Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

White supremacy is terrorism.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Come on, man.

Bad news for Ron DeSantis is great news for America.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Optimism opens the door to great things.

DeSantis transforms Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

In my day, never was longer.

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2016 / Friday Morning Open Thread: GOP — Abandon Whale!

Friday Morning Open Thread: GOP — Abandon Whale!

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(John Deering via GoComics.com)
.

From the Washington Post:

A wave of apprehension and anguish swept the Republican Party on Thursday, with many GOP leaders alarmed by Donald Trump’s refusal to accept the outcome of the election and concluding that it is probably too late to salvage his flailing presidential campaign.

As the Republican nominee reeled from a turbulent performance in the final debate here in Las Vegas, his party’s embattled senators and House members scrambled to protect their seats and preserve the GOP’s congressional majorities against what Republicans privately acknowledge could be a landslide victory for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton…

“The campaign is over,” said Steve Schmidt, a Trump critic and former senior strategist on George W. Bush’s and John McCain’s presidential campaigns.

Calling a refusal to accept the election results “disqualifying,” Schmidt added: “The question is, how close will Clinton get to 400 electoral votes? She’ll be north of 350, and she’s trending towards 400 — and the trend line is taking place in very red states like Georgia, Texas and Arizona.”…

Meanwhile, top Democrats fanned out to battleground states on Thursday to hammer Trump for what they described as an unprecedented attack on the country’s political system and to attempt to yoke Trump to Republican candidates down the ballot.

Campaigning in Miami, President Obama said Trump’s doubts about the election outcome are “not a joking matter. That is dangerous.”…

And in Arizona, where polls show an unexpectedly tight presidential race, first lady Michelle Obama said Trump “is threatening the very idea of America itself” by suggesting he would not honor the election results.

“You do not keep American democracy ‘in suspense,’ ” Obama said in Phoenix.

Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, Clinton’s vice-presidential running mate, held a rally at a downtown Charlotte brewery, where he said Trump’s claims of a “rigged” election reminded him of the Third World politicking he had seen as a young missionary in Honduras.

“The bigger we can win by, the harder it is for him to whine and have anyone believe him,” Kaine said, trying to galvanize supporters on the first day of early voting in North Carolina…

***********
Apart from a little hard-earned schadenfreude, what’s on the agenda as we wrap up this busy week?

Reader Interactions

192Comments

  2. 2.

    Mustang Bobby

    @rikyrah: Good morning, Friend.

    I got home in time to see Trump bomb at the Al Smith dinner, then watched Hillary Clinton kill, and then the follow-up commentary by Al Franken. Now if that was how all the debates went, I’d watch.

  5. 5.

    Keith G

    Okay, It’s early and I am just sitting down to coffee and breakfast, but what is that map indicating? I is confused.

    Edit…Never mind…I took another look and it snapped into place. I need legends, it seems.

  11. 11.

    Schlemazel

    @amk:
    All those red cactus & tumbleweed plantations are huge while the tiny blue specs are where people live.

  14. 14.

    Mustang Bobby

    Carlos Curbelo (R) is in trouble here in Miami; it’s a toss-up between him and Joe Garcia, whom he beat in ’14. Also, there’s a tight race between David Jolly (R) and Charlie Crist (R? I? D?) in central Florida. Jolly’s a teabagger and Crist is an opportunist. And there’s a slight chance Iliana Ros-Lehtinen (R) could lose in my suburban Miami district to Scott Fuhrman, a liberal-and-proud Democrat.

  15. 15.

    David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch

    mike murphy ‏@murphymike

    This is priceless. Love the grim faces backstage. Hope Hicks must be pondering a name change. Real jaunty vibe inside the TrumperBunker.

    0 replies 31 retweets 109 likes

    Ya know Trump has a brother and 2 sisters and you never ever see them. They too must be considering changing their names back to Drumpf.

  16. 16.

    Schlemazel

    We have a very good chance of flipping 2 red seats blue here on the tundra. The odious John Kline retired and the mouth-breathers selected Trump-lite, Jason Lewis, to replace him. Mr. Lewis is a radio talk show clown & has a history of nasty, stupid and mean things on tape. He is going down. Congressman Paulson inherited the wealthy white West suburbs from a moderate Republican 20 years ago. I am sure he is a nice man & had good intentions to be the moderate corporatist that would represent his district. He keeps his mouth shut or says nice things but votes with the bastard caucus 100%. We need a tiny bit of help as his is a close thing. I am hoping Trump takes him down for us. We probably can’t keep that seat unless the GOP splinters but losing seats like that could help speed the break up or force the party to put the breaks on their crazy hard right (which I don’t see as possible)

  20. 20.

    David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch

    Robert Costa ‏@costareports

    What we saw tonight: the specter of a grievance movement that will haunt Republicans for months and years to come

    0 replies 635 retweets 971 likes

    Holy shit, he even lost wingnut Costa who just spent 2 years as Trump’s lackey, apologist.

  22. 22.

    craigie

    That was the finest version of Hillary I have ever seen. I’m going to enjoy having her speak for me.

    By the way: jump on Twitter and look at #TrumpBookReports. Hilarious!

  27. 27.

    Schlemazel

    @Mustang Bobby:
    Vinny was Batshit Bachmann’s predecessor. I think he saw the crazy train coming & got out while he could still pretend to be a moderate. He is earning wingnut welfare as a beltway lobbyst but haunts the local paper’s editorial page along with a pretend Dem leading for “the middle way” which somehow always ends up being the GOP platform minus the nasty language.

  32. 32.

    rickstersherpa

    @Mustang Bobby: I would take the opportunist any time. They are someone you can deal. After 6 years of Scott, Biondi, et. al. isn’t even Florida getting tired of the corruption and misgovernment?

