Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Washington Post Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

He really is that stupid.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Books are my comfort food!

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Don't Mourn, Organize / Open Thread: The Not-Yellow Rose of Texas

Open Thread: The Not-Yellow Rose of Texas

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Anybody from the area want to comment? From what I can see, the assumptions seem to be that this is (a) putting down a marker for future elections; (b) a way to encourage voters to show up for down-ballot races; and/or (c) a relatively low-cost way of messing with Trump/Cruz/the Texan GOP…


The Repub Governor certainly seems to be doing his best to GOTV for Democrats…

Reader Interactions

198Comments

  1. 1.

    Fair Economist

    El Paso is adjacent to the ONE swing district in the entire state of Texas, TX-23. It’s also adjacent to New Mexico.

  2. 2.

    rk

    I don’t know what to make of anything in this election. One moment she’s dying of pneumonia and she’s down by 4 or 5 points in all the swing states. Then yesterday she was leading in the national polls. Then her chances of winning the election keep going down. Here is Josh Marshall writing that it’s basically Hillary’s campaign fault that she isn’t leading by huge margins against a moron like Trump. And then there’s the headline at 538 which says that “Hillary is leading in the six states that she needs to win: and here’s why that isn’t as good as it sounds”. If she’s in such a precarious state, then why is she bothering with Texas?

  4. 4.

    Mary G

    I think she’s trolling the Republican Party. She’s been talking about winning Texas for months, and if it turns reliably blue, the presidential electoral map will be almost impossible to overcome. Even if it’s unlikely to turn this year, it might down the road. Propane Jane on Twitter is pushing for Texans to vote.

    Also, she’s been criticized by some Democrats for not reaching out enough to Hispanics and this helps with that.

  5. 5.

    Davebo

    There are more registered democrats than republicans in TX, they just don’t vote.

    Texas voter registration doesn’t include a means to register as a democrat, republican or any other party.

  6. 6.

    Elizabelle

    Bet Hillary’s offices will be open more than weekdays.

    ABC reporting there’s been a workplace shooting in Tennessee.

  7. 7.

    Elizabelle

    ABC News/David Muir: twice describes the Tulsa man shot as “a father walking to his car.” Top story is OK officer charged.

  8. 8.

    Jeffro

    Relatively small investment to a) help get the ball rolling & swing TX in the future, b) troll Trump, Cruz, Abbott, c) cause a commotion/get the media worked up, d) be seen as a sign of strength (especially due to B and C)

    I think it’s great. If TX becomes a swing state, think of the amount of GOP resources that starts to pull away from other places.

  9. 9.

    Major Major Major Major

    @rk: If you’re talking about this, that’s not Josh., that’s not Josh.

    As for the rest, coverage was this topsy-turvy in 2012 as well, only less so because Romney wasn’t literally the apocalypse. They always feel crazier from the inside.

  10. 10.

    jl

    @rk: I think that was a John Judis column at TPM, not Marshall.

    After reading about mess at Wells Fargo, I agree that Warren’s response was better than Clinton’s, both on the merits and politically.
    Some commenters here said they thought Warren was grandstanding in Stumpf appearance, but I think she went too easy on him. I think Stumpf is either a crook himself or is covering for high level crooks at his bank. I think clear there was an intentional policy to illegally push cross sales at Wells Fargo, and any employees who tried to complain about the illegal and unethical practices were very severely and selectively punished. There were bad company policies producing the mess, not several thousand bad apples who just by some crazy chance ended up in the bank’s employ.

    Not sure if Judis is correct to generalize from the Wells Fargo situation to the whole campaign, though.

  11. 11.

    NR

    @Emma: If she’s sinking money into Texas, then she’s the moron. She’s behind in Iowa, Ohio, and Nevada, tied (at best) in Florida and North Carolina, and per today’s polling, really needs to worry about Virginia and Colorado. Hell, polling data shows that even states like Michigan, Wisconsin, and Maine aren’t totally solid for her. The money she’s spending in Texas would be better spent in pretty much any of the states I just listed, instead of in a state that she can only possibly win if Donald Trump rips off his mask at one of the debates and reveals himself to be Arab Hitler.

  12. 12.

    Hal

    And then there’s the headline at 538 which says that “Hillary is leading in the six states that she needs to win: and here’s why that isn’t as good as it sounds”. If she’s in such a precarious state, then why is she bothering with Texas?

    I think Silver’s point is that if polling is off in one of those states and she does indeed lose FL, NV and NC thenot Clinton doesn’t have many other paths to win? Last week Silver was saying that if Trump flipped all the toss up states and another that’s not even a toss up, Clinton loses. An vastly unlikely scenario, so I don’t know if he has statistical diarrhea or just likes to go over every scenario possible to avoid as much egg on his face as he possibly can. He did insist Trump would not be the nominee after all.

  13. 13.

    Schlemazel

    @rk:
    Fuck Josh. Fuck him right in the left ear.

    If you have not learned by now to ignore polling perhaps this is the year they can once again demonstrate why they should be ignored

  14. 14.

    TheMightyTrowel

    @rk: largely concur but it was waste of pixels john judis on tpm blaming the hill campaign not the more reality based josh marshall.

  15. 15.

