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If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

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

Their freedom requires your slavery.

This blog will pay for itself.

Fear or fury? The choice is ours.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Reality always gets a vote in the end.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

The world has changed, and neither one recognizes it.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

You are here: Home / Politics / Republican Stupidity / The Voldemort Strategy

The Voldemort Strategy

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Ryan will treat Trump as “he who cannot be named” [warning: Politico] until election day.

Speaker Paul Ryan told House Republicans on a conference call Monday morning he is done defending Donald Trump and will focus on keeping an increasingly imperiled House majority, according to sources on the call.
Ryan said he “won’t defend Trump” and that he has no plans to campaign with the GOP presidential nominee before Election Day, according to sources on the call.
[…] Ryan will be campaigning in 17 states and 42 cities this month, with additional events planned, said GOP sources.

Sources (and the Clinton campaign) quickly clarified that Ryan was still endorsing Trump.

I’ll set aside a long rant on what a total chickenshit this guy is to ask a more obvious question: How the fuck do you have 42 events and not name the guy at the top of your own goddam ticket? Why does Ryan expect that these rallies – which, after all, are targeted at the base – won’t devolve into spectacles where angry Trump supporters jeer and boo at one of the most blatantly transparent attempts to have it both ways that we’ve seen in a long time?

Reader Interactions

184Comments

  1. 1.

    Villago Delenda Est

    He’s a coward. Unfit to be Speaker of the House…in fact, unfit to hold any public office.

  6. 6.

    Dmbeaster

    I love this nutball posture, which has already resulted in him being booed at his Wisconsin event. Nothing better than spreading the disenchantment to 17 states with swing districts. I hope it depresses the pro Trump vote so that they dont also pull the lever for Ryan’s down ballot buddies.

  7. 7.

    Pest Bog Mummy, Frakensteinbeck

    @Villago Delenda Est:
    What’s funny is, he was the only option the Republicans had. Boehner had to delay his retirement to convince Ryan to accept the Speakership and the rest of the House to vote for him. Every other candidate was either totally unacceptable to the moderate (asshole) wing of the Republican House, or to the Freedom Caucus (insane white supremacist) wing. Nobody had enough votes to get elected.

  8. 8.

    oldster

    I hope that Trump’s most ardent, vehement and vocal supporters will show up at every Ryan rally and tell him exactly what they think.

    I don’t have much in common with them on any other issue, but on this one we see eye to eye: Ryan is a lying weasel. He must be forced to declare which side he is on, and stick to it.

  9. 9.

    George Spiggott

    Suck on this, Paulie:

    The nominee for president is the leader of the nominating party.

    Donald Trump is the leader of the Republican Party.

  14. 14.

    Baud

    Not to be lost is that the entire Democratic Party is behind Hillary Clinton — and Bernie Sanders too, Mr. Trump.

    Dems in Array! Deal with it.

  15. 15.

    Chris

    His audience is going to tear him the fuck apart at every event from here to November.

    And BOY HOWDY, will he have earned it.

  21. 21.

    Kay

    So here’s what the public found out today. That “rush” of Principled Conservatives trying to distance themselves from the cretin they promoted and nominated?

    Nothing to do with the tape. They saw internal polling that he was cratering which coincided with all of us a finding out he’s some kind of predator. That level of collapse doesn’t come from a tape that maybe 3 out of 10 voters saw. It was PRIOR.

  23. 23.

    Lurking Canadian

    Is there any chance this worthless sack of shit could lose his seat? Say he loses all the support of the Trump voters in his district because of his cowardly refusal to back Il Duce?

  24. 24.

    Bruce K

    Well, he’s damned if he supports Trump, screwed if he ditches him, and that particular scenario couldn’t happen to a more deserving guy.

  25. 25.

    debit

    Fare thee well
    Fare thee well
    Fare thee well my fairy fey
    For I’m going to Louisiana
    For to see my Susyanna
    Play Paulie Wolly doodle all the day.

  27. 27.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I had an Ohio pol tell me once that Boehner was a “skirt chaser” in the statehouse. I laughed out loud because “skirt chaser” is so old-fashioned I think I have ever only read it. I didn’t know people said it. Little did I know they’re all horrible and seriously threatening and not funny.

  29. 29.

    JosieJ (not Josie)

    @Kay:

    They were just relieved that they had a chance to safely kick him to the curb. I’m sure there are quite a few who are kicking themselves that they didn’t do the same before Trump shored up his base at the debate (and with that sickening “news conference”).

  30. 30.

    low-tech cyclist

    Time for some Python:

    Brave Sir Ryan ran away
    Bravely ran away away
    When danger reared its ugly head
    He bravely turned his tail and fled
    Yes, brave Sir Ryan turned about
    And gallantly he chickened out
    Bravely taking to his feet
    He beat a very brave retreat
    Bravest of the brave, Sir Ryan!

  31. 31.

    sigaba

    From Free Republic:

    [Deplorable Traitor] Paul Ryan Will No Longer Defend Trump

    First comment:

    Defeat Ryan pure and simple.

    @amk: That’s where it’s going, already started.