  33. 33.

    JPL

    After the dinner, Hillary mingled with the crowd. Kissenger waited until the crowd thinned so he could give her a hug.
    The group obviously wanted to spend time with the next President of the United States.

  34. 34.

    Politically Lost

    It’s four a.m. on the west coast and I should not be conscious. Woke from a terrible dream about a rat that wouldn’t die. Fucking bizarre. If the rat were orange it would have made more sense.

    One thing about being in a blue state in a deep blue county my actual votes only go for democrats that are running against other democrats. There’s no district to help flip with my vote.

    One cool thing about our county is that they have a drive up window at the registrar of voters for dropping off absentee ballots. And, there are drop boxes through out the county for ballots. So, the wife and I get our ballots and voter guide in the mail spend a leisurely afternoon discussing our votes, researching issues. Then yesterday I drove by the registrar and dropped the ballots off. Every county should have that.

  35. 35.

    Punchy

    Whats up with all that blue in SE Iowa? I understand Johnson County (U of Iowa), but what else in that area is bringing the proggys?

  37. 37.

    bemused

    @David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch:

    Wow. Not that I haven’t seen Trump glaring at Hillary before but this pic perfectly captures Trump. This is what a 70 year jealous, old man baby looks like, pouty expression and clenched hand. Nice contrast with Hillary broadly smiling and talking with people. I doubt Trump had many benefit attendees vying to shake his hand and chat after the dinner last night.

    I saw Rudy laugh at a dig by Smith on a video this morning and Rudy had a big smile and laughed. So funny to see ugly old prune Rudy’s stone face when Hillary roasted him.

  39. 39.

    David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch

    Tall and tan and young and lovely
    The girl from Ipanema goes walking and
    When she passes, each one she passes goes “ahhh”

    When she walks, she’s like a samba
    She swings so cool and sways so gentle that
    When she passes, each one she passes goes “ahhh”

    German defensive back – Tabea Kemme, chilling out prior to Saturday’s international match (photo)

  41. 41.

    stibbert

    At the Al Smith dinner in 1948, during the Berlin Airlft, Gen. Lucius Clay spoke in strong support of Pres. Truman’s foreign policy. Clay (US military governor of Germany) helped turn the election season around, embarrassing both Dewey’s scaredy-cat Republican withdrawal/appeasement & Wallace’s pro-Soviet 3rd-party campaigns. Having just returned from West Germany, his appearance at the Al Smith event was a watershed event in the presidential campaign that ended w/ Truman’s unexpected victory.
    See Andrei Cherny, “The Candy Bombers”

  42. 42.

    David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch

    @debbie: I thought the push-up bra wth a plunging neckline was inappropriate for the occasion. If she wants to wear that to Vegas or the Riviera – fine. But not to a children’s charity.

    I guess, you can take the woman outta fox news, but you can’t take fox news outta the woman.

  43. 43.

    bemused

    @Schlemazel:

    In my district, Rep Rick Nolan is being challenged again by Stewart Mills, of Mills Fleet Farm family. What is encouraging is that recently 13 small town mayors wrote a letter endorsing Nolan and Duluth News Tribune (not a liberal paper) also endorsed Nolan. The DNT pointedly said Mills declined to do any debates but one with Nolan and has had few public events. When he and Nolan did the one debate, Mills arrived just before debate started and left right after without talking to constituents.

  48. 48.

    Ceci n'est pas mon nym

    So has anyone identified the people seated behind the podium from the dinner, especially the guy on our right who has the wide-eyed horrified freeze when Trump starts with the insults?

    Also kind of curious about the guy on the left with some sort of medal around his neck. But it’s the one on the right I really want to know.

  50. 50.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Punchy: Cedar Rapids is part of that district too, I think. That’s a fast growing metro area by Iowa standards.

    See how the upper left red district looks bigger than the others? That’s Steve King’s district and it’s so rural, they had to make it bigger to balance the population. I live in light blue upper right district.

  52. 52.

    Betty Cracker

    @Mustang Bobby: Wow, it would be a BFD if Iliana Ros-Lehtinen gets punted out of office. And if Charlie Crist can’t oust Jolly, I hope he takes a fucking hint and finds some other line of work. Jeebus.

  53. 53.

    Punchy

    Offshore odds update….Dems to control Senate (50 seats + WH) went from -200 to -265 in less than a week. Pretty big change in our direction.

  55. 55.

    Baud

    Haha. Trump went too far for Paul LePage. How soon before he loses the Charles Manson endorsement?

  56. 56.

    WereBear

    Only the delusional believed Trump was capable of even the measly “adult” decisions of a right wing politician. Now the delusional are having a crisis.

  57. 57.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Emma: Heh. I realized that after I posted the link and then listened to it. Was wondering how long before somebody spotted my screw up.

  60. 60.

    randy khan

    @Patricia Kayden:

    I said this in the thread on the dinner last night, but you’ve got to give her credit for following the old etiquette rule that says that lower the neckline the longer the gloves.

    FWIW, I noticed after the speeches that the neckline didn’t appear quite so deep when she stood up.

  62. 62.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Emma: My wife likes to sing, especially the songs she grew up with. She would never sing in public but I think her voice is beautiful and find it relaxing/comforting.

  63. 63.

    Eric U.

    @Emma: both the Spanish and Portuguese versions are surprisingly wordy. What dahell are they saying with all those furrin’ words?

    Anyone know why Owen Ellickson calls Christie “Hole?”

  64. 64.

    barns

    So when is this pivot to the left that wrong way Cole and Applebees salad bar DougJ and cracked crystal ball MarkyMux told us was going to happen and that we should be oh so very afraid of?

