
The talking points keep crashing into reality.
Kay
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
But that’s a lie too. He doesn’t want the black vote and he knows he won’t get it. He wants white suburban voters who won’t support a blatant racist. It’s kind of interesting. We found out how far the GOP can go on blatant racism before white suburbanites bolt- pretty far! Trump was too far.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kay: Scott Walker’s never been to Milwaukee, has nothing to do with Milwaukee and was never the county executive in Milwaukee.
Mustang Bobby
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Good luck with that. Every time she goes on TV, five banshees get out of the business.
Kay
Well,if Trump pivots and gets the 25% of GOP leaning voters back that he’s not drawing now that just means it’s an ordinary D v R election.
And we can win those too :)
He was due for a comeback narrative. You all knew it was coming.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kay:
I’ve heard this song before, one of the oldies but goodies; the Republican nominee used it successfully in 1968. Law and Order rhetoric and something called the Southern Strategy, I’m sure that’ll have black folk flocking to the Trumpster.
Kay
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
He got everything he wanted. I would think Milwaukee would be a free market paradise by now. The voucher experiment is 25 years old. There are lots and lots of kids in Milwaukee who spent their entire school careers in publicly funded private, religious schools, never encountering a union-thug teacher :)
When do these Right wing experiments pan out, I wonder?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mustang Bobby: I’ve seen Kellyanne on the TV machine when she was the voice of the youth back in 1992, she was unimpressive then and I’ve seen nothing in the remaining years to change my opinion of her.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
Kay
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
It’s what Kasich does. They’re uncomfortable with blatant racism, college educated white people in the midwest.. Kasich must be furious – this is his thing ! :) It’s repackaged now- “compassionate conservatism”.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Kay: “Compassionate Conservatism”, I’ve heard that somewhere before.
ETA: Kasich was the one GOP’er that concerned me. He seems to be the only one of the 17 that could pull that off.
OzarkHillbilly
@Patricia Kayden:
I’m not so sure, I think it might split down the middle this time. A whole lot of white people are OK with racism as long as it isn’t in their face.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: Have you seen Kansas lately? It’s paradise.
Baud
@Kay:
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Long term, it may be a good thing that Trump is now the face of compassionate conservatism.
@OzarkHillbilly:
They might not turn out, but I would be pleasantly shocked to see Dems get a majority of white voters.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
Aleta
Rats might desert a sinking ship but sharks come in to feed.
Baud
@Aleta: Nice.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
THIS. IS. BIG.
This is like Ric Flair firing Ted Dibiase and hiring Bobby “The Brain” Heenan – WOOOH!
Cat48
@Patricia Kayden:
Too early for me to check out MoJo, can’t stomach him after Trumps speech last night. I’ll probably end up in Gitmo bc I don’t like him & have no desire to get along with him & his Russian allies.
As for SC, anything is possible I guess. Maybe upstate will stay home bc their very religious. I look at the local paper, but I haven’t seen a,poll for a while. If I do, I’ll let you know. Will Hillz win Iowa? looks close.
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
Baud
@Patricia Kayden:
I wonder how it would play if Hillary went to a black community and said that white people that Republicans had taken their votes for granted.
BruceFromOhio
Perfect! 2022 is not a presidential election year, and it will keep him busy preaching to the choir.
@Aleta: Couldn’t happen to better bunch of rats.
debbie
@Ian:
Doesn’t matter. Most of the Trump supporters are older. He has had little traction with younger voters, and this will become more and more of an issue as the years go by.
PaulWartenberg2016
Trump just put the head of Breitbart News in charge of his campaign. A guy who shills conspiracy theories, rages against RINOs, considers Fox Not-News “soft”, and would likely up Trump’s ranting and insults to Coulter-level shrieking.
I’d say the entire GOP just went to Ludicrous Speed, but I doubt the Scots will let Trump anywhere near plaid.
rikyrah
@David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch:
Not a joke?
For real?
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: I doubt a majority but a more or less 50/50 split? I can see that. Trump is already telling his legions of fans to not bother voting.
rikyrah
@Kay:
Continue to bring the truth. Kay
debbie
I just listened to an NPR extended interview with Julian Assange. What a slimeball. The interviewer gave it his best, but Assange not only admitted to nothing, he called Wikileaks the “rebel library of Alexandria.”
Patricia Kayden
@Cat48: I wonder why Iowa went for President Obama twice but appears to be a toss up this time around.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa_trump_vs_clinton-5597.html
PaulWartenberg2016
@gene108:
I think the polling numbers suggest South Carolina is closer for Hillary than Mississippi, although both could benefit from a depressed white voter turnout.