  33. 33.

    hueyplong

    If you were the journalist writing that article, and if you weren’t suffering from some medical emergency while doing so, I think you’d have to ask these questions (among others):

    1. Were the members of the Freedom Caucus on that call?

    2. What did they say?

    Do we think King and Gohmert just sat silently by their speaker phones?

  34. 34.

    Bailey

    The nomination list for GOP considerations for the annual “Profiles in Courage” award will necessarily be thin, but I’m hereby nominating Mitt Romney. No, really, I am. He’s the only GOP member that will come out of this okay.

  35. 35.

    Kay

    @hereandnow @jeremyhobson Hillary Clinton’s answer referencing Lincoln was literally true. wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/927 …

    This got my attention last night because I thought “wow- is she lying? It can’t be that no one on cable news actually read the Wikileaks docs they’re asking her questions about, can it?”

    I mean, come on. This would be a firing offense in any serious job. They didn’t READ it yet they asked her questions about it? Jake Tapper did this big show out of challenging Kaine on it! Kaine at least ADMITTED he didn’t read it!

  36. 36.

    Jersey Tomato

    This dithering around on the GOP leaderships’ part leaves them in the worst possible position. Their party will lose the race for the Presidency, the Senate, and possibly enough House seats to move them into the minority without them ever taking action to avert those outcomes one way or another. Trump fans will be livid over their lack of support; more moderate GOP voters will be angry that they allowed Trump stink to get all over the party; and the Democrats will ridicule them mercilessly for not having the guts or know-how to prevent Trump from hijacking their party.

  38. 38.

    Gelfling 545

    @Gin & Tonic: Yep. I’ll bet the old son of a barkeep is very happy with his retirement. While I doubt he ever imagined Trump (who would have?), he seems to have seen pretty clearly the path his party was on.

  39. 39.

    Botsplainer

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Hell, I’d probably enjoy a nice bottle of MacAllen 18 with the guy while listening to stories.

    He was just an old ward-heeling bagman anyway.

  43. 43.

    aimai

    @Kay: That is a very interesting document. The wikilieaks “pull out” lines–that paraphrase what is coming after, are completely misleading. Eery single time you say to yourself “uh oh” you read the rest of the speech and realize what she is saying is diametrically opposed to the gloss they are giving it.

  44. 44.

    Lyrebird

    Inspired by Tim F’s post:

    Tom Crabtree Retweeted
    stefan heck ‏@boring_as_heck Oct 8
    TRUMP’S IDEA OF LOCKER ROOM TALK: I love sex crimes.
    ACTUAL LOCKER ROOM TALK: Jesus, that old man is using the hand dryer on his asshole.
    7,432 retweets 18,948 likes

    (sorry I don’t know how to cite a tweet, but you can look up his name)

  45. 45.

    Baud

    I would love to believe that Hillary purposely didn’t “dominate” the debate to achieve this result. But that would by 11 x 11 dimensional chess.

  46. 46.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Kaine was great. “I don’t know if it’s authentic and I don’t know what it says”

    Turns out, either did Jake Tapper. They could have axed that whole segment, really. No information was received or transmitted. Reading is hard.

  48. 48.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Kay: She could have said “I wasn’t referring to two OPPOSITE positions but to multiple ways of talking about the same position in order to emphasize its significance to different constituencies” or something, but I suppose that would be as defensive-sounding as it was clarifying. (I tend to be defensive when challenged on something I care about.)

  49. 49.

    Botsplainer

    Best part of all of it is that Trump has crushed his own brand for himself, his progeny and that stinking shitweasel of a son-in-law.

    With any luck, they’ll barely have enough left over after the business collapses and adversary proceedings to all share a shitty 3 bedroom condo outside Ocala. Ivanka can work at a Kohl’s outlet store, the boys can do landscaping and Donald can sit at home like Whyte Goodman at the end of Dodgeball, watching “Apprentice” reruns.

  50. 50.

    Eric U.

    @Kay: they haven’t read the SoS emails either. The email that has the (c) is as innocuous as they come. There is no way that email was classified. It was about congratulating a foreign leader and offering condolences about the passing of the predecessor

  52. 52.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    The town hall was horrible. There were few questions from real people. And the questions they did ask were the worst I can recall in a town hall debate.

  53. 53.

    RaflW

    Ryan will be shocked at the incivility at the first few events and have to cancel the rest.

    What we are witnessing is the mask being ripped off one of the lest capable Speakers in modern history. He projected a confident air, whereas sexual predator Hastert seemed hapless but actually ran his ship comparatively well.

    He was from a generation of pols who at least knew how to work, not just preen. Also, someone who can predate and molest and not get caught for decades (unfortunately!) has many of the skills to be a GOP Speaker. Let that sink in.

  54. 54.

    FlipYrWhig

    @aimai: You can see why Greenwald and Assange get along so well. They’re both in the tendentious misinterpretation business.

  55. 55.

    dmsilev

    @Bailey:

    The nomination list for GOP considerations for the annual “Profiles in Courage” award will necessarily be thin, but I’m hereby nominating Mitt Romney. No, really, I am. He’s the only GOP member that will come out of this okay.

    I’d agree with that to some extent, but we should recognize that Mitt had very little to lose by coming out against Trump and sticking with that. He’s not holding elected office and is unlikely to seek another elected position, so if the Trump fanatics call him nasty names and swear to work against him in any election, so what?