    I’m still amazed that so many people are acting surprised over any of this. It’s like you have no clue who Trump is and has always been.

  66. 66.

    Chyron HR

    @barns:

    Do you realize you’ve spent every waking moment for the past five years screaming incoherently at us because we were right about Anthony Weiner and you were wrong, wrong, wrong?

  67. 67.

    Karen S.

    This campaign season has seemed so unreal to me, but something fell into place for me last night. The context is Drumpf’s yammering about the election being “rigged.” I kicked myself for not understanding this sooner. It occurred to me that one of the reasons he keeps saying the election is rigged is because he’s losing “bigly” to HRC, a woman, a girl if you will, and the only way a woman can beat him, he believes, is if the whole thing is rigged, if there’s some sort of Affirmative Action going on. It’s not unlike what some segments of whites in the U.S. believed and continue to believe about Pres. Obama. In the minds of people like Drumpf and his supporters, women of any race or ethnicity and blacks can only best a straight white guy like him is if they’re given some sort of head start.

  73. 73.

    Kay

    Trump is really crazily angry and bitter. I don’t know if he can do 20 more days. There’s a clip of him with an Ohio reporter yesterday. She asked him about the reputation for racism he has now. He stares at her and doesn’t speak so she asks again. He spits out “I am the least racist person you will ever meet” and stalks off- he’s livid.

  75. 75.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Karen S.: “Rigging” frames Trumps life. Since the moment he was born everything has been rigged in his favor, so much so that even after losing nearly a billion dollars he comes out of it smelling like a rose. Remember how he bragged about buying politicians? Send Pan Bondi $20K and WHOOSH he’s exonerated! See? He always wins! For him things being rigged in his favor is just as natural as having oxygen in the air. His taking credit for being a winner is about the same as me taking credit for breathing. But to him, that is just the way things are supposed to be.

    But he is in a new game now. One in which the rules aren’t naturally rigged in his favor. He was going to have to apply himself and learn the rules of this new game. But he didn’t. And now he’s losing. The reality is so foreign to him he has no idea of how to deal with it.

    He’s a WINNER! He ALWAYS wins! If he ISN’T winning, it MUST be because it’s RIGGED against HIM!

    In his mind, it’s the only possible explanation.

  77. 77.

    Kay

    @Karen S.:

    I kicked myself for not understanding this sooner. It occurred to me that one of the reasons he keeps saying the election is rigged is because he’s losing “bigly” to HRC, a woman, a girl if you will, and the only way a woman can beat him, he believes, is if the whole thing is rigged, if there’s some sort of Affirmative Action going on.

    I agree. I also think it’s a big part of his campaign team’s thinking. It’s why they spent a month focusing on Bill Clinton. They won’t even give Hillary Clinton the respect of being his actual opponent.

    They have a sexism problem in the GOP. It isn’t unique to Donald Trump. They started with some fucked up assumptions.

  78. 78.

    hovercraft

    @David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch:
    Good morning.
    If looks could kill ! Between that photo and the GIF from yesterday, I’d advise Hillary to never be alone in a room with him. I’d also recommend that she invite him to all her WHCD’s and a few State dinners, where he can sit and stew about what could have been, and have to be in the presence of the girl who took it away from him.

  80. 80.

    p.a.

    If there were another debate I think there’s a good chance tRump would start flinging his own excrement à la a monkey in a cage.

  81. 81.

    Jeffro

    Hey folks – I’m heading in for a little repair work in about an hour – will be getting a “SLAP tear” in my shoulder stitched back together. ‘Bout time too, it has been forever since I’ve been swimming or kayaking!

    Might take a while until I get the hang of typing one-handed (and left-handed at that). But hey, short-term pain for long-term gain and all that :)
    Everybody have a great weekend – get out there and enjoy the cooler temps & pretty leaves!!

  82. 82.

    barns

    @Baud:
    Maybe someday you people will figure out how this innertubez thing works.

    Ban…lol. Wondering what took them so long. Guess they were too busy cutting/pasting tweets and calling it content. It’s all a choice and who isn’t pro-choice around here?

    Besides, whoever admins this site can’t even figure out how to get wordpress working properly. Just another thing I love (to make fun of) about this place. Surprised this site hasn’t been hacked yet. Or maybe it has?!

  83. 83.

    Baud

    @hovercraft:

    Thankfully, she’ll never have to be in the same room with him again.

    I wonder what will happen to Trump’s celebrity and social status after this is all done. Does he go on Dancing with the Stars and all is forgiven?

  85. 85.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    That blank face of suppressed rage! He is FURIOUS. He’s just barely maintaining control.

    Have you seen the clip where he tore up his notes after the debate? He was grimacing in that. The blank face in the Ohio clip is one step madder on the rage scale, IMO. He’s afraid he’ll lose control.

  86. 86.

    Baud

    @barns: I don’t care. I usually scroll past your comments. But usually, obnoxious trolls are allowed to post until they say something bigoted. I was wondering what you said that went over the line.

  89. 89.

    Another Scott

    @Jeffro: Here’s hoping it’s a complete success and that you have a quick recovery! Stay out of the Cement Pond for a while as you heal up, and tell Ellie “hi” for us. ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  96. 96.

    WarMunchkin

    God, the amount of red on that map. Just so we’re all clear, thanks to the Hastert suggestion, failing to capture the House means legislation is exclusively dictated by the Tea Party.

  97. 97.

    Kay

    Hillary Clinton: “I took a break from my rigorous nap schedule to be here”

    This made my husband guffaw. He gave her a B. He took some points off on comedic timing, but admits people may be born with that.

  98. 98.

    Karen S.