Thing is, I think South Carolina has more industry and education than Mississippi, and the one group of whites that Trump is *losing* are educated Whites.
amk
Shorter donnie – You thought I was just a racist rabble rouser? Now watch me.
BruceFromOhio
@Kay: See also: Kansas, State of.
@OzarkHillbilly: Ah yes. =)
debbie
@Kay:
You know, when elected officials no longer feel they have to comply with federal orders or judicial rulings, the country’s already lost.
Peale
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I guess. Since they got 7% in the last election and it was the same message they’ve been sending to AA voters for 40 years, updated slightly to remind AAs that they should join in the Anti-immigrant fun. Since that got them 7% last time, it could work again. If someone else were the messenger.
rikyrah
@gene108:
The magic White people number for Hillary in Mississippi is 16%
That all she needs in Mississippi to flip it.
?BillinGlendaleCA
OT: I had “made while you wait”(about 2 minutes) ice cream yesterday.
OzarkHillbilly
@rikyrah: Donald Trump appoints Breitbart chief and demotes Manafort
Patricia Kayden
@Baud: Secretary Clinton appears to have genuine respect for Black voters which means that your scenario is unthinkable. Thankfully.
Makes me laugh when Republicans claim that Blacks are on a plantation because we vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic party. They must think we can’t hear or see their racism, i.e., support for the Confederate flag, voter ID laws, stand your ground laws, etc.
Baud
@rikyrah:
I didn’t realize that Mississippi had that many magic white people. ;-)
Seriously, that’s an amazing number.
MJS
I’m hoping that any media concoction of a “pivot” (e.g., Morning Joe) is met with a steady stream of Hillary proxy tweets aimed at Trump. That should put an end to that malarkey. Paging Senator Warren. Senator Warren, you’re up.
TS
All’s good – Bill kristol thinks Trump can win. hahahahahaha
debbie
@Cat48:
All that needs to be done is to ask these religious people to count how many of the Ten Commandments Trump has broken.
BruceFromOhio
@OzarkHillbilly: Trump is already telling his legions of fans to not bother voting.
This concerns me over the medium haul. If enough angry, disenfranchised people with guns decide to run the whole thing into the wall because Dear Leader says it’s “rigged,” i.e. broken, you end up with the seeds of a civil war. Water enough ground with hate and fear, and the fucking lunatics have the fields to grow in to make life dangerously unpleasant for the rest of us. And we got plenty enough of that shit already.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: To be fair, other groups of people that Republicans hate aren’t as sensible as black people in terms of voting. In that sense, I can understand their confusion.
Patricia Kayden
@OzarkHillbilly: Yep. By constantly beating the drum of a rigged election, Trump is discouraging his supporters from wasting their time voting. I doubt that’s what he intended though. He’s just too dumb to think things through to their logical conclusion and his sycophants are too cowed to warn him about unintended consequences.
Baud
@debbie: Eleven.
rikyrah
@Baud:
I think that it is doable. They defeated a Personhood Amendment in Mississippi. Surely there are enough of those White women to bring Hillary up to 16% of the White vote.
Patricia Kayden
@debbie: But isn’t SC the state which had the “hiking the Appalachian trail” Governor? They forgave him and I believe he’s now a Senator. IOKIYAR.
Cat48
@Patricia Kayden:
Maybe Iowa just prefers younger candidates who can charm your socks off :).
I.do think they were attached to Obama & his family bc they campaigned there for a year. They even know what his fav eats are. He hired a lot of people for all the offices & took a few to DC when he won. Maybe she needs to go w/Obama a few times.
Cat48
@Patricia Kayden:
He’s in the House, my rep,
David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch
@rikyrah: Believe me! Believe me!
Hal
Conway was on Halperin’s show with Donnie Douche a few days ago. She shoveled so much shit I’m surprised they all didn’t drown, but according to Douche, if Trump had 20 of her he would be 20 points ahead.
Baud
@Cat48:
Arugula!
Cat48
@debbie:
My,husband said the people he works with, now wishes they had not voted for him. He told them, Do the Right Thing, Vote Hillary! They laughed but didn’t commit.
Baud
@Cat48: Good on your hubby.
JMG
@Hal: Conway’s been on cable offering the Republican line since Monica at least. Since she is always available, cable news shows love her. God forbid the hosts have to come up with hours of insight on their own, because they can’t.