  56. 56.

    sigaba

    @amk: It took a little time and people mighta been rubbed the wrong way but the word is just strange enough to stick in the mind. Also helps that the Deplorables themselves embraced it Marcuse-style.

  57. 57.

    kirbster

    Ryan has always believed that “President Trump” would be just like “Legal Deposition Trump”, the guy who claims to know nothing about all the contracts and papers that his managers, lawyers, and accountants place in front of him for signature.

  60. 60.

    dmsilev

    @aimai: And if our media had any capability or willingness to be even slightly insightful, they’d realize that this says far more about Wikileaks and its motivations (or Assange’s motivations at this point) than it does about Hillary Clinton.

  61. 61.

    shomi

    Is that kiss on the cheek snub by both of the shitweasels daughters getting any media love? Right after Hillary mentioned how his kids saying they like him was his best attribute….lol.

    I guess they like him about as much as you can like a groping creepy father who says he’d like to have sex with them if they weren’t his daughters. Yea, they must think that is such a compliment coming for dear ole dad.

  62. 62.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Botsplainer:
    Don’t be fooled. Boehner is directly culpable for the gridlock since 2010. He exploited the power of the Speakership for obstruction in a way no one has before. The phrase ‘The Hastert Rule’ makes it sound like Boehner’s policy of allowing only bills that would pass with only Republican support to be voted on was standard practice. Nobody has pulled that shit before. Boehner was worse than the Tea Party, but got them to take the blame.

  65. 65.

    amk

    Jeff Gauvin @JeffersonObama

    POLLS 10/10 12PM
    ■NBC/WSJ: CLINTON +14
    ■NOLA: CLINTON +10
    ■RASMUSSEN: CLINTON +7
    ■QUIN: C+6
    ■PRRI: C+6
    ■REUT: C+7
    ■FDUP: C+9
    ■UPI: C+6
    9:50 PM – 10 Oct 2016

  66. 66.

    Mary G

    And every day some new information will come out of Hillary’s oppo bag and he will have to run away from the pack of hounds from the media asking him about it.

    “Oh frabjous day! Calooh! Callay!”

  67. 67.

    Lyrebird

    @RaflW: Thanks for your comment on an earlier thread. (this morning or last night?) Having been bullied does seem to prime certain reflexes, and what the Republican candidate keeps stirring up is rottenness pure and simple. I hope you’ve got a great circle (partner, friends, etc) of support in your life now.

  68. 68.

    brendancalling

    The Cowardly Ryan was jeered at this weekend’s rally, the one where he disinvited Trumplestiltskin. Why does he think any other rally will be any different?

    The beats has turned on them.

  70. 70.

    RaflW

    @aimai: Economist/writer Johnathan Bernstein just commented that no other organization in living memory has been pored over in such detail. And that he can’t imagine (and I agree) any other org having 10s of 1,000s of emails come out and look that clean.

    Didn’t one of the big investment banks/hedge funds get taken down in part because top guys were emailing each other about $1000 bottles of champagne during the Bush/’08 melt-down, as they were rapaciously profiteering?

    OK, that’s a side note, but seriously, Clinton ran an operation that has tons of staff, and what? They have Danna Brazille saying Chelsea is a brat (or somesuch. Who cares, total nonisssue).

  72. 72.

    trollhattan

    @Baud:
    Proposed a few days back that all Hilz needs to do is hold serve from now on to cakewalk to Nov 9 (nope, no mixed metaphor there). She basically did so last night while Donny did whatever the hell that was. Her organization’s got this.

  73. 73.

    RaflW

    Hey, thanks Lyrebird. Yep, I’ve been partnered for over 10 years, fab family and circle of friends, and I’m an active member of the gay-friendliest denomination in the country (go UUs!). Life is good, even if Trump/Pence and their minions are letting their evil freak flags fly. Maybe especially because of it – their underbelly is exposed and people smell the stink.

    I was heartened to see, for example, the business community (and sports) give Pence a sharp stick in the eye for his bullshit homophobic ‘religious freedom’ law in IN that was as transparent as heck. The worm has turned for lesbians and gays. We’ve got work to do for our Trans and gender nonconforming and Bi friends, but the old order gay-bashing is generationally passing out of power. Phew.

  74. 74.

    Kropadope

    Trump is so awful you can’t speak about him, but you’re still endorsing him. Riiiiight…..

    This is why we desperately need to flip Congress too. Different chamber, but I got a call from the DSCC today pushing three Senate races; PA, WI, and IL. I told them I’d throw them some money when I get paid on Friday, but I want to give to ActBlue also. So, what’s left is to decide how to divvy it up.

    Also, my Libertarian friend today suggested I should vote for Jill Stein. I asked him “do you realize she ACTUALLY wants the government to take everything over, not just imaginary like your fears about Obama and Clinton?” No response. Also, he clearly wasn’t listening all the times I told him my second choice would be Gary Johnson. He’s a distant second choice, but still…

  75. 75.

    trollhattan

    Must say, in the Battle of the Poll-aggregator Nerds Sam Wang has a bigger lead than Hilz’. Funny guy, too, adding to his portfolio.