    @Kay: Exactly.
    The misogyny and bigotry buttresses the thinking of the majority of the GOP. It was there before Trump came along and will be there after Trump hopefully fades away because it seems like the GOP base needs someone to “other” even if they’re not wholly aware of it.

  99. 99.

    Elizabelle

    Good morning all.

    I’m not hearing or seeing any new news about that dastardly NC GOP office firebombing.

  100. 100.

    gvg

    @Karen S.: I spotted that this summer when he talked about the Hispanic judge and lawsuits in general. He defines “fair” as him winning. I don’t think he even knows his definition is wrong. Some of the supporters he gained then were not catching that meaning from his speeches saying he wanted to make things fair for Americans. thats why those supporters thought he would be good for them. They are gullible. They also don’t understand international business very well. I find lots confusing myself, but I know enough to know mostly what I don’t know..
    He is not for anyone but himself in demonstrated fact of his whole life. No one should be a supporter, not even the racists. He is not trustworthy and would betray everyone.

    These last few weeks when he knows he has lost are going to be horrible. I can’t understand him enough to say how but thats how it looks to be shaping up to me.

  102. 102.

    Elizabelle

    @efgoldman: CBS this morning was trying to say “both sides” too, but the video they shared made it clear it wasn’t.

    I think that’s what ABC and CBS do these days; go with “both sides” but put up video that undercuts that cliche. Having it both ways.

    Can’t tell you what NBC does, because that channel does not work on this TV. Dog and the FSM heard my prayers!

  104. 104.

    Pest Bog Mummy, Frakensteinbeck

    I’ve never had much faith he would drive away white male voters or change opinions on downballot races much, but I’ve been hoping for lower turnout. If they don’t show up at all, they can’t color in every Republican bubble but Trump’s.

    @gvg:

    thats why those supporters thought he would be good for them. They are gullible.

    I disagree on this one. If you’ve ever worked customer service, you know that Trump’s attitude isn’t rare. Every asshole with a touch of narcissism defines ‘fair’, ‘polite’, and ‘moral’ as giving them what they want. It ties tightly into racism as well. This is Trump’s base, they love him for validating them, and they picked him because they’re god damn furious America no longer recognizes that they’re right all the time.

  106. 106.

    Kay

    @Karen S.:

    They have a problem if they can’t see her apart from her relationship with Bill Clinton. She’s a different person. If that isn’t how you start it’s hard to catch up to most people. I actually think Bill Clinton has been absent to most voters this campaign, other than to Democratic stalwarts and they weren’t voting for Republicans anyway. He’s been almost irrelevant as a campaign fixture or voice. I haven’t heard one word about him from non-obsessive people.

  107. 107.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: No.

    If Hillary was running against your run of the mill Republican politician things would be a lot closer, depending on who it was she might even be losing (one of the “natural rules” is after 2 terms, the presidency shifts to the other party). No competent politician gratuitously insults the voters he/she needs to win but Trump does. “It’s just Trump being Trump!”

    I always thought Trump was a gift to good to be true. Thought the Repubs couldn’t be that stupid. I was wrong about that. I will never again overestimate the intelligence of Republicans. But I also always said that the country that re-elected Barack Hussein Obama to a 2nd term in the White House would never replace him with Trump. I was right about that.

    I give Hillary credit. She goaded Trump into such obvious and repulsive buffoonery that he has hung himself with a rope of his own weaving, but we all know she is not a natural politician. It’s work for her, hard work, and it comes off as fake to all too many.

    But she keeps working at it, and it is that which makes her success in this campaign all the sweeter.

  108. 108.

    MattF

    @gvg: That’s consistent with ‘if I win, the election’s not rigged’. Coming from anyone else, that would be a (weak) joke, but Trump really means it.

  110. 110.

    MattF

    @OzarkHillbilly: Hillary keeps working at it, and she learns from her mistakes. Trump doesn’t do either of those things– more accurately, he flat out cannot do either of those things.

  113. 113.

    prufrock

    @Betty Cracker: Jolly has been running lots of ads against Crist, saying that he’s been in politics for too long. Ironic, since the seat he’s currently occupying was previously held by one man for FORTY YEARS! He died in office! Hell, the building I work in is named after him!

  115. 115.

    geg6

    @David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch:

    That’s his GOTV guy. Holy shit. They barely have a GOTV outfit to begin with (because Trump is convinced that rallies are more effective), but now they have nothing. Seventeen days before Election Day and in the midst of early voting starting in the states that have it. Jesus. This could be a 1984 level drubbing.

  116. 116.

    JPL

    @efgoldman: The second hour, they highlighted the tension in the room, and the the negative reception Trump received. Norah O’Donnell stayed behind last night, and had a chance to chat with Hillary, but she wasn’t on the show this morning.

  117. 117.

    MattF

    @geg6: My guess is that Murphy had a ‘if you do that, I’ll quit’ moment. Not a good tactic for dealing with Trump.

  118. 118.

    Mike E

    @Baud: he’s a misogynistic prick, too, who targets Gogol’s and nmem (& others prolly) like a certain washed up pres candidate…;-)

  119. 119.

    Karen S.

    @Kay: Yeah, it’s strange how, on the Trump/GOP side, Bill Clinton looms so large. I know I shouldn’t do this, but I do read comments on Facebook when articles posted by NPR or the Washington Post or the New York Times show up in my feed. The articles may be just straight reporting on the HRC or Trump campaigns, never once mentioning Bill Clinton, but inevitably someone commenting will mention Bill’s philandering, the accusations of rape against him, etc. It just flabbergasts me each time. Bill Clinton isn’t running for anything, but they cannot or will not separate Hillary from him. I wonder if people like that can’t or won’t see themselves as individuals apart from their spouses and can’t imagine that anyone else can do that.