PS: Conway is a pollster in the same way I am the shortstop for the Dodgers.
OzarkHillbilly
@BruceFromOhio:
That ground has been getting watered for a long time. Now it is getting flooded. I understand the fear but the vast majority of the last American patriots are too busy watching Hannity and drinking Bud to get up from their Lazy-boys and do anything more than head to the shooting range where they fantasize over their own personal Alamos, slaughtering the black and brown hordes storming up the white suburban streets.
As to the few who actually are dangerous, I have 2 words for them: Bundy family.
(not to say there won’t be tragic casualties, but the chances of them being me/you or any body I/you know are between slim and none)
MJS
@BruceFromOhio: I’m not worried. Those who believe armed insurrection will be the way to go in the event of a Trump loss are the same type who took over the bird sanctuary in Oregon. They quickly become a laughingstock. I don’t expect them to do anything more than take to their keyboards and continue to spout their racist nonsense.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: No point worrying because there is little we can do except continue winning.
Cat48
@Baud:
? Correct, Arugula!
MikeTheZ
The other shoe just dropped for Manafort. AP reporting he funneled $2.2 million in Ukrainian money to lobbying firms, and hid the foreign source.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@MJS: It’s hard to move quickly in a hoverround.
Baud
@MikeTheZ: Haha.
sherparick
1@David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch: Well, as the saying goes, “good luck with that.” Kind of reminds me of a Looney-Tune cartoon where Daffy has ended up in the water and is screaming for help and Bugs throws him an anvil. Works every time. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AnvilOnHead
Sadly, the “Republican Party” by that name may go out of business, but the Neo-Confederate Party, the party of White Supremacy by whatever name, seems certain to endure for the rest of my lifetime, and probably the life time of my nieces and nephews and their children, and probably in union with the party of Plutocracy and the party of Christianist Dominion. Now, this “party” may not be able to win national Presidential elections, with their stronger minority, secular, and younger voter turnout, but it has been very successful in off-year elections with lower turnout. It does make them a completely incoherent as a Governing party (except on the issue of tax cuts for rich people), but they have found that the McConnell strategy of complete obstruction and sabotage against the Obama Administration works well for these off-year elections. The MSM blames the Administration for not showing “leadership” and “working with the other side” to get things done, it depresses Democratic turnout when major policy goals are frustrated (like on immigration, climate change, and economic revival), and energizes the Republican base for the off-year elections. Of course, then the Presidential primaries come next and in both 2012 and 2016 they turn the Republican Party into a clown show and the cycle repeats since the issues of white ressentiment that drive White turnout in Southern, Western, and Midwestern states in the off-year elections magnify the Republicans Party’s problems in Presidential election years when large numbers of non-whites and hippies come out to vote. http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2016/8/16/112843/928
Patricia Kayden
@MikeTheZ: So will Trump finally drop Manafort as an official spokesperson? Let’s see. I hope Secretary Clinton makes an ad about this to highlight Trump’s corrupt associations.
Iowa Old Lady
@Cat48: It’s hard to say what’s going on in Iowa, but it worries me.
Gin & Tonic
@MikeTheZ: Huh. Cause this guy was saying on Sunday, after the NYT story broke, that he was working on something, too, and that Manafort was going to have a bad week.
Baud
@Iowa Old Lady: Clinton doesn’t seem to be devoting resources there yet. Hard to believe they are working on expanding the map but ignoring Iowa. Something must be afoot in internal polling.
Just One More Canuck
@Mustang Bobby: Per TPM, Trump’s been feeling “controlled” and “boxed in” by his advisers. Now he can let his freak flag fly. I wonder what that would look like.
Cermet
@Patricia Kayden: Not as shocked as I would; I was simply pointing out that Georgia and SC are both getting less red and Georgia is in play, even (not that it will turn blue in the final vote this Nov.) What I am saying is these states are getting more blue and very likely, by next cycle (if the economy does not crash) Georgia will likely turn blue and SC will be even less red. Demographics are working against the thugs – just like Texas(s) is shifting (slower) to more blue.
sherparick
@Patricia Kayden: No, he is only a Congressman, although of course a Movement Conservative, Christianist Republican. Tim Scott is the junior Senator to Huckleberry, and though Black, votes as a true Christianist Republican, enthusiastically representing the interests of his White constituents, particularly on the issues of tax cuts and against spending on things SNAP, Family Planning, etc.