    In last night’s debate, the 2005 candid video of Donald Trump saying what he does with women was still on everyone’s mind. In response, he brought up many topics beloved by Republican rank-and-file voters: Bill Clinton, Benghazi, emails…it was a veritable Greatest Hits of 1996-2016. The likely consequence of this scorched-earth strategy is that Republican leaders are trapped. All their base (R) belong to him. This will reverberate downticket.

  76. 76.

    Feathers

    @Eric U.: apparently the (c) was only because the information had been relayed via a diplomatic cable (or other officially secret method).

    Watching the debate last night I realized the emails are the perfect abuser complaint- something where you are definitely wrong and can’t claim to be right, in the past so there isn’t any mitigation available, no actual consequences which can be made up for, just an endless hurt that has nothing to do with the event in question, thrown into your face, over and over again. The truth isn’t a sufficient answer, because you are the problem, not the email server or the broken bowl or the message you left on the fridge that wasn’t read…

  78. 78.

    Kropadope

    @trollhattan:

    Proposed a few days back that all Hilz needs to do is hold serve from now on to cakewalk to Nov 9 (nope, no mixed metaphor there). She basically did so last night while Donny did whatever the hell that was. Her organization’s got this.

    What she needs is for voters to not be complacent about polls and show up. Remember, a lead for Clinton doesn’t mean showing up doesn’t matter, it means showing up gives you a chance to REALLY stick it to the Repiglicans.

    @Eric U.:

    The email that has the (c) is as innocuous as they come.

    Also, too, it wasn’t in the title line like it should’ve been, but buried in the content.

  80. 80.

    aimai

    @Feathers: Yeah. All this. But I really wish she had reached into her purse and said “I just happen to have the newly declassified documents in question in my hand, I’ll read them now: Header “small letter c” (In the wrong place for an actual classified document Don, which youwould know if you had ever been through a security check and been entitled to handle classified documents”) and now for the content: “Mrs. Clinton will have her hair done on Thursday…condolence cards need to be sent to Person X…please remind ambassadors to recycle responsibly….etc…etc…etc…”

  81. 81.

    trollhattan

    @RaflW:
    Wow. Her media in sum has been spectacularly good. Donny proclaims himself a “star” and thinks he therefore has mastered the media. That’s like me thinking I’m a surgeon having had my ankle operated on.

  82. 82.

    cokane

    It’s the perfect stance for Ryan, who has been playing this chickenshit game with the evangelical wing of the party his entire life.

  83. 83.

    Brachiator

    OT comedy relief:

    16 year old at Indio music festival.

    I didn’t know who Paul McCartney was. I never heard of him before.

    The Rolling Stones played “Little T & A” during their set. They did not dedicate the song to Donald Trump.

  84. 84.

    Hal

    The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies… and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not… and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives… the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies….

  85. 85.

    karen marie

    I just made ten phone calls for Hillary. It makes me feel less despairing to do this, even though I didn’t speak to a single live person but merely left messages. Even if you’re normally averse to speaking to random strangers, I encourage you to at least give it a shot.

  86. 86.

    Amir Khalid

    @Kropadope:
    Begging your pardon, but I don’t see a second choice after Hillary, and if I did it wouldn’t be that airhead. Only she did all the homework to prepare for the job. Whereas Gary Johnson had to ask what “a leppo” was.

  89. 89.

    Barbara

    @dmsilev: Jeff Flake and Ben Sasse are probably more courageous than Romney. Although not up for reelection this year, they are elected officials who have to face voters soon and faced a lot of pressure from their respective state delegations to get with the program. Not that I agree with virtually anything else they stand for, but they haven’t stood for Trump and that does distinguish them.

  90. 90.

    Peale

    @sigaba: I’m assuming they figure they can take back any seat they lose to a Democrat in the mid-terms. So yeah, please, Trumpsters. Oust everyone you can.

  92. 92.

    Another Holocene Human

    @RaflW: Thanks for your support of us genderfrauds, but just wanted to note that the MCC still exists, pretty sure they are in fact more gay friendly than UU because they are the original gay church.

  94. 94.

    Kropadope

    @Amir Khalid: Right, but beside Clinton and Johnson, the others running are Trump and Stein. I did also say he was a distant second.

    He was closer a few weeks ago, my logic being that Johnson’s policies are most likely to make Americans miserable and Clinton is more apt to cause misery abroad. Since Americans are the only ones who get a vote on the American government, I figured the government should be given wider latitude to make Americans miserable than foreigners. Then I considered Johnson’s climate change position and quickly realized that yes, Gary Johnson will make the whole world miserable.

  96. 96.

    condorcet runner-up

    a bit off topic, but, I took the goddamn day off today and, instead of enjoying it, I have instead spent the morning arguing on Facebook with trump true-believers. fml.

  97. 97.

    hovercraft

    It was pointed out last night that the only person the alt-right hate as much as the Clintons is Paul Ryan. All we have to do is sit back and wait. Ryan’s little bit pregnant is going to set the tiny fingered vulgarian will explode all over him.
    I’m getting tired of popcorn I need a new snack.