    Keith G

    The campaign seems to be busy gathering volunteers in Houston and other places down here. I have been contacted nearly every way possible to get involved in meatspace. Unfortunately an upcoming surgery has constrained my time, but they seem to be satisfied with a regular tossing of coins into their kitty.

    Listen to John Dickerson’s Whistlestop podcast this week. Here is the blurb:

    The stakes were high. It was the first election in a half-century without an incumbent president or vice president competing. There was a very good chance the Democratic Party would be the first to nominate either a black man or a woman. History was almost certain to be made.

    Before history, there was combat between three strong top-tier candidates. Hillary Clinton had the money, the name, and the establishment support. John Edwards had lived in the state since his turn as John Kerry’s running mate. Barack Obama’s convention speech in 2004 had made him a political star, and he arrived in Iowa to crowds unseen in caucus history.

    It was a fun listen. One forgets just how sharp the elbows were that were swinging back and forth. I especially love how the Obama camp attacked Hillary in terms that today would be common on a Morning Joe round table. BTW the campaign said that her mis-statements/lies about Bosnia disqualified her from being commander-in-chief.

    edited – @Mary G: Right now, Trump only has a 6 point lead in the state. Double digits had been the norm.

  19. 19.

    chopper

    @NR:

    that’s the hillary hater we all know. thought with the other day’s use of ‘good’ and ‘hillary’ in the same sentence that you were going soft on us.

  20. 20.

    scott (the other one)

    @rk: That was John Judis, not Josh Marshall. I have been very unimpressed with most of the things I’ve read at TPM from Judis and that piece was no exception.

  23. 23.

    piratedan

    well, my understanding is that quite a few of the polls do not do a lot of polling via cell phone. As such, there’s not a good representation of the feelings of the younger voters. Plus the landlines are going the way of the dinosaur, as such, most of the folks that they poll do skew older.

    I think she’s adapting Obama’s model. Don’t sweat the polls because they aren’t representative of the electorate. More youngsters get their political information these days from the Daily Show, Sam Bee and John Oliver and picking up bits on You Tube than they do the mainstream media outlets. You have to go out and register voters, remind them to vote, make the connection personal.

    I think Sam Wang has it right, she’s going to win if we keep up the effort. How big she’ll win remains to be seen as we need to do everything we can to flip the Senate and House.

  29. 29.

    Calouste

    @Hal:

    I think Silver’s point is that if polling is off in one of those states and she does indeed lose FL, NV and NC thenot Clinton doesn’t have many other paths to win? Last week Silver was saying that if Trump flipped all the toss up states and another that’s not even a toss up, Clinton loses. An vastly unlikely scenario, so I don’t know if he has statistical diarrhea or just likes to go over every scenario possible to avoid as much egg on his face as he possibly can. He did insist Trump would not be the nominee after all.
    his site needs traffic.

    Shortened that for you :).

  31. 31.

    Mnemosyne

    @rk:

    Campaigns often have better polling than the public polls. We’re talking about numbers that were still well within the margin of error, even when they were “bad.”

    Throw in the fact that public polls have to estimate who they think will show up to vote while campaigns have actual lists of people who say they’re planning to vote, and I can see why the Clinton campaign might think it’s worth it to put some more resources into Texas.

  38. 38.

    BGinCHI

    Remember how scary it was 4 years ago after Obama had a lousy first debate? It looked like Mitt was really going to do it.

    If Hillary goes after Trump in the debates and shows that he’s stupid and hysterical, then that plus his terrible ground game is going to come calling in Nov.

  39. 39.

    Walker

    @rk:

    Reposting with out the Politico link.

    Google Elan Kriegel. That is why Hillary is bothering. Nate’s approach is second hand on very noisy data. Some of his methods are questionable. Kriegel has a very principled approach that combines data and cost effectiveness.

  40. 40.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    @piratedan:

    More youngsters get their political information these days from the Daily Show, Sam Bee and John Oliver and picking up bits on You Tube than they do the mainstream media outlets.

    Except we’re talking Hispancis here who have their own sources of news. Makes one wonder if something up there because I have heard Hispancis screaming in the street about how vile Trump is The Hispanics would be hard to weigh in a poll because Trump is the first canidate in modern times to outright troll them. Bush tried to court them with some success and Romney had nothing they would have been offended about.

  41. 41.

    Mnemosyne

    @lamh36:

    I’ve been fighting with my police officer cousin-in-law on Facebook all day, trying to get him to see that it’s entirely possible that (a) shooting Mr. Scott followed police procedure AND (b) that Mr. Scott was (probably) shot in the first place due to police error during a botched raid that made him think the plainclothes undercover cop was a bad guy he needed to defend himself against.

    It’s been uphill, to say the least.

  42. 42.

    Pogonip

    I was a pollster once. I don’t think politicals are as accurate as they used to be. Many people do not answer the phone unless they know who’s calling, especially if they have no money; no one likes talking to bill collectors. In this election you also have the problem of the socially acceptable answer; people who prefer Trump may not want to admit it.

  43. 43.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Emma:

    She and her group are planning their own strategy and not listening to the morons?

    Exactly. Why should she listen to the media which has been nothing but hostile to her? She should follow Dr. Dean’s strategy and try to win in all 50 states.

  44. 44.