  122. 122.

    hovercraft

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    The shrill Mr Krugman disagrees with you.

    Hillary Clinton is a terrible candidate. Hey, that’s what pundits have been saying ever since this endless campaign began. You have to go back to Al Gore in 2000 to find a politician who faced as much jeering from the news media, over everything from claims of dishonesty (which usually turn out to be based on nothing) to matters of personal style.

    Strange to say, however, Mrs. Clinton won the Democratic nomination fairly easily, and now, having pummeled her opponent in three successive debates, is an overwhelming favorite to win in November, probably by a wide margin. How is that possible?

    The usual suspects are already coalescing around an answer — namely, that she just got lucky. If only the Republicans hadn’t nominated Donald Trump, the story goes, she’d be losing badly.

    But here’s a contrarian thought: Maybe Mrs. Clinton is winning because she possesses some fundamental political strengths — strengths that fall into many pundits’ blind spots…….

    First of all, who was this other, stronger candidate that the G.O.P. might have chosen? Remember, Mr. Trump won the nomination because he gave his party’s base what it wanted, channeling the racial antagonism that has been the driving force for Republican electoral success for decades. All he did was say out loud what his rivals were trying to convey with dog whistles, which explains why they were so ineffective in opposing him.

    And those establishment candidates were much more Trumpian than those fantasizing about a different history — say, one in which the G.O.P. nominated Marco Rubio — acknowledge. Many people remember Mr. Rubio’s brain glitch: the canned lines about “let’s dispel with this fiction” that he kept repeating in a disastrous debate performance. Fewer seem aware that those lines actually enunciated a crazy conspiracy theory, essentially accusing President Obama of deliberately weakening America. Is that really much better than the things Mr. Trump says? Only if you imagine that Mr. Rubio didn’t believe what he was saying — yet his insincerity, the obvious way he was trying to play a part, was surely part of his weakness.

    That is, in fact, a general problem for establishment Republicans. How many of them really believe that tax cuts have magical powers, that climate change is a giant hoax, that saying the words “Islamic terrorism” will somehow defeat ISIS? Yet pretending to believe these things is the price of admission to the club — and the falsity of that pretense shines through.

    And one more point about Mr. Rubio: why imagine that a man who collapsed in the face of childish needling from Mr. Trump would have triumphed over the woman who kept her cool during 11 hours of grilling over Benghazi, and made her interrogators look like fools? Which brings us to the question of Mrs. Clinton’s strengths.

    When political commentators praise political talent, what they seem to have in mind is the ability of a candidate to match one of a very limited set of archetypes: the heroic leader, the back-slapping regular guy you’d like to have a beer with, the soaring orator. Mrs. Clinton is none of these things: too wonky, not to mention too female, to be a regular guy, a fairly mediocre speechifier; her prepared zingers tend to fall flat.

    Yet the person tens of millions of viewers saw in this fall’s debates was hugely impressive all the same: self-possessed, almost preternaturally calm under pressure, deeply prepared, clearly in command of policy issues. And she was also working to a strategic plan: Each debate victory looked much bigger after a couple of days, once the implications had time to sink in, than it may have seemed on the night.

    Oh, and the strengths she showed in the debates are also strengths that would serve her well as president. Just thought I should mention that. And maybe ordinary citizens noticed the same thing; maybe obvious competence and poise in stressful situations can add up to a kind of star quality, even if it doesn’t fit conventional notions of charisma.

    Furthermore, there’s one thing Mrs. Clinton brought to this campaign that no establishment Republican could have matched: She truly cares about her signature issues, and believes in the solutions she’s pushing.

    I know, we’re supposed to see her as coldly ambitious and calculating, and on some issues — like macroeconomics — she does sound a bit bloodless, even when she clearly understands the subject and is talking good sense. But when she’s talking about women’s rights, or racial injustice, or support for families, her commitment, even passion, are obvious. She’s genuine, in a way nobody in the other party can be.

    So let’s dispel with this fiction that Hillary Clinton is only where she is through a random stroke of good luck. She’s a formidable figure, and has been all along.

  123. 123.

    MattF

    @Karen S.: I think the conservative view of Bill Clinton is the analog of how liberals see Richard Nixon. Nixon, after all, was the founder of the Southern Strategy which is, ultimately, the source of the Age of Trump. And Bill was the triangulator who remained popular and kept winning in spite of everything conservatives could pitch at him.

  129. 129.

    1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)

    @Mike E: I keep getting a PUA vibe there–maybe it’s all the negging, often used as a conversation-starter.

  130. 130.

    germy

    @hovercraft:

    Furthermore, there’s one thing Mrs. Clinton brought to this campaign that no establishment Republican could have matched: She truly cares about her signature issues, and believes in the solutions she’s pushing.

    That’s an excellent point, well stated.

    EDIT:

    But is “dispel with” going to become part of the lexicon for now and evermore? It started as a stupid remark from Marco, became parody… but now it’s spreading

  132. 132.

    germy

    @amk:

    she would have wiped the floor with any other kkklown of da deep bench, be it lil jeb, waterboy, crank kasich or texas crud.

    In a fair fight, I agree, she would have beaten them all. But would it have been a fair fight with our friends in the corporate media with their thumbs on the scales? They pushed down on her until it became obvious they couldn’t face each other or their own reflections making excuses for the republican nominee, but they still consider Paul Ryan a serious policymaker and the honorable Sen. McCain a calm thinker with valuable opinions to share.

  133. 133.