scav
Thing is, after any crack-up of this demonstrably well-oiled machine of the greatest elements (clearly demonstrated to the discerning by the flung metal filings and stripping of gears noises) the man with the small hands firmly on the driving wheel is not going to issue a concssion speach, he’s going to let loose with an epic analysis of how his hereunto formidable and perfect hires failed him! and how the Benighted Stupid VOtERS betrayed him and the whole thing was rigged (in more than half the states and all of the polls and by an international plot of bookies) and all media outlets except a few KKK and NRA ones churned out in basements on mimeographs, ad infinitum. But the voters will surely be called upon as unworthy of his support and attention because he utterly is going back to his perfect life with a spotless reverance for his own infallability in execution. So, I guess the dice throw is how many followers with all the best guns will he hurt the equally inerrent feelings of and how many he will inspire to greater acts of violence to prove their undying love and win back his fickle favor.
hmm. wonder if coffee will shorten my sentences today. Might just be a baroque day looming.
MomSense
@rikyrah:
Wave election! ?
amk
Rude rudy now comparing the breitbart thug hire to raygun’s hire of jim baker. Clutching at straws here and yet msm (and some bj’ers) term this as a “pivot” just because the scum’s speech last night wasn’t all spittle.
msb
So the Breitbart guy and the not-a-pollster are supposed to be better than Manafort, the dictator-polisher?
Mike E
Andrea Mitchell swung that “voters mistrust Hillary” sledge pretty hard yesterday… you’d think emails were found to be a major cause of cancer, seemingly
Patricia Kayden
@Just One More Canuck: “N” word rallies with him leading the chants. “C” word rallies with him leading the chants. Pretty much what is already happening at his rallies but with him actually using derogatory terms from the podium instead of just allowing his audience to have all the fun.
Just joking. (I think).
Brachiator
GOTV is definitely the message.
The fact is that the media is not behind Trump. The fact is that there is no horse race narrative being pushed. What matters is a swing states plus more strategy, and getting out the vote. If this depresses Trump voters and keeps knocking Trump off his stride, so much the better.
And as others have noted here, getting the early vote is critically important.
OzarkHillbilly
@scav: Coffee always lengthens my sentences.
TS
@Mike E:
It is all they’ve got – Hillary’s campaign is all about policy, an administration that cares about people, a knowledge needed to be President & pointing out that Trump has NONE of these things.
nonynony
@OzarkHillbilly:
In 2008 it was a 43/55 split Obama/McCain. After 8 years of W wrecking the country and McCain spending an entire year floundering. Topped off by him bringing us Sarah Palin.
I think that’s about the best Clinton can hope for. Maybe a few extra percentages – 45/53. Or maybe it’ll be worse because of a large “protest vote” contingent and it’ll be more like 40/53 with 7% in the “other” category.
The only way I see her making it close to 50/50 with white voters is if white voters who vote Republican are so depressed that they don’t bother to show up at all, driving up the relative number of Democrats. I wouldn’t want to count on it but it would be nice to see an election in my lifetime where white people weren’t being baited with racial resentment into voting for the biggest asshole.
Baud
@TS:
It really is, which is amazing. Makes me wonder how much “reporting” the news media really gets from the campaigns, and if the Trump campaign really isn’t doing the job here.
Kay
@amk:
I agree with you to a certain extent but I also think it’s naive to imagine they’ll just give up. They will lose the Supreme Court if they lose this election and there really is a fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives – it’s profound. They want to undo all of the New Deal precedents. That’s the goal. It will be a very different country if we go back to pre-Civil War. It really will. The House that FDR Built is the house we all live in. Besides all the bullshit and politics, there really is a huge ideological difference. They know that. That’s what’s at stake.
They are not going to surrender. That’s a pipedream.
Cat48
@Iowa Old Lady:
They know they have some type of problem in Iowa. Hillz was there last week and Kaine is going,today. Hillz is in Cleveland today. They really should take Obama or maybe Bernie or even Elizabeth Warren.
Baud
@Kay:
FWIW, I think their ideal is actually the post-Civil War, turn-of-the-century Lochner, Jim Crow era.
Baud
@Cat48: Good. I hadn’t heard much about Iowa.
scav
@OzarkHillbilly: Gulp. I may be in real trouble then. The coffee sitting next to me in my extra-large mug is unusually strong today.
JMG
Bloomberg News talking about one of their “investors surveys” (Who knows who’s in that group) showing Clinton well favored over Trump. Anyone with a portfolio, even if it’s just a 401(k), has got to be frightened as to what a megalomaniac in the White House could do to their assets.