    Gelfling 545

    @NCSteve: I did wonder if he had invested a large amount of money in TPM on the condition that they let him show up & post some nonsense from time to time.

  45. 45.

    NR

    @Hal:

    Last week Silver was saying that if Trump flipped all the toss up states and another that’s not even a toss up, Clinton loses. An vastly unlikely scenario,

    Well since Hillary is behind in Nevada, Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, and Iowa, and her dream of taking states like Arizona and Georgia appears to be dead, Trump only needs to flip one more state to win. That’s an awfully precarious position for her to be in.

  47. 47.

    Patricia Kayden

    @NR: What is your evidence that Secretary Clinton is not campaigning hard and spending money in any of the states you mentioned? She can open offices in TX and in all of those states at the same time. It’s not an “either/or” situation.

  48. 48.

    Elizabelle

    @BGinCHI: Watched BBC America News tonight.

    Little Marco Rubio’s campaign manager advised that the only way Hillary could win the debate is to stay home. That she should just let Trump hang himself with all his lies and inaccuracies.

    Um, Mr. Campaign Manager, don’t you think that’s part of her two-prong strategy for dealing with him at the debate?

    With advice like that …. he does have a point that the rules are different for Trump and Clinton.

    You might enjoy watching online. It had an early GOP debate where Trump told Jeb! “Be quiet, I’m speaking.”

  49. 49.

    Mnemosyne

    And, yeah, the whole detail that Keith Scott was apparently shot by a plainclothes officer is, I think, quite significant and keeps getting buried in all of the stories (including the linked one). There is a huge, huge difference between he pointed a gun at a uniformed officer and he pointed a gun at a plainclothes officer who TOTALLY swears that he identified himself.

    It’s sounding likely that Mr. Scott’s shooting was a tragic mistake by officers who mistook him for the suspect, but it doesn’t sound like the department will be admitting that anytime soon. ?

  52. 52.

    singfoom

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Why should she listen to the media which has been nothing but hostile to her? She should follow Dr. Dean’s strategy and try to win in all 50 states.

    Yeah, I don’t get why this isn’t the common first step strategy for every single fucking presidential campaign since Dean was DNC Chair. Sure, allocate different amounts of resources on solidly blue already states vs. battleground states vs. deep red no dice states, but make sure the ground game is on in all of them.

    And watch the downticket benefits flow like the spice.

  53. 53.

    Fair Economist

    @Walker: I googled Elan Kriegel, and was rewarded with an interesting article (Politico doesn’t always suck, just sometimes.) But high in the search rankings was a *different* article with this title:

    3 Jewy Things About Elan Kriegel, Hillary Clinton’s Number Cruncher …

    Just to remind everybody what we’re up against.

  54. 54.

    Patricia Kayden

    @lamh36: That he didn’t have a gun when he was shot in cold blood by police.

    What really bothers me about this situation is that the police were not in uniform. How the hell would he have known that they were police officers approaching him if they were not in uniform? He would have had the right to reach for a gun if he was approached by strangers in a hostile manner.

  56. 56.

    Schlemazel

    @Patricia Kayden:
    NR is sffering from acute methan poisoning from having his head so far up his ass. This sort of “thinking” is the best he can do. Many of us here are concerned about him but he refuses to get the sort of mental health support he needs

  57. 57.

    Mnemosyne

    @lamh36:

    I think that means the chief has been told that his officers screwed up and killed the guy by mistake, and he’s trying to figure out what he can say that won’t piss off the union reps.

  61. 61.

    Fair Economist

    @Mnemosyne:

    And, yeah, the whole detail that Keith Scott was apparently shot by a plainclothes officer is, I think, quite significant and keeps getting buried in all of the stories (including the linked one). There is a huge, huge difference between he pointed a gun at a uniformed officer and he pointed a gun at a plainclothes officer who TOTALLY swears that he identified himself.

    I just read that even the Charlotte PD admitted the video doesn’t “clearly” show he even had a gun.

    IOW, it might be that a cop not even wearing a uniform just walked up to somebody unarmed and shot him.

  63. 63.

    lamh36

    @Mnemosyne: Rev Sharpton was on MSNBC in the 5 o’clock hour.

    And he said what if this Black officer had been policing in a white neighborhood, do we really think the officer, in an open carry state, might not have just said “sir do you have a permit for that gun” instead of shooting him.

    He also made the point that in the case of both men…Trump’s stop and frisk solution couldn’t even applied to the two men, because there was no “stopping or frisking”, just “stopping with a bullet”

  64. 64.

    singfoom

    Since this is an open thread. I know that Yves and crew politically aren’t popular here (because they’re batshit crazy and hate Clinton more than Trump), but they are good at the financial beat. Another fucking horrible detail to add to the Wells Fargo debacle talked about yesterday:

    Wells Fargo retaliated against whistleblowers, set up a FAKE whistleblower hotline

    Bloomberg article about it: Whistleblowers and good activists

    The TLDR:

    “CNNMoney spoke to a total of four ex-Wells Fargo workers” who think they were fired for whistle-blowing, and “another six former Wells Fargo employees told CNNMoney they witnessed similar behavior.” That is presumably a sample rather than an exhaustive list, and you can begin to construct a hypothetical list of the incentives facing Wells Fargo consumer bankers:

    1.Open fake accounts to meet sales goals: Maybe get fired.
    2.Don’t open fake accounts, miss sales goals: Probably get fired.
    3.Tell executives about all the fake accounts: Definitely get fired really fast.