    Tokyokie

    @Kay: I’ve been predicting for several weeks that Deadbeat Donnie won’t live to see the end of 2017. He’s obese, he’s 70, he eats a crappy diet, he doesn’t exercise, and he’s internalizing a lot of stress in a really unhealthy way. In a few weeks, he’ll add the humiliation of a catastrophic electoral defeat to a woman and realize that he has completely devalued the family’s brand and that his net worth is considerably south of zero. He’ll neither be a winner nor rich, and with the utter destruction of his self-image, the stress will mount, and he’ll be unable to relieve in a healthy fashion. He’s a prime candidate for a major stroke or MI. And that’s assuming that one of Donnie’s Russian business partners doesn’t decide that he no longer has any chance of recouping his investment in Donnie and pays off one of Donnie’s merc bodyguards to bust a cap on his ass.

  134. 134.

    germy

    @Karen S.:

    I know I shouldn’t do this, but I do read comments on Facebook when articles posted by NPR or the Washington Post or the New York Times show up in my feed.

    I have a similar bad habit: I read the comments left on the online versions of my local newspapers and TV news. Horrifying, racist, ignorant stuff.

  135. 135.

    Chris

    @stibbert:

    At the Al Smith dinner in 1948, during the Berlin Airlft, Gen. Lucius Clay spoke in strong support of Pres. Truman’s foreign policy. Clay (US military governor of Germany) helped turn the election season around, embarrassing both Dewey’s scaredy-cat Republican withdrawal/appeasement & Wallace’s pro-Soviet 3rd-party campaigns. Having just returned from West Germany, his appearance at the Al Smith event was a watershed event in the presidential campaign that ended w/ Truman’s unexpected victory.

    There’s a lot about Hillary’s situation that reminds me of Truman’s. Stuck with a tough act to follow in the form of a popular, charismatic and transformational president; not nearly as much of a rock star. Painted as a party hack rather than a reformer by many in the left wing of her own party even though she’s solidly embraced pretty much all of her more-beloved predecessor’s work. “Everybody knows” that she’s unpopular and distrusted, so the powers-that-be never bother to interview her supporters – and they’re shocked by how many she actually has.

  137. 137.

    hovercraft

    @germy:

    But is “dispel with” going to become part of the lexicon for now and evermore? It started as a stupid remark from Marco, became parody… but now it’s spreading

    Dispel with, Bigly (yes I know it may be big league), Basket of deplorables, and a Taco truck on every corner will be with us long after the Donald is crying into his Taco bowl on inauguration day.
    Also too, SAD!

  139. 139.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @hovercraft:

    So let’s dispel with this fiction that Hillary Clinton is only where she is through a random stroke of good luck. She’s a formidable figure, and has been all along.

    I have never said otherwise. What I did say was,

    we all know she is not a natural politician. It’s work for her, hard work, and it comes off as fake to all too many.
    But she keeps working at it, and it is that which makes her success in this campaign all the sweeter.

    Do you, or Krugman, think that both statements can not be true?

    I also said,

    If Hillary was running against your run of the mill Republican politician things would be a lot closer, depending on who it was she might even be losing (one of the “natural rules” is after 2 terms, the presidency shifts to the other party).

    Does anyone actually disagree with that?

    I love Krugman but his field of expertise is economics, not politics. How he views politics is very similar to my own way, but I know that I am not in the majority. When he says,

    Yet the person tens of millions of viewers saw in this fall’s debates was hugely impressive all the same: self-possessed, almost preternaturally calm under pressure, deeply prepared, clearly in command of policy issues. And she was also working to a strategic plan: Each debate victory looked much bigger after a couple of days, once the implications had time to sink in, than it may have seemed on the night.

    he is singing my song. And he follows it up with

    And maybe ordinary citizens noticed the same thing; maybe obvious competence and poise in stressful situations can add up to a kind of star quality, even if it doesn’t fit conventional notions of charisma.

    But compared to what? In this election it’s Trump. Hillary and her campaign do not exist in a vacuum, and give her credit where credit is due, she and her team have made the most of it, but does anyone really think she would have double digit leads against say a Mitt Romney? Who Obama beat by 4 pts?

    Imagine for a second if she was running against a Ben Sasse. (who in this years GOP would never have gotten thru the primary) In 4 years it just might be him.

    Krugman is giving way too much credit to our avg citizen 45% of who reflexively vote GOP.

  142. 142.

    Gelfling 545

    @David ?▶️Bad Hombres▶️? Koch: A dear young relative of mine has suffered mightily from having this last name. She has suffered verbal abuse from people who should know better. When we traveled to France this past spring I taught her how to say “I am not related to that man.” in French. Her father remarried recently and her stepmother retained her own surname for many reasons, actually, but this was certainly a factor.

  144. 144.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @germy:

    She truly cares about her signature issues, and believes in the solutions she’s pushing.

    Yes she does, and it is to her credit that she has been largely fighting on behalf of those issues for decades.

  145. 145.

    Emma

    @Baud:

    I wonder what will happen to Trump’s celebrity and social status after this is all done. Does he go on Dancing with the Stars and all is forgiven?

    Two different things. His celebrity is something for the rubes to determine. His social status, never too high in New York circles to begin with, is shot to hell. A lot of New York money give meaning to their lives by donating biiiiiigggly to charities and art causes. He does neither. And after the dinner last night, well, he’s anathema. He was inappropriate and rude to a lady in a social setting.

    He’s charred toast unless he donates half his (real) fortune to the MET or the the soup kitchens.

  146. 146.

    rikyrah

    @Karen S.:

    I kicked myself for not understanding this sooner. It occurred to me that one of the reasons he keeps saying the election is rigged is because he’s losing “bigly” to HRC, a woman, a girl if you will, and the only way a woman can beat him, he believes, is if the whole thing is rigged, if there’s some sort of Affirmative Action going on.

    yep.

    that about sums it up.