  101. 101.

    khead

    Why does Ryan expect that these rallies – which, after all, are targeted at the base – won’t devolve into spectacles where angry Trump supporters jeer and boo at one of the most blatantly transparent attempts to have it both ways that we’ve seen in a long time?

    Who says it has to be actual Trump supporters that do the jeering and booing? I am thinking it might be fun to slap on a “Make America Great Again” hat and go boo at the rally of a GOP house member who has “unendorsed” Trump.

  102. 102.

    tsquared2001

    ‏@realDonaldTrump
    Paul Ryan should spend more time on balancing the budget, jobs and illegal immigration and not waste his time on fighting Republican nominee

    Let the bloodletting begin!!!
    ETA: at 7:22 AM

  104. 104.

    Another Holocene Human

    OT: did anyone else catch Diane Rehm this morning with that disabled Syrian girl, Najeen? As someone who has been intimately acquainted with cerebral palsy, Diane’s words and attitude really pissed me off bigly. Diane’s said a lot of dumb stuff the last few years but this interview was really cringe inducing. Some of the public calling in wasn’t much better (one called her big sister “the real hero”–gee, I think that family shares the heroics, don’t they, given aunt and uncle got killed by ISIS but they got to Germany alive. what an insensitive thing to say), I must add.

    One thing that sucked was that I guess Diane Rehm only skimmed the book because she starts implying Najeen didn’t go to school because Islam and she has to correct her and explain it was because she had CP. Shades of a friend of mine whose father literally carried him into the school every day in Poland because he had CP.

    Dammit. I’m really pissed now.

  107. 107.

    slag

    Such profiles in courage, Republicans are. This must be why it took a Democrat to finally get Bin Laden.

    Obama, Biden, and Hillary weren’t sitting around in the oval office fretting about what Glenn Greenwald would do when he found out. They were actually doing their jobs. Such a nice change of pace from the previous administration.

  109. 109.

    BR

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I’d pick Johnson, mainly because Weld seems like a reasonable guy all things considered — like one of the old school liberal Northeast GOPers that went extinct. Only one among the six P/VP candidates among Libertarian, GOP, and Green that seems reasonable. Johnson seems clueless, Greens are cynical and full of hot air, and GOP needs no explanation.

  110. 110.

    Punchy

    @Botsplainer: Are you joking? You think Trump will be broke at the end of this? He’s going to transfer every last ducat of his millions and millions in campaign fund into his Foundation or bank account (I know, they’re the same thing). Pretty sure he doesn’t give a shit if it’s legal or not. This seems to be the reason he’s not running any commercials; he wants everything he can get.

  111. 111.

    debit

    @Punchy: Someone ran a pro Trump commercial yesterday in Minneapolis. I was a little surprised at the waste of ad money. He’s not going to win in MN, not even close. Why bother?

  112. 112.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Barbara: I can respect Jeff Flake, and I can respectfully disagree with whatever policies he might push, but Paul Ryan?

  113. 113.

    cokane

    O and guys, like I’ve been saying from the beginning, the House is up for grabs. Wanna punish Ryan? We all know what to do

  114. 114.

    BR

    @Punchy:

    It’s also my theory why he’s holding rallies all over the place in a scattered and frantic way, even in strategically questionable states. He’s trying to rack up as many air miles as possible, all of which mean not only the campaign but the taxpayers are paying him.

  115. 115.

    hovercraft

    @RaflW:
    I just saw that Ad on msnbc, in Jersey. Not sure if it’s part of a National buy, or if it’s aimed at PA, our coverage area is a combination of NY and PA.
    That Ad will get to those white educated women in the Philly suburbs.

  118. 118.

    BR

    Interesting thing I realized today, especially reading some unsurprisingly clueless comments by undecided voters last night — that all the months of Clinton ads may now be having an impact. She has been hammering him on all sorts of things on TV, but people didn’t want to believe it. But they were primed, so when the tape came out and Trump failed to respond properly in the debate, everything clicked.

  120. 120.

    Baud

    @BR: Yeah, if I didn’t stay home for the first time in my life, I’d have to go with Johnson too.

    It’s a depressing thought.

  122. 122.

    Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class

    @hovercraft:

    In my vision, he leaves her out of the humiliation her family wrought on his – her being the shiksa who made him a shonda fur die goyim. His family can’t step into Temple with pride anymore.

    This is where my “shitty Trump filled 3 bedroom condo outside Ocala” fantasy plays so well.

  123. 123.

    Mister Forkbeard

    @Bailey: @Eric U.: Is that mail available? Would love to actually show this to people on the intarwebs who insist she knowingly spread classified material.

  125. 125.

    RaflW

    GOP operative and temporary dyspeptic (who I am not a fan of, as he still wants to squash Dems) did offer this gem: He is calling the rump party base “Trumpqaeda”.

    That’s not bad as an epithet.

  126. 126.

    Kropadope

    @Baud: Why stay home? There are important races other than the President. You could always leave the spot blank and vote for everything else is the D dropped out and you didn’t like any of your other choices.

  127. 127.

    Mister Forkbeard

    @amk: Holy god. Those poll results are just awful for Trump – and given the differences in GOTV operations I’d expect the numbers (if voted on today) to be even better for clinton.