Iowa Old Lady
@Baud: We’re not polled very often so it’s possible the numbers we’re seeing are off.
?BillinGlendaleCA
You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.
amk
@Kay: They sure will fight for senate and congress but I don’t see them getting 100% behind this racist wreck.
WereBear
You would be right if they were really Christian. :)
But they are truly White Supremacists. And that is what they vote for.
Jeffro
@PaulWartenberg2016:
New possible campaign slogans:
– “Let Trump Be Trump!”
– “Set Controls For The Sun”
– “Better to Burn Out Than Fade Away” (I think he actually said that at last night’s rally)
Oh my. Apologies if this has already been suggested, but was Alex Jones not available to helm the campaign?
Baud
@JMG: There was a David Frum tweet this morning noting that the stock market isn’t exactly responding negatively to Clinton’s likely win.
Kay
@amk:
I would never have predicted they would gut the VRA. They did. That’s only one of a series of civil rights law that can be gutted. They could get rid of the entire (federal) regulatory basis in the Constitution. That’s what environmental laws and worker protections are based on. They could make collective bargaining illegal.
That’s what they want. I don’t think we should kid ourselves and think they’ll just slink away “oh, well, bad choice in the primary!” Remember 2000? They would have conducted a coup to drag Bush over the finish line.
Baud
@Kay: I agree, Kay. I don’t think our side appreciates a lot of the legal substructure that supports what too many of us take for granted.
WereBear
I now recoil from her face like it was Shelob.
OzarkHillbilly
@nonynony:
That’s where I’m coming from with the +/- 50/50 white vote (and for the record, I will consider a 48/52 split to be within the range of 50/50 considering the history) I don’t really expect it, but if Trump continues as he is, AND the GOP establishment turns on him, white turnout will be way down. Maybe even enuf for the 50/50 scenario. Maybe.
?BillinGlendaleCA
I had no idea the Senate Majority Leader was in town.
p.a.
Whew- health/anxiety/sleep issues, 50mg benadryl gave me 7 hrs uninterrupted sleep, first time in weeks.
rikyrah
The Real Trump Voters
by Martin Longman
August 15, 2016 2:00 PM
Simon Maloy does a good job of distilling the new Gallup data on Trump voters. They aren’t exactly who most people think they are. They’re not as economically distressed or negatively impacted by the loss of manufacturing jobs as is widely assumed, and they’re often more suburban than rural. Counterintuitively, “Gallup found that the only candidate who is viewed consistently positively in areas with higher concentrations of manufacturing jobs is… Hillary Clinton.”
And:
Of course, we all know that race plays a major part in Trump’s appeal, but, again, not in the “a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged by reality” kind of way. Trump voters are indeed overwhelmingly white, but they are not generally whites who have had negative experiences with minority crime or even much direct employment competition with immigrants of color.
JMG
@Kay: The difference is that in 2000 many voters, including Democrats, didn’t actually see much difference between Bush and Gore. So there was more acceptance than outrage as to the imposed outcome. Then Bush happened. Any attempt to reverse a Clinton win through legal or illegal machinations would be much harder to cram down the electorate’s throat.
Betsy
@Schlemazel: no it won’t. They always seem to recover in the biennial off-year elections.
p.a.
@WereBear: the mistrust/email is all they have to try to turn this into a race; Benghazi doesn’t resonate beyond the 27%.
Betsy
@p.a.: I hear you. Feel ya, too.
TS
@Cat48:
Has Bernie campaigned ANYWHERE for Hillary. Last I read he was raising money to primary DWS
MikeTheZ
@Gin & Tonic: That’s what I’m thinking. And here I was worried we’d be left hanging on that one.
rikyrah
Giuliani on Breitbart exec joining Trump campaign, Kellyanne Conway becoming manager: “this is what Reagan did when he brought Jim Baker in”
— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) August 17, 2016
MrSnrub
@Hal: So, since Trump has 1 of her that means he’s 1 point ahead? I’m confused.
Peale
@Cat48: it’s a little strange that they do. Trump, if I recall, insulted the caucus goers of Iowa when the polls turned against him and refused to go to the last of the gazillion debates they had in Iowa this cycle. I thought he basically called them rubes. Not the usual way to win back voters, but maybe the voters of Iowa like to be called rubes. Who knew?
rikyrah
Donald Trump is blaming Democrats for the plight of unemployed African Americans in Milwaukee in a WI where Scott Walker never happened.