    Not because grown up Tracy Flick is a superior candidate to him in every way…..

    nope..

    Because of some Affirmative Action.

  147. 147.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    She asked him about the reputation for racism he has now. He stares at her and doesn’t speak so she asks again. He spits out “I am the least racist person you will ever meet” and stalks off- he’s livid

    had to be a local reporter….tee hee hee…

  148. 148.

    1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)

    @Elizabelle:
    @germy: Yes, that clade of men who operate on the theory that
    1. All women can be had, if you’re just determined enough.
    2. Women exist to be had, and serve no other useful purpose.
    3. Women who do immediately put out on demand are evil and deserve all the insults that can he heaped upon them.
    4. Women who do put out, under any circumstances, for any man, are skanks and sluts and deserve all the insults that can be heaped upon them.
    5. Women who have put out for another man but will not put out for the PUA in question are evil, hateful skanks and sluts who deserve all the insults that can be heaped upon them.
    6. In general, the best way to get a woman’s attention and make sure she pays attention to you is to insult her in some way (AKA negging). This is perceived by the PUA clade as leveling the playing field, and the more desperately you admire the woman in question and want her to notice you the more vicious your negging should be.

    Our determinedly desperate visitor has been applying #6 on a regular basis here, if you think about it. I take it for a sign of inadequate socialization and a desperate desire to interact with people it sees as cool and interesting. The BJ tendency to lovingly fling abuse at each other at odd moments may confuse it somewhat as well, come to think of it; the local rules for that are pretty opaque to an outsider, especially if that outsider is unclear on a lot of the rules for human interaction among functional adults.

  149. 149.

    Gelfling 545

    @barns: I assume you mean something by this but it appears that you have been reading the alternate reality version of the blog. Presumably your comment would make sense there.

  150. 150.

    amk

    @germy: No one had the press giving a complete free ride and free advertisement more than the deadbeat dick and she still beat him even with her hands tied with benghazi!!! and emails!!! 24×7 bs in a loop. Yes, she would have wiped the floor with every other kkklown.

  151. 151.

    Robert Farmer

    @Baud: Nah. Only for white people is HRC under water.

    According to Gallup, (gallup.com/opinion/polling-matters/191918/race-gender-biggest-differentiators-views-clinton-trump.aspx) HRC is at or above 55% in all categories that do not include white males. But that doesn’t support the horse race narrative, so never gets reported.

  152. 152.

    Chris

    @liberal:

    “Not all Conservatives are stupid, but most stupid people are Conservatives.”

    I’ve always believed the opposite, actually – not all stupid people are conservative, but most conservatives are stupid people.

    You don’t need to be conservative to be stupid – plenty manage the latter without the former. The remarkable thing about movement conservatism today isn’t that it includes stupid people but the extent to which it consists of nothing but stupid people, and people who have to pretend to be stupid in order not to be run out of the party.

  153. 153.

    hovercraft

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    I don’t disagree with most of your points, but I still think you are more in line with the she is doing as well as she is because she is running against the orange shitgibbon crowd. Hillary ran against O,Malley and Bernie, Bernie was the Occupy part of our parties dream candidate, but O’Malley according to the beltway for the past several years war our next big thing, our Rubio or Sasse, if he was what our party wanted or as skilled as they said he was, he would have beaten Hillary. In 2008 Hillary had the entire party lined up and all the donors, but we chose Obama, and if we hadn’t wanted her this time the establishment would not have been able to force her on us. We chose her. She is not flashy, the media and many others hate her, but it seems that there are many more of us who admire and respect her, and even some who love her. Any democrat as you say who was running against any republican after a two term president would have had a hard time keeping the presidency. But as Krugman points out, the policy proposals would have been the same ones that RMoney and Ryan have been pushing, that lost four years ago, the populist angst out in the country would not have had an outlet on their side, they would have just been talking to that 45 %, which isn’t enough to win. With a more conventional opponent, the biggest difference would have been a press core more inclined to carry water for the GOP nominee, and stress the need for change. That would have been a huge factor, but where it would have still fallen short is with the mouth breathers who don’t normally vote who will come out for Trump, they would have stayed home.
    Hypotheticals are difficult because they assume all things being equal but they never are. Would it be closer? I agree it would be, but it would also mean running a more conventional traditional campaign which she knows how to do. The GOP did a terrible job of oppo research during the primaries, Clinton and Co. would not have fallen down on that.

  154. 154.

    Ivan X

    Juicers, I am feeling spontaneous, and am willing to fly for the weekend from NYC to anywhere 3 hours or less away to help go knock on doors and elect Hillary and Democrats.

    a) Where should I go?

    b) Who do I call to arrange, if anyone? Campaign office in said place?

    c) Or should I call Brooklyn Hillary campaign HQ and ask them?

    I reserve the right to repost this in a new open thread. I am feeling an impulse to save the Republic.

    Thank you for any insight/help.

  156. 156.

    Dmbeaster

    @amk: Re sea of red, both 538.com and Daily Kos have great graphics for the country sizing each state to its electoral vote total, while maintaining some resemblance to the overall shape. I think 538.com’s is the better one, and that sea of red vanishes.

  157. 157.

    Chris

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    we all know she is not a natural politician. It’s work for her, hard work, and it comes off as fake to all too many.

    Is it weird that that actually makes me more sympathetic to her? Plenty of introverts know what it’s like to sit through a job interview needing to fake what other people think “enthusiastic,” “pleasant,” and “sincere” is supposed to look like and never knowing if we’re laying it on too thick or if, per Groucho Marx, we can fake it and we’ve got it made.