    I’m really curious about how the debate will have influenced the polls in a few days, especially given that the most damaging part of it is going to be the “Trump lied the whole debate, and physically and legally threatened Hillary” articles that are going to be pushed for the next few days.

  130. 130.

    Brachiator

    @hovercraft:

    Jared comes from a big real estate family in Jersey, him and Lucrecia will be just fine. His families millions are real.

    About that family.

    Jared’s father, New Jersey real estate mogul Charles Kushner, served jail time for the crime of foiling an investigation into an alleged illicit activity through obstruction of justice and witness tampering. Behind the legal language was a sordid story: Kushner hired a prostitute to entrap his brother-in-law and sent the tape to his sister, Esther, in an alleged effort to stop her from being a witness against him in a civil inter-family suit.

    BTW, apparently, Jared originally wanted to put the Bill Clinton accusers in the official seats where Hillary might have to approach them and offer to shake hands. The debate commission said that security would remove the women if the Trump team persisted in this little scheme.

  132. 132.

    ? Martin

    @BR: And she keeps that pattern going. I’m convinced that last night she set up the next round. She let all of the conspiracy theory stuff lie out there – the shit my wife was completely bewildered about because she doesn’t give a shit about Juanita Brodderick or emails or Benghazi. It’s just jibberish to her.

    Clinton knows the key to winning the House and Senate is to hang Trumps core on the rest of the party. She wants Trump in the race and just barely in charge. And that’s the story today – Ryan couldn’t distance, nobody else is disavowing or dropping endorsements, those that recently did are probably a little bit nervous. Trump says he never committed those acts, so we’re in a state where the party line is that it was locker-room talk. We’ll take a few days to get everyone lined up again, House members won’t face angry Trump voters for abandoning him, etc. And then the next tape will drop that will be worse than the last one. And everyone will again run around trying to figure out if losing Trump supporters is worse than losing moderates, the RNC will run around figuring who they can cut loose and who they can’t, where money should be going, etc.

    Clinton is killing ants. She whacks them, they scatter, and if you leave them enough to work with, they regroup, and you whack them again. She didn’t want a death blow against Trump last night. She needs him and his voters to take the House and Senate. She wants Trump staggered but alive. She got that yesterday. At some point the death blow will come – probably just before Halloween when everyone will have social events to discuss it at, and too late for the GOP to do a goddamn thing.

  134. 134.

    slag

    @Major Major Major Major: You finally got me with that one.

    I have been avoiding ending up on another email/snail mail list throughout this entire election, but thanks to you, I’ve finally given in and donated. While I’m sure the spammers will make me regret it instantly, it had to be done, I suppose.

    (Truth be told, I would have easily donated earlier and more often had I not feared the inevitable consequences of my actions. I wonder how much money campaigns and causes lose thanks to their “marketing” techniques. Now get off my lawn!)

  135. 135.

    catclub

    @Baud:

    Not to be lost is that the entire Democratic Party is behind Hillary Clinton — and Bernie Sanders too, Mr. Trump.

    Contrast just with 2012, zero defections from Mitt Romney. Trump is historically unique – all on the bad side.

  136. 136.

    David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch

    @Baud: Mike Murphy said she was trying to be presidential and that means not lowering yourself to trump’s level. he also said, trump had nothing to lose, so he could be as offensive as he wanted to be, while hillz is constrained by being on the goal line with everything to lose. Last thing you want to do is do what Seattle did in the super bowl – get fancy and get turn the ball over, instead of just scoring with a boring running play.

  137. 137.

    Lyrebird

    @RaflW: YAY!!

    the old order gay-bashing is generationally passing out of power. Phew.

    Also YAY thank (deity or force of choice) !!

    My mom, who was involved in the Civil Rights Movement in the 60s, has said many times that she’s amazed and thrilled that the pace of change, however overdue, has become a sea change for LGBT rights. (not denying the need for progressively more as you get to the B and the T and the Q)

    I’m glad the ads with moms seem to be really doing good stuff for the Clinton campaign. For me, the Baryshnikov one was even more powerful, but I’m not a typical consumer*. And Barney Frank’s endorsement video… I cried.

    *ETA: I’m thinking we should persuade Jay Smooth to make a new video, “How to tell someone that what they said is fascist…”

  138. 138.

    Amir Khalid

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Tough question; none of those three looks at all prepared to be president. Unlike Johnson and Stein, Trump is of horribly unfit character so I’d rule him out at once. There’s little to choose from between Johnson’s shocking ignorance and Stein’s hopeless naivete. Johnson is an amiable dolt, and if he were in the White House with Republican House and Senate (he’s a Republican deep inside, after all) he’d just acquiesce to all the damage they were doing. Stein’s heart is in the right place, kind of, but she would be an ineffectual president; I mean, can you imagine the Democratic congressional caucus trusting her to be an ally? I picture an exasperated Nancy Pelosi telling her, “I really need you to focus, Madam President Tinkerbell.”

    It’s an entirely fair question but a tough one, and I simply don’t have an answer.

  143. 143.

    Shell

    All the Trump surrogates are pushing “the locker-room excuse, no biggie” Now they’re excusing away his threats to put Hillary in jail as just a “quip”. Ha-ha.

    So, I guess we can’t believe anything he says.