    So yeah, Carrie Holstead who was the head of the retail banking unit and John Stumpf need to resign and have their money clawed back.

  66. 66.

    hovercraft

    @PatrickSvitek @HillaryClinton There are more registered democrats than republicans in TX, they just don’t vote.

    — CathyTX (@CathyTX) September 21, 2016

    But are they real democrats, or the type that populate many of the Southern states? Republicans who just never got around to switching, after all I’m pretty sure Rick Perry used to be a democrat.

  67. 67.

    Mnemosyne

    @Patricia Kayden:

    I’m guessing (and this is just a guess) that he may have mistaken the undercover cop for a carjacker and thought he might need to defend himself. Assuming, that is, that he had a gun at all (which now seems to be back in doubt).

    And I still think that if the police had announced it as there was a tragic accident during an attempted police raid today and not police killed an armed man during a raid, there wouldn’t be a riot going on. People would still be angry, but at least they wouldn’t feel like the police assumed that any black guy near their undercover raid was a suspect.

  68. 68.

    Patricia Kayden

    @lamh36: Yes. All White people are successful and all Black people are failures. Good to know. Republicans are such idiots.

    P.S. Love that the BBC and Guardian is exposing the racists this election season.

  70. 70.

    NR

    @Patricia Kayden:

    What is your evidence that Secretary Clinton is not campaigning hard and spending money in any of the states you mentioned? She can open offices in TX and in all of those states at the same time. It’s not an “either/or” situation.

    She has a finite amount of money. Every dollar she spends in Texas is a dollar she can’t spend somewhere else. And so it’s foolish to waste money in a state she can’t possibly win.

  71. 71.

    hovercraft

    I can’t stand Nina Turner ever since she drank the Bernie koolaid, she been pretty insufferable. But DAMN she just went off on AJ Delgado on Tweety’s show over police killing black men and women. It was amazing she spoke as the mother of a black son, who’s a black police officer, who she fears for both on and off duty. AJ tried to go the you’re against law enforcement route, and Turner just let her have it.

  72. 72.

    singfoom

    @Mnemosyne: Is there a timeline explanation anywhere that you’ve seen? As in, how much time elapsed between the first warning yelled by an officer to Scott and the shot(s) that killed him? What I read is that there was a mix of plainclothes and raid cops with “POLICE” on their vests (but still in plainclothes). It would be interesting to know that time angle. Because if it was in the order of 20 seconds, even with the “POLICE” emblazoned on their vests, he might not have known quickly enough….. IF he actually had a gun and was drawing (which isn’t clear)

  73. 73.

    chris

    @Fair Economist: I saw that and clicked thinking, “You bastards!” Turns out Forward is a Jewish magazine and they were pointing out and celebrating that Kreigel is Jewish. I guess “Jewy” isn’t actually a bad word. In some circles anyway.

  74. 74.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Schlemazel:

    You can’t do it.

    You can switch to view the desktop site on your phone, if you are feeling sufficiently masochistic. Button is at the extreme bottom of the page.

  75. 75.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Mnemosyne: Sadly, it appears that undercover cops approached him without identifying themselves thinking that he was their suspect and shot him dead. Now, it appears that they’re hiding the video because it would show that he did not have a gun and the shooting was completely unjustified.

    By the way, if you’re going to claim that citizens have a right to own guns, how can you shoot them down for doing so? Are the police going to start hassling White gun owners?

  76. 76.

    Mnemosyne

    @Fair Economist:

    I’m willing to meet cop defenders halfway and say it’s plausible that the cop mistook Mr. Scott for the fugitive. But they have to meet me at that halfway point and admit that it’s possible for cops to make mistakes in the first place.

    BTW, last I saw, mistaken identity seems to be the reason Philandro Castile was killed in Minnesota. The cops were looking for an armed robbery suspect, Mr. Castile had dreadlocks and a legal weapon in the car, and the cop shot him thinking he was the suspect. But good luck getting that story out now that the “Blue Lives Matter” crowd has decided that it was all Castile’s own fault because he smoked pot, or whatever today’s excuse is.

  78. 78.

    BR

    Ignore our resident troll. Consider the fact that here in CA there are several Clinton campaign offices, to organize volunteers to impact both downballot races *and* to campaign in neighboring swing states. TX is huge and I imagine they’re doing the same there. Yes, maybe in a blowout we could win TX this year, but I don’t think that’s why they’re doing it.

  80. 80.

    Patricia Kayden

    @hovercraft: Also disappointed with how Nina went over the deep end with her Bernie support. She usually is an aggressive part of the Ohio GOTV effort but I guess she won’t be doing that this year.

  81. 81.

    Lurking Canadian

    @Patricia Kayden: This. Having a gun is not a reason to shoot anybody. Anything short of actually raising it in anger shouldn’t be a reason to shoot somebody. It might be a reason to ask “Do you have a permit for that weapon, sir?”

  85. 85.

    Mnemosyne

    @singfoom:

    I haven’t seen any kind of timeline yet. I do find it sadly plausible that an innocent person caught up in the chaos of an undercover raid might panic and think that a plainclothes officer was an escaping criminal rather than a police officer.