— John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) August 17, 2016
rikyrah
Trump kept saying he’s in Milwaukee. But actually, he delivered speech 1hour away in West Bend, which is 90%+ white
— igorvolsky (@igorvolsky) August 17, 2016
Peale
@rikyrah: lol. Yes. so maybe this Bannon guy is Secretary of State or Treasury material? Some prestigious agency awaits, for sure.
rikyrah
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Met a guy who went to Trump event in Erie w son. Told son he would pay him $1 if saw someone nonwhite. Ended up paying 50cts (ambiguous)
— James Fallows (@JamesFallows) August 17, 2016
rikyrah
Trump to bring Gen. Flynn to 1st national security briefing Weds. Same Gen. Flynn at Putin’s right-hand in this pic.
— The Daily Edge (@TheDailyEdge) August 17, 2016
Jeffro
@rikyrah: I’m trying to picture just how heavily edited that briefing had to be, knowing Flynn is that close to Putin.
“Gentlemen, thank you for joining us. The word is a complicated place. Thanks again and have a great day.”
rikyrah
$25 mil. tax break for Trump Casinos courtesy of Christie Administration. News will damage Christie more than Trump?
— Matt Katz (@mattkatz00) August 17, 2016
rikyrah
Trump is polling worse among black voters than almost every single Republican presidential nominee since 1948:
— FiveThirtyEight (@FiveThirtyEight) August 17, 2016
Cat48
@TS:
No, I don’t think he’s going to. He’s probably at his new house on the lake. :)
shomi
Still smells like horserace journalism to me. It’s a very good trend for Dems if the premise becomes “can he turn around his stupid unforced errors”.
This was always the outcome. Only thing I am surprised about is that there are still people claiming to be surprised. Other thing I am surprised about is that the gap is not larger. I still think the weasel headed fucknugget will get far fewer than the current 40% estimate. Even if he doesn’t say anything stupid from now till Nov.
rikyrah
@Kay:
YOU TELL THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH.
THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH!!!
Cat48
@Peale: So, Rubes? Trump may not win then. They could be distracting by school starting & football, etc. I haven’t seen many polls.
MomSense
@Baud:
Exactly. I vividly remember telling people who didn’t see a difference between Bush and Gore (still a BS argument) that being knowledgeable about our system of government means that we have to vote for the best person to appoint the Justices, Judges, and AG.
MomSense
@Cat48:
Well I hope he jumps in that lake.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: Some polls show a gender gap wider than any since 1952. I think that’s underestimating it, but we shall see.
Matt McIrvin
@Patricia Kayden: Iowa was 91.3% white in 2010; I can’t help but think that’s significant. For a while Clinton seemed to be running behind Obama in New Hampshire and Maine, also very white states–though she’s made up a lot of ground there.
Aleta
Still wondering how our system can allow a candidate who could(should) not pass a background check for a security clearance to now receive security briefings. At least Biteback News will have an ‘inside source’ for some prize winning fake reporting on security threats caused by HRC. That’ll provide much needed amplification of hysteria during this dull campaign season. And inspire a flow of newly desperate donations and PAC money into Trumpscam Associates Inc.
Quinerly
@Aleta:
I’m with you on this. Was about to type in a comment but you said it better.
Peale
@Cat48: well, not rubes. Had to go back. Iowa voters were “stupid”. I guess that’s the threshold. Call voters stupid and they’ll certainly rally around a candidate. It’s Not a well supported approach to garnering voter support, but it has its advantages.
Gin & Tonic
@MikeTheZ: More shoes dropping. This *is* shaping up as a bad week for Manafort.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: A thing that’s struck me is the extent to which they’ve adopted rhetoric used by the left in the early 2000s to delegitimize George W. Bush. I think Trump referring to the election as “regime change” is an example of that: it was a line used ironically against Bush in 2004. Roger Stone is straight-up using the “one word: Diebold” approach, claiming that the election will be fixed through electronic voting-machine tampering; that was all over lefty blogs back in the day.
Matt McIrvin
…and, of course, one of Trump’s favorite lies is that he was against the Iraq war all along, so he can pin it on Hillary and try to get antiwar Bernie supporters to vote for him.
oldgold
The ag economy is tanking. That explains Iowa.
rikyrah
@Kay:
1. Once again, I wish you were FrontPaging it, Kay.
2. I believe that one of the other FrontPagers should do a post with this quote, because this is absolutely on point, and one of the clearest, best, crystallizations of what’s at stake in this election that I have ever seen.
rikyrah
Liz Cheney appears to be on her way to Congress
08/17/16 09:12 AM
By Steve Benen
If you think what’s missing from Congress is a member of the Cheney family, you’ll be pleased with yesterday’s primary results out of Wyoming.