  144. 144.

    Lyrebird

    @slag: Anyone here know someone on the inside of ActBlue?

    I would have easily donated earlier and more often had I not feared the inevitable consequences of my actions.

    Yes, there needs to be a way to donate w/o getting on the mailing list. I guess I should get smart and list notmyname at yahoo or something on there.

  145. 145.

    WaterGirl

    @Lyrebird:

    For me, the Baryshnikov one was even more powerful, but I’m not a typical consumer. And Barney Frank’s endorsement video… I cried.

    Links to those ads, please. And thank you.

  147. 147.

    Jeffro

    @amk: looking forward to seeing just how badly the GOP split hurts them…if half of all Trumpkins refuse to vote down-ballot, and half of the Establishment refuses to vote Trump…WOW…

    …they might have to outsource the 2016 GOP “autopsy” to Democrats, as there won’t be a Republican left to write it.

  148. 148.

    Mary G

    @Brachiator: The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. They made such a big deal about how orthodox Jared and Ivanka are, but he broke Sabbath on Saturday to strategize with Trump and Bannon over the lady guests.

  149. 149.

    David ?▶️Hillary/Harley Quinn 2016▶️? Koch

    I’m wondering if Hillz uses the rest of her oppo material. They have more of Trump on tape abusing women and freely using the N-word.

    I wonder cuz I could see how the “liberal media” would get mad at Clinton for running up the score. Just the same way they got mad at her for the alt-right speech.

    also too, when Jimmy Johnson was coach of the U he would run up the score and it freak out the media.

  152. 152.

    GregB

    @? Martin:

    Her performance really did seem like an Ali rope-a-dope strategy.

    The GOP keep watching canaries in the coal mine dying by the droves but then grasp on to a few remaining live canaries and seem to think, see they are alive, all is well.

    I can only imagine what will drop soon. Ben Carson seems to think it will be very bad.

    On election night, NH will be the canary in the coal mine. Look for Clinton’s winning margin and if Congressman Guinta and Kelly Ayotte are announced as losers early.

    If so it will be a 4 alarm dumpster fire for the Republicans.

  154. 154.

    Mnemosyne

    @GregB:

    I think the Clinton campaign is going to pivot and release some proof that Trump is getting financing from Russia. That’s why she made him deny it last night.

    More revelations about bigotry will be more of the same, so that’s why I think there’s another arrow in the quiver.

  156. 156.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Major Major Major Major: I ask the question in light of the fact that many here and elsewhere have insisted that a vote for Johnson or Stein (or nobody at all) instead of Hillary, is the same as voting for Trump. So if Hillary wasn’t on the ticket, who is the least objectionable among the remaining 3? And would voting for somebody other than that person (or nobody at all) be the same as a vote for Trump?

  157. 157.

    hovercraft

    @Brachiator:
    As I said last night, Jared married into a family that’s just as scuzzy as his own, they have not dragged him down into the gutter, he just comes from one that has actual money.

    EDIT: Jared is the biggest reason that Christie isn’t the VO, since he was the one who frog marched Jared’s dad to the pokey. And he made sure the cameras were there.

  158. 158.

    Brachiator

    @Mary G:

    . The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. They made such a big deal about how orthodox Jared and Ivanka are, but he broke Sabbath on Saturday to strategize with Trump and Bannon over the lady guests

    Oh, yes. The Times and others are all over this.

    From Haaretz:

    For Republican Jews who haven’t wanted to abandon the party despite misgivings about Donald Trump, his Orthodox daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner have served as a form of kosher stamp. …

    But the gloves-off atmosphere at Trump Tower on Friday seems to have tipped the scales, where, the New York Times reported“an increasingly upset and alone” Donald Trump huddled into the next day with a “small circle of loyalists” that included Kushner — but not Ivanka. 

    The Times noted that “Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, an observant Jew who normally does not work on the Sabbath, was among those who gathered with him on Saturday.” 

    In the aftermath of the Times story, there was teasing in Jewish circles on the Internet that Kushner had permitted himself to work under the religious exception of “pikuach nefesh” — that violating Shabbat was justified if one was saving a life and that his father-in-law was indeed fighting for his political life. 

  160. 160.

    Lyrebird

    @WaterGirl: Hiya.

    I can find the Baryshnikov ad, but not the Barney interview. We should ask Omnes this evening, since he has seen All The Videos…

    Seriously, I’m actually glad that leaked email was mentioned. When HRC was my Senator, I was majorly unimpressed, including by that “crossing-the-aisles” flag-burning amendment she cosponsored. Office wasn’t the greatest at responding to constituents. Her Lincoln remarks help put that flag-burning nonsense into perspective… not that in this election I need any more reasons to help her campaign! Just appreciating your remarks the other evening.

    ETA: Barney talks about then-First-Lady Hillary calling him up and asking if she could walk with him in the (NYC??) Pride Parade, talks about what it meant to him in that era, that she would take that step… IIRC they made it a tradition.

  163. 163.

    J R in WV

    @RaflW:

    You’re Gay? Wow, who knew? Wow, who cares!! We’re all human…

    ETA: So glad you’re also doing well, take care!

  164. 164.