    Assuming, of course, that Mr. Scott had a gun at all, which has now been thrown in doubt.

  86. 86.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Walker:

    No, any naked hyperlink puts you in moderation currently. Dress it up with the “link” button above the comment box and you’ll be fine.

  87. 87.

    weaselone

    @shomi:

    Some Hispanics obviously vote, just not at percentages achieved by old white people. Of course, the proportion of younger white people and African Americans aren’t as high as old white people either so maybe we shouldn’t try to get them to vote either. What’s the point of a ground game?

  90. 90.

    Schlemazel

    @Steeplejack (phone):
    Thanks. I was afraid of that. More than I am afraid for nr’s mental well being. Methane abuse is no joking matter!

    This is nr’s brain ?
    This is nr’s brain on methane ?

  91. 91.

    hovercraft

    Republican strategist wants to know if Hillary has the ‘stamina’ to deal with Trump’s nonsense for 90 minutes without getting frustrated and losing patience, over his non answers and antics. I guess he’s one of the few people in DC who missed her testimony before the idiots on the Benghazi committee, and he’s getting the word stamina into the ether to imply that she’s unwell. Maybe the bat signal went up to imply she’s dying again to suppress her poll recovery.

  93. 93.

    Patricia Kayden

    @lamh36:

    “sir do you have a permit for that gun”

    This is what I don’t understand about these open carry states. Why is it that so many Black men are being shot and killed because the police fear that they may have a gun in states which allows citizens to openly carry? This is a disconnect which needs to be addressed. If the NRA was a legitimate organization, it would address this issue.

  95. 95.

    MomSense

    @Keith G:

    I keep missing you here but wanted to say that I hope all goes well with the surgery and the after care. Sending my best to you.

  97. 97.

    JMG

    IMO Clinton’s strategy should be Ali’s in the Rumble in the Jungle. Let him punch himself out. Smile nicely, keep going back to the positive message for America, then when Trump starts getting weird (he can’t stand being ignored), move in for the old one-two.

  98. 98.

    rikyrah

    The stuff in the air about these last shootings. I think that we have back to back victims that don’t fit the stereotypes. Man with a broken down car. The other a disabled father waiting for his child. Both men crash against the easy way to try and blame Black people for their own deaths. Neither one was in the PIC, or we would have seen their mugshot. All this pressed against the athletic protests. Better examples of why they kneel could not have been found.

  99. 99.

    Elizabelle

    @hovercraft: Just cuz the, what, 37 deep bench GOP candidates got smoked by Trump, does not mean Hillary cannot deal with him.

    What they’re really afraid of.

    @BGinCHI:

    I think he’s going to straight bully her, talk over her, and dollars to donuts he says some serious sexist shit.

    Oh, he will. And his supporters and Wolf Blitzer will tingle and think he won the debate. But Hillary will probably do fine, and is preparing hard even as we speak.

  100. 100.

    Schlemazel

    @shomi:
    I realise I might be wrong. Perhaps nr does not have his head up his own ass. Perhaps he had it up yours and yours is up his in some soet of weird human centipede thing. Either way you two do deserve each other

  102. 102.

    piratedan

    @Enhanced Voting Techinques: my understanding is that Telemundio has been very professional about everything despite Trumps optics, which probably explains why Trumps has been looking at a 15-20 percent drop in the Hispanic polling when compared to Romney.

  103. 103.

    JPL

    @Sandia Blanca: I’m not sure about TX, but in GA you can declare during primaries. You simply ask for a democratic or republican ballot. Those are the lists, that folks use to determine party affiliation. It’s not foolproof, because I have voted in a republican primary. I won’t anymore because you get phone calls soliciting funds and it makes me feel creepy.

  105. 105.

    Elizabelle

    @Mnemosyne: I’ve not read anything about the Charlotte shooting, but I haven’t heard about the plainclothes on CNN or surfing websites.

    The Charlotte police chief, an African American himself, looked uncomfortable during interviews about the footage.

    Also, tragic as it is, this could be a really informative episode, coming a week before that ridiculous NC state law to prohibit police body cam footage going public goes into effect.

    This is precisely the reason that footage needs to be out.

    Has anyone figured out what McCrory is yammering about with police constitutional rights?

    The Fifth? The right not to self-incriminate?

  108. 108.

    MomSense

    @hovercraft:

    I hope she rolls her eyes and brushes off her shoulder. I will find that yuugely carthartic.

    I have a feeling der Trump will try a switcheroo and not come in with his usual bravado hoping Hillz over reacts.

  109. 109.

    Applejinx

    @rk:

    If she’s in such a precarious state, then why is she bothering with Texas?

    Because it’s the right thing to do? I’d be among the first to call her out if she was doing wrong things: only fair to consider the possibility that she’s doing the right thing. Texas NEEDS to turn blue. It’s hot and dry down there and Republicans tend to respond to disaster by refusing FEMA and praying harder.

  110. 110.

    ThresherK

    @Elizabelle: If Trump doesn’t actually drop his trousers and start pulling his member, excatly what would Wolf Blitzer actually say on TV as being a losing move for Donald Trump at the debate

    (This is the quadrennial question from any sentient lefty.)

  111. 111.