Liz Cheney has won Wyoming’s Republican primary for U.S. House. Cheney beat seven challengers for a chance at the job her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, first won 40 years ago.
Her campaign focused on national security and rolling back federal regulations affecting Wyoming’s beleaguered coal industry.
Incumbent Rep. Cynthia Lummis (R), who has served as Wyoming’s sole representative for the last eight years, is stepping down at the end of this Congress. There was a large GOP primary field, which Cheney ended up leading with relative ease.
Yesterday’s results don’t guarantee Cheney’s place in Congress, but given Wyoming’s status as a ruby-red state, it’s widely assumed that the winner of the Republican primary is well positioned to win the U.S. House seat in the fall.
What’s especially notable about Cheney’s victory is the degree to which the former Fox News pundit and State Department official had to undo the damage done by her last congressional bid.
Shantanu Saha
Don’t settle for running out the clock. Trump’s continual fumbles give us the opportunity to run up the score, and run it up BIG. Whenever we have the ball, we run it down their throats. No field goals, just touchdowns. Rub their noses in it until they have the most humiliating loss in modern times.
Aleta
@Betty Cracker: A historically wide white gender gap will be a gross thing to ponder during HRC’s victory. On the other hand, fuck those voters who claim to love a woman but vote for Trump.
Immanentize
@Baud: I agree with this. As much as the republicans hate New Deal programs, it is really the Katzenbach cases from the 60’s — which empowered the federal government to enforce equal protection legislation — that they really are after. Scalia, J. never pretended different.
ETA. I just checked and Scalia is still dead and his seat Unfilled.
nonynony
@shomi:
I’m sticking with my prediction of 45%. He’ll get Romney’s levels with white voters but lose the other gains that Romney made over McCain to throw it back down to McCain’s 45%. I’ll predict a 50% +/- a shade for Clinton – lower than Obama’s levels in 2012 but still high and hopefully an actual majority. The remaining 5% or so will be split between various protest candidates.
I’ll be very, very happy to be wrong here. But I’m a pessimist and a misanthrope and I just don’t believe that Republicans won’t come back to Daddy when they’re finally sitting in the voting booth or staring at their mail in ballot.
Aleta
@Kay: They are concentrating the big money on Congressional races and those for state legislatures, governor, municipal offices, and of course judges and sheriffs.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@Mustang Bobby: Man, outsourcing is hitting everyone these days.
Chris
@Ian:
Aye.
gogol's wife
@Chris:
I have a better opinion of the USA than you two do.
Ruckus
@David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch:
Adam Sandler doesn’t mind being a loser, he just isn’t into being that big of one.
Shalimar
@JMG: You’ve fucked the shortstop for the Dodgers?
MikeTheZ
@Gin & Tonic: This is shaping up to be the most insane news cycle of the election, and Trump still hasn’t said anything yet.
catclub
@PsiFighter37:
It is funny that Trump cannot bring himself to fire the guy. He did not fire Corey Lewandowski face to face either.
catclub
@rikyrah:
ha ha. Her campaign focused on being better known than the other 6.
Betty Cracker
@gogol’s wife: I vacillate between optimism and pessimism. This election will be a referendum on so many things.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@Baud: Obama got 10% of the white vote in Mississippi in 2012, running against Romney, who hits all the buttons for “White Patrician Male Leader”, aside from the Mormonism, which I am pretty sure was ignored by most of them in the face of four more years of the Kenyan Usurper.
The last polling data from Mississippi dates back to the primary in early spring, and she looked surprisingly good against Trump then. We don’t have any more recent polling–it’s Mississippi, Republican since Nixon reached out his icy hand, and has 6 big electoral votes, so no one’s bothering–but we have no clear idea what white likely voters, especially the women, are thinking there right now. But of that 16%, we already know 10% is doable.
Those six electoral votes are in no way essential to a Clinton victory, but having Mississippi vote for a Democratic Presidential candidate would be an immense moral victory, just as having South Carolina and Georgia flip would be.
J R in WV
@OzarkHillbilly:
I kicked $100 into your Democratic candidate for Senate, Jason Kander is opposing Blunt. Or whatever his right-wing-nutjob name is.