    Feathers

    @Punchy: One of my small hopes in all of this is that Trump’s legally stealing all the campaign donations will bring about some sort of reforms.

  168. 168.

    RaflW

    @Brachiator: Wow. So that’s the sick family that can produce an adult son able to marry into and function with the sick, sick dynamics of the Trump family. A match made in hell.

  170. 170.

    Bailey

    @catclub:

    Kasich. Still likely in the running for future elected office.

    True, he’ll be spared.

    And I realize Mitt isn’t running for anything ever again (probably) but I give him the nod because he was far more out front and aggressive about it. Held a special press conference and tore Trump limb from limb. At the same time, there was heavy speculation and possible recruitment for him to jump into the race to save the party, which he declined to do. Kasich just mostly failed to endorse and then answered some follow up questions as to why. (Unless there was a bigger take down from him that I missed–possibly.)

  171. 171.

    RaflW

    @? Martin:

    She wants Trump staggered but alive.

    I’m not sure she was playing quite the eleventy jillion dimensional chess you describe, but this nugget is absolutely true. He has to be at the top of the ticket on Nov 8, and we all have to hope that disgusted voters say a giant F.U. to the GOP by voting straight Dem. Second best is them saying an more quiet but effective F.U. to the GOP by staying home.

  172. 172.

    J R in WV

    @slag:

    Seriously, there will be and is an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each and every email you get in response to a DEM donation, and they will honor your request. My Balloon-Juice ActBlue contribution went to 18 democratic candidates, I got 18 emails – one from each campaign, asking for more. I politely clicked unsubscribe, entered my email and a short remark about being unable to support so many good candidates individually, and that I wished them the best of luck.

    That was all. No more. Really. I guess I do get phone calls from the DSCC and DCCC, but they too are on our side. I always thank the phone bank workers for what they do, tell them I don’t respond to phone solicitations, but I do support their cause by working for it myself. We usually have a short but pleasant conversation, end of story.

  173. 173.

    RaflW

    @Shell:

    Now they’re excusing away his threats to put Hillary in jail as just a “quip”.

    Reince, speaking with Hannity last night (in the spin room, I think) said that Clinton had “done things … many of them illegal.” He is in on the jail thing. He’s framing the illegalities so that Trumpfenfuhrer can indict and jail her post haste. Of course, none of that will happen since he’ll lose terribly, but that is how vile Prebus is.

  174. 174.

    Major Major Major Major

    @RaflW: That’s not really 11-dimensional chess, it’s more… just chess. Not tricky stuff to strategize, trickier to pull off. But her team is, to use a phrase I very much consider applicable to Hillary, ruthlessly competent.

  175. 175.

    sinnedbackward

    @Lurking Canadian:The PVI in Ryan’s seat is R+3. He only won reelection to his House seat in 2012 by about ten points.

    If more than one in five or six of the Republican voters in his district sit it out, he’s in big trouble.

    Ditto if one in ten switch to the democrat.

  178. 178.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    @Kay:

    They saw internal polling that he was cratering which coincided with all of us a finding out he’s some kind of predator.

    Sam Wang makes a similar point:

    The insta-consensus among commentators is that somehow this event is a cause of Trump’s electoral doom. I think the logic is backwards – to me, the growing obviousness of his doom created an environment for this story to blow up.

    I’m gonna speculate on why the tape wasn’t used during the primary, and it’s not because Billy didn’t tell JEB! about it. Trump was seen as a joke by the VSPs and everyone not on the Stormfront mailing list, and going so negative against a (perceived) non-entity like Trump would have been rightly seen as an act of abject desperation by a spectacularly weak candidate, like using nuclear weapons on an ISIS training camp. It wouldn’t have hurt Trump that much*, but it would have killed JEB!’s campaign dead.

    * Republican primary voters have…different…priorities from the rest of us.

  179. 179.

    Major Major Major Major

    @karen marie: You think Johnson would be better?

    As far as I can tell, Stein would veto Ryan’s dismantling of the safety net, nominate judges that wouldn’t take us back to the Lochner era, and have a “do nothing ever” foreign policy identical to Johnson’s.

  180. 180.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @sigaba: As the protagonist of one of the novels by Tom Lehrer’s friend Hen3ry (“the ‘3’ was silent”):

    A young necrophiliac who achieved his boyhood ambition by becoming county coroner

    (On An Evening Wasted with Tom Lehrer [live], half of the audience laughs & half goes uhhhh? Whereupon Lehrer gibes, “The rest of you can look it up when you get home.”)

    His next gig: Autopsying the GOP pachyderm.

  181. 181.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @amk: Paying homage to Oscar Wilde’s characterization of foxhunting (“The unspeakable pursuing the inedible”):

    The deplorables supporting the despicable.

    (Can’t believe no one’s already said that, but if not, it needed to be said.)

  183. 183.

    No One You Know

    @Kropadope: Voters need to show up, not to “really stick it” to anybody, but to show whether the polls actually mean anything about the electorate.

    The only thing more cowardly than Paul Ryan, going forward? The so-called “undecided voter.” If you can’t vote for a committed public servant with brains, education, relevant experience, and a cause, and you can’t decide against a sexual predator gish galloping over a threat to jail same, you don’t deserve the vote you have.

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