    Elizabelle

    @MomSense: Trump has been very low key in his speaking style in the clips I have seen today and yesterday, on CNN. He’s going for that “presidential and thoughtfully empathic” style.

    Mind you, he still managed to perk everyone’s ears with the stop and frisk endorsement.

    But I think he’s trying to retool his personality this week.

    Jeb! is home thinking “low energy.”

  112. 112.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Schlemazel:

    This is nr’s brain ?
    This is nr’s brain on methane ?

    That might just be the first time I have done a spit-take in reaction to fucking EMOJIS.

  113. 113.

    Mary G

    @rikyrah: Video. It’s kind of hard to be complacent and think the PD is just doing a hard job when you look at tape like they had in Tulsa and how hard North Carolina is trying to hide theirs.

  116. 116.

    hovercraft

    @weaselone:
    Actually the highest voter turnout is African American women then old white people. Hispanics are the lowest ethnic group at less than 50 %.

  118. 118.

    JMG

    It is totally in Trump’s interest to be calm and polite in the debate (doesn’t mean he can do it, mind). His big problem is that two-thirds of voters think he’s an asshole. If he tries to bully Clinton, or yells too much, he’s going to lose the debate with voters no matter what the cable nitwits say (honestly, all of you should stop watching that stuff. Worse than sniffing glue). Clinton’s problem is that a majority of voters thinks she’s a sneaky, crooked Career Pol. That’s why she should just keep positive and fact-based. She has an easier stereotype to dispel, because Trump really is an asshole.

  119. 119.

    joel hanes

    For discussion of Texas politics from a cheeful Democratic activist perspective, Juanita Jean’s is the place to go. They held a fundraiser last year, and got a couple hundred thousand vote-by-mail forms into the hands of senior TX Dems.

    And Juanita Jean herownself is always worth reading.
    (During the W years, her previous blog was called “Kiss My Big Blue Butt”. The woman has moxie.)
    If BJ still had a blogroll, she would belong on it.

    I note that both the Dallas Morning News and The Houston Chronicle have endorsed this year’s Democratic Presidential nominee. I’m scanning the skies for flying pigs.

    This is a very unusual election.

  121. 121.

    germy

    @MomSense:

    I hope she rolls her eyes and brushes off her shoulder. I will find that yuugely carthartic.

    As long as she doesn’t sigh. TV journalists find that intolerable.

  122. 122.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Elizabelle:

    That’s, to me, the really interesting thing about Trump when he attempts to “pivot” or be more “presidential” — when he puts on that sober, chin-stroking, “thoughtful” face — and especially when he delivers prepared remarks from a TelePrompTer. He just comes across as enervated. There’s no energy in his voice, no passion or commitment in his delivery. But there seem to be only two settings for Trump: crazy, out-of-control, say-anything, loose-cannon Trump beloved by his base; or sober, somber, boring, bored, low-energy, unengaged Trump beloved by pundits. I’m not sure which one revolts me more.

  125. 125.

    Ceci n'est pas mon nym

    @NR: Yes to all that, but you post from the Spock-with-a-goatee universe. While it’s always interesting and educational to see these little bleed-throughs into our reality, in our universe, it’s a smart move for all the reasons stated.

  126. 126.

    hovercraft

    @Elizabelle:
    And the other 37 were not that bright, Ted Cruz was supposed to be the master debater, but he just got out lied by a better liar. Plus they were all trying not to offend his supporters because they wanted their support for themselves.

  128. 128.

    JMG

    Opening an office in Texas is simply common sense for Democrats. It tales a lot of losing and building in a red (or blue) state for the opposition to be ready to win. Fifty-state strategy, right?

  129. 129.

    Alain the site fixer

    Having some background in research and census data, I suspect that their internal polls show that there’s enough anti-Trump Hispanic energy to make it worth investing in a heavily Hispanic area with a lot of potential votes to add to the table. Most pollsters do a horrible job polling the Hispanic population and that, coupled with previous non-voters and a soupçon of mobile users being hard to poll and I’m getting more excited that Texas could flip. If it does, game over for National Republicsn politics.

  136. 136.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Major Major Major Major:

    You’re right, I don’t, but I am reminded that my Met Opera discussion group on FB had a quiz up a while ago where you had to look at a string of emojis and guess the opera. Some were obvious, others far more subtle.

  139. 139.

    Josie

    @Keith G: They are also beating he bushes in San Antonio. I have been contacted numerous times to volunteer, but I can’t because half of my time is spent in another city taking care of my infant grand daughter.

  140. 140.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    @shomi:

    But…Hispanics don’t vote. If you are now thinking, yea but this election is different. They said the SAME thing when Obama ran and….surprise…Hispanics didn’t show up to vote.

    They voted Jerry Brown in because of their loathing for Meg Whitman.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_gubernatorial_election,_2010

    This election reminds me and awful lot of 2010 – establisment Demo with a “iffy past” verses a self promoting buisnessperson who got into race baiting on the Hispanics.

  146. 146.

    hovercraft

    @Major Major Major Major:
    Well she’s not yet as high as Obama who won I think 73 ish, but he’s also 10 points behind RMoney, and the Latino registrations are way up, so their share of the vote will go up. The portion that is undecided in the 2 way are the people who are with Johnson and Stein, they may not love Clinton, but they loathe Trump, so if she can turn them out, she’ll be in good shape. Yes that’s a big if.