Hoping it will be well spent and not wasted on GOTV efforts directed at people who have never missed an election, and have never voted for a Republican.
We get calls about GOTV at least once a day, because I contribute I suppose, and we haven’t missed an election with Dems and Reps running since we settled down in a voting precinct. Being a union maid household, we never voted for a Republican, evah, and won’t.
Good luck out there in Missou!
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Aleta: I work in that world. Both Clinton and Trump would pass, contrary to the butthurt squalling of the righties.
The briefers are not going to tell either one of them anything that could do any real damage.
catclub
@Gin & Tonic:
Thanks for that reminder! I guess I was thinking more revelations of illegal payoffs from Russian bosses, but being demoted probably counts.
Gin & Tonic
@catclub: Well, check one of my other posts above. The Times (UK) is linking Manafort to laying the groundwork (back in 2006) for the annexation of Crimea.
catclub
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
But Trump would have a much harder time – relatives who are not US citizens, financial dealings in foreign countries.
Clinton would have to itemize all the times she has had interactions with foreign governments – except on the forms, they exempt all those that are part of one’s US government job. Likewise for foreign travel.
Joel
@efgoldman: Careful with the benadryl though, it has a secondary anticholinergic target. That’s why people wake up feeling groggy. Long term effects are not really known. Believe it or not, something like ambien may be safer.
catclub
@1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet): I second all those points.
also
1. Black turnout in 2012 was higher percentage than white in MS, if I recall correctly.
2. It might fall off without Obama on the ticket.
3. Hillary winning those black voters overwhelmingly in the primary is a good sign.
4. That question of what white women in MS think of Trump is the interesting one.
MikeTheZ
Politico reports Trump said he doesn’t trust the intelligence he’s going to be receiving today. WHAT THE FUCK
Miss Bianca
@scav: Go Baroque!
Immanentize
@MikeTheZ: so “small government” Republican Party has finally morphed into the nihilistic paranoid anarchist party.
Immanentize
IOWA — I just read that Suffolk polling is in the field in Iowa.
nonynony
@1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet):
This even understates it. Having Mississippi, SC and/or George vote for Democratic Presidential candidate who isn’t trying to pander to the white vote and is explicitly running on a platform of tolerance and inclusivity while running against an explicitly racist agitator attempting to gin up the white resentment vote would be a huge moral victory. Add in the fact that she’s a woman and not a white male patrician figure and it amps it up higher.
And while it wouldn’t shut up the inanities of the “Mudcat Saunders” wing of Democratic punditry, it would continue them on their slide into obsolescence. They already sound stupid after Obama’s two-term win without the pandering to the white guys who drive trucks with Confederate flags on them demographic – how much more stupid will they sound after not just three successive drubbings, but a drubbing where solid former Confederate states have rejected that idea? I’d love to see it.
scav
Spare a cycle for the Christie-Trump drop of tax deals available for those with connections. NYT: Trump Casinos’ Tax Debt Was $30 Million. Then Christie Took Office.
17 cents on the dollar, after six years in court and accusations of filing false reports. And a better deal than other tax delinquents got, so extra-gilded special special. (What was that other long-standing lawsuit Christie bailed on? Exxon is the top google: 8.9 billion settled for about 2.5 million. Odd how things seem to rhyme in the same direction in Christie’s NJ.)
Another good quote, this time for the business genius himself (these must be the secret-sauce techniques he’ll bring to government).
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@catclub: There is also the question of what they might think of Hillary. Observers of her Senate campaigns were struck by the number of older white women in upstate New York, not otherwise likely Democratic voters, who really responded well to her.
Peale
@MikeTheZ: Why should he? He doesn’t believe crime statistics. He doesn’t believe in census reports. He doesn’t believe in economic reports. Why should he believe in intelligence reports? They’re probably just politically correct bullshit that doesn’t support what he thinks about the world. For instance, they probably don’t spend a lot of time in them talking about the Mexican government’s plan to overwhelm our nation with its rapists. How could you trust a report that doesn’t deal with the greatest threat to the country in a generation?
catclub
@1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet): yes. A woman President is a big Biden deal, even if it does not get mentioned often.
Seth Owen
@Shantanu Saha: along those lines, the top top TOP domestic priority of Clinton should be to use the next session of Congress to fill every single federal court vacancy nationwide, while they have the chance. Every single one. The only vacancies that should be left in 2 years are those caused by death or serious health disability just before the election.