  148. 148.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @efgoldman:

    We’ll see how he does extempore with somebody who can get under his really, really thin orange skin.

    Remember Dubya in one of the 2004 debates when he had that box-shaped thing under his jacket, and there was (and is to this day) speculation that he was wired and getting talking points. Well, in the past twelve years technology miniaturization has greatly improved. I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Trump has some kind of illicit wireless communication system set up with his team Monday night. It would be totally in character.

    (Edit: The hairpiece alone could hide a standard cardioid mic.)

  152. 152.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Ha! I remember that, and I think might even have commented here during a live-blog of whatever it was. It honestly sounded like he had never seen or heard those particular letters in that particular order.

  155. 155.

    Mnemosyne

    @Enhanced Voting Techinques:

    California is different — Latinos here were energized by the anti-immigrant Prop 187 back in the late 1990s and are a pretty powerful voting block.

    Texas Latinos definitely don’t vote in numbers that match their share of the population there, but I can’t help but think it’s significant that Texas is the one state where Jim Crow laws — including voting laws — applied to both Latinos and African-Americans. I don’t think that minority voting numbers are very good in most former Jim Crow states, so I suspect that Texas is more of a minority voting match to, say, Mississippi than it is to California.

  156. 156.

    scav

    There are so many polls anymore that there are bound to be outliers, and what with people ignoring them or playing with them, and with the problem that they’ve become a solid source of news so that everyone has motive to jigger them (including the pollsters), I’m somehow comfortable with the idea they’re getting noisier than they once were. There’s still signal in there, but they never were 100% destiny or doom even in more truthful less spinny times. Still only one factor in a larger program.

  159. 159.

    Alain the site fixer

    @Major Major Major Major: not below the Presidency, but that’s a good start! I do see a lot more realization at the grass roots level that folks need to step up and run for local elections. That leads to county then district the state then national. Good top level candidates take huge investment of people and time. It’s like a bracket tourney spread over 20 years. So I’m excited that perhaps the fire will be lit in heavily-Tejano areas like El Paso and we might see a faster than expected rise of Democratic officeholders..

  162. 162.

    Alain the site fixer

    @efgoldman: tell me about it. Things I miss most about Colorado, #5 – so many fewer headaches and less migraines in two years than in 6 months here in the greater D.C. Area. Also, allergies. When I left D.C. I was a smoker and allergies weren’t so bad. I quit in Colorado and now I’m back, allergies are 10x worse. That sucks!

  164. 164.

    gwangung

    @scav: I think they’re getting so noising with the methodological controls getting so weak that you need more and more of them to get a strong, true central tendency from an aggregator like Nate or Sam Wang. And at some point, the required number may just be larger than the number that are done…

  165. 165.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if Trump has some kind of illicit wireless communication system set up with his team Monday night. It would be totally in character.

    I would love if the Clintons had some kind of signal jammer. If it emitted a sound like a fax machine connecting, squeal at high volume, that would be even more fun.

    Or shocks. Mild electrical shocks.

    Or if he got busted and the device was removed, about five minutes before airtime.

    What does Trump need debate prep for? He’s going to delegate international and foreign to, uh, whoever …

  166. 166.

    Eric U.

    Trump could easily hide a device in his mullet. I’m nearly deaf in one ear, a contact speaker would work great for me. Maybe Hillary should run her hand through his head ferret

  167. 167.

    Ben Cisco (onboard the Defiant)

    Sitrep: many Charlotte office buildings closed early today, not only in the University area where the initial shooting took place, but also in uptown (downtown) and Southpark. Clinic I was supposed to go to for a consult closed on me, make up date pending. Cooler heads need to prevail…

  168. 168.

    Truegster

    I’m in Austin and Hillary stickers are on many cars, I see several everyday now (as opposed to 3 -4 months ago). I see more little blue H stickers than the occasional giant red Trump sticker, which is ALWAYS on a truck or maybe suv. I live north and drive downtown m-f. Now I think about it, I’ve only seen a Trump sticker on one suv, every other time has been on a giant modified Texas truck.

  171. 171.

    Steve in the ATL

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I am reminded that my Met Opera discussion group on FB had a quiz up a while ago where you had to look at a string of emojis and guess the opera.

    I want to party with you.

  173. 173.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Hey look, it’s the commenter who scores lower on ‘sentience’ than anybody else on the entire website, with the sole exception of “shomi” aka “blomi”…

    FTFY, since your analysis wasn’t looking for that…

  174. 174.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Truegster:

    I can’t remember an election year with such a dearth of bumper stickers and yard signs. There were a few “Anybody But Trump” signs up during the GOP primaries, and I still see an occasional old anti-Obama or even pro-Dubya bumper sticker, but I haven’t noticed a single Trump OR Clinton sticker yet (north Atlanta suburbs). That may change as we get closer to Election Day, but I, for instance, will not put a sticker on my car — too many crazies with guns out there, and why should I invite trouble? — and only wear my HRC t-shirt when I’m actually volunteering for Hillary.

  175. 175.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Elizabelle:

    I would love if the Clintons had some kind of signal jammer. If it emitted a sound like a fax machine connecting, squeal at high volume, that would be even more fun.

    Or shocks. Mild electrical shocks.

    Or if he got busted and the device was removed, about five minutes before airtime.

    I like the way your mind works, and would appreciate subscription information to your newsletter.

  177. 177.

    Steve in the ATL

    @SiubhanDuinne: I concur with your reasons for not putting a sticker on your car, and have noticed the same about the dearth of signage. I was shocked the other day when I saw a Hillary sticker on a soccer mom SUV at the Publix on State Bridge/Old Milton Parkway.

  178. 178.

    Fake Irishman

    She’s got offices in San Antonio and Houston as well — one reason is not only laying groundwork for future, because perhaps good organizing in those areas will put Dems over the top in county wide elections in both places. In high-turnout elections, Bexar County leans blue now and Harris is almost perfectly on a knife’s edge. Winning district attorney and sheriff’s races will make a big difference in those areas, as well as perhaps picking up a court of appeal seat or two.

  179. 179.

    catclub

    @Walker:

    Kriegel has a very principled approach that combines data and cost effectiveness.

    Some other article noted that flexibility is important. If the state GOP’s are running Trump’s GOTV, then they cannot easily switch emphasis from one state to another.
    Or money, or staffing.

  180. 180.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Steve in the ATL:

    the Publix on State Bridge/Old Milton Parkway.

    That is less than a mile from where I live (Pleasant Hill/PIB), and I pass that site literally every day, so maybe there is hope yet. I haven’t seen any, though.

  182. 182.

    catclub

    @Mnemosyne: Black turnout in 2012 in Mississippi was higher percentage wise, than for whites, if I recall correctly.
    Don’t know if that is relative to total population of eligible voters or relative to population of registered voters.

    That 48% turnout for latinos might be in the face of 65% turnout for white voters.

  184. 184.

    gorram

    @NR: One of them is New Mexico and it’s got a hell of a larger portion of its population near El Paso than Texas.

  187. 187.

    Steve in the ATL

    @catclub: I would totally use a “Tears of a Clown” emoji if it references the English Beat version of the song!

    ETA: where is Omnes? I’ll bet he loves that, too!

  189. 189.

    J R in WV

    @NR:

    My wife and I did phone bank calling into Ohio this evening – several times we got a Hillary supporter on the phone who had already been called today. Think of that!

    How many people were making calls into Ohio for people to receive multiple calls from phone bank volunteers?

    Lots. They aren’t taking Ohio for granted at all. They’re calling people over and over.

    We apologized to them, thanked them for their support, and told them to feel good about being called as it showed how hard Hillary’s campaign was working to win Ohio.

  190. 190.

    Sandia Blanca

    @JPL: Just to be more clear, in Texas we do vote in primaries, and as in Georgia, you can ask for either party’s ballot (unless it’s a primary runoff), but you do not register as a member of any party.

  192. 192.

    different-church-lady

    Speaking of Texas: Patriots leading Texans 20-0, with a third-string quarterback.

    Hoodie Nation welcomes your hate.

  196. 196.

    J R in WV

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    True. I didn’t notice the nym until I was posted… it was fun although there were just the office chief and me and the wife. We all three were calling into Ohio from WV…

    And wife really did get several Hillary supporters that had just been called, one said 45 seconds ago!! One woman was so excited, she told wife “I’m wearing my Hillary button!” and I talked to a black lady who was nearly crying she was so excited to elect a woman to follow the first black president. Hope we can pull it off for her!

  197. 197.

    Matt McIrvin

    @SiubhanDuinne: The only Presidential yard signs around my neighborhood (northern Massachusetts) are for Trump. I think everyone else is afraid to put them up, and with good reason.

    On the roads, I do see Hillary bumper stickers, but I think they’re people from bluer towns closer to the city. For a long time it seemed like Bernie Sanders utterly dominated Boston-area bumper stickers.

  198. 198.

    nominus

    Yeah, lots of armchair campaign managers wondering why the Dems are “wasting” money in Texas. The thing about it is that it’s a potentially gigantic payout for little risk. 38 EV plus laying the groundwork to start flipping congressional districts sounds like a decent gamble. They’re already out-spending Trump in the battleground states, so might as well try it. IF and I know it’s a long shot, but IF they could swing Texas then the pundits will marvel at what a brilliant strategic decision it was, just like they did when Obama’s campaign spent money against Romney too early in the season.

    Can’t find it at the moment, but Burnt Orange Report had the breakdowns from 2012 and 2014. Back-of-the-envelope calculations says that if you can get AA and Hispanic turnout up to the level of whites, then you have (roughly) enough to turn the state blue, if the party voting breaks down by demographic the same way it does everywhere else – and it does in Texas, we aren’t that special when it comes to the demographics. If you get AA men and Hispanics (total) to turn out at the same rate as AA women, then it’s no-contest Blue.

    This is why the “demographics say Texas should turn blue soon” crowd has always been confused – the numbers are already there, it’s just turnout turnout turnout. It looks like they’re doing an inverse Ted Cruz Theorem – he thought there were enough white conservative religious votes that weren’t turning out, in spite of everyone saying they weren’t there. The Dems think there are enough uncounted Hispanic votes in Houston, SA, and the RGV to offset the numbskulls in Gohmertland. I think they’re right, it’s just a question of registration and GOTV.

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