  158. 158.

    liberal

    @Chris: I’m just paraphrasing Disraeli, I think.

    It’s pretty established, though, that people left of center have higher IQs than people to the right, on average. Of course, you can’t necessary draw any conclusions about who’s right from that.

  160. 160.

    liberal

    @Tokyokie:

    In a few weeks, he’ll add the humiliation of a catastrophic electoral defeat to a woman and realize that he has completely devalued the family’s brand and that his net worth is considerably south of zero.

    Yeah. Hopefully that racist, misogynistic scum will die a quick but painful death.

  162. 162.

    hovercraft

    @Ivan X:
    New Hampshire to beat the newest Amigo, Kelly Ayotte.
    Florida, Lil Marco
    Take the train to Philly, that way you can book it back home at anytime, you can knock on doors in the Philly burbs and get rid of Mr Club for Growth Toomey.
    If you can stomach it you could also go to Indiana and knock on doors for Bayh.
    My .02
    Good luck.

  163. 163.

    liberal

    @Chris: But that’s not the question.

    The question when we’re selecting people to represent the party isn’t whether we like them, it’s whether they can win.

    Sadly, that entails a whole slew of character strengths that I’m not necessarily so fond of myself.

    So if I say “she’s not a good retail politician”—and she’s not—that’s not a personal insult. I’m sure I’d be a fucking terrible retail politician. It means she has a deficit as a politician.

  166. 166.

    catclub

    @Chris:

    people who have to pretend to be stupid in order not to be run out of the party.

    I have gained a good deal of respect for Lindsey Graham in this category. He is the one who said they are no longer making enough angry white guys to keep the GOP in power – or words to that effect. Not to say that I like him or his policies, but he is no idiot.

  167. 167.

    germy

    People look at the Statute of Liberty and they see a proud symbol of our history of immigrants … Donald looks at the Statue of Liberty and sees a four, maybe a five if she loses the torch and tablet and changes her hair.

  169. 169.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @germy:

    But is “dispel with” going to become part of the lexicon for now and evermore? It started as a stupid remark from Marco, became parody… but now it’s spreading.

    Yes. Instead of “dispel” or “dispense with,” unfortunately. For precedent I offer normalcy, which was nowhere to be found in the English lexicon until then-Ohio Senator Warren Harding first spoke it (AFAICT) in a speech of May 14, 1920. The perfectly good word he was fumbling for was & is “normality”, but that didn’t stop Mike Pence 0.1 bka

    The only man, woman, or child who ever wrote a simple declarative sentence with seven grammatical errors [from an e.e. cummings pome]

    from mangling the langwedge with that howler for good & all :^(

  170. 170.

    OzarkHillbilly

    but I still think you are more in line with the she is doing as well as she is because she is running against the orange shitgibbon crowd.

    Well, that might be because that is exactly what I am saying and that is all I am saying. :-) It is impossible to argue hypotheticals (things are never equal) in any kind of seriousness and I am not. I’m just saying that Trump, being Trump, was inevitably going to melt down in just this way once it became obvious he was going to lose because in his world that.just,can.not.happen. but Hillary being Hillary it damn well was going to happen.

    It would not have happened with another more standard GOP politician. What would have happened I do not know, all I know is a double digit lead at this pt in the campaign would not have happened. (unless that standard GOP pol was caught with a dead girl or live boy in his bed)

  172. 172.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Chris: It makes me respect her more that she feels strongly enough about the things she cares about to do this thing which is not easy for her. As an introvert I long ago gave up on faking it.

  173. 173.

    Enhanced Voting Techinques

    @hovercraft: I put something else on to Krugman’s list; Hilary comes across as very natural and sincer.

    Didn’t they also claim Obama “got lucky”. Since luck as a big part of it because only one person gets to be president at a time, they sill need to right mix of talents to get there and be lucky.

  174. 174.

    Calouste

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    run of the mill Republican politician

    Ted Cruz came second in the primaries, Marco Rubio came third. Run of the mill Republicans, as far as they still exist, have no chance of winning the nomination.

  176. 176.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @hovercraft: Just FTR, not to dredge up old battles, but you are roughly 175 degrees wrong re O’Malley being the consensus “next big thing.” The vast majority of the Beltway punditocracy had nothing good to say about him from the gitgo; in fact they went out of their way to ridicule everything he did. Maybe disdain for a Kennedyesque “young punk in a hurry” & a semiconscious desire to take down a supposedly wizard campaigner. My personal guess is that either they or someone they knew (neighbors, social acquaintances) had gotten personally pissed off by something Martin did as MD Governor…& we all know that in politics, 1 awshit > 1000 attaboys.

    FTR at last report MOM has been in the Midwest campaigning hard for the entire Democratic ticket. (I’m on his e-mail list as a conttributor & friend of long standing.) He’s a much better politician & person than the (go)pound(sand)its will ever know.

    (NB Minor edits to fix typos & add a word or 2.)

  177. 177.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Enhanced Voting Techinques:

    Didn’t they also claim Obama “got lucky”.

    Isn’t that just a variant of the old racist trope about athletes? Larry Bird was successful because of hard work and determination, Magic Johnson was successful because he was naturally talented – that crap.

  178. 178.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Dmbeaster: So you’re saying it’s The Partying of the Red Sea?

    ::dux::

    (Charlton Heston spins in his grave, shotgun clenched in his cold dead claws…)

  179. 179.

    germy

    @Uncle Cosmo: I remember when the word “underwhelmed” was a joke word. “How was your meal?” “I was underwhelmed.” “Ha ha ha!”

    But now it’s a serious word.

  180. 180.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Calouste: I was not speaking of the nomination, I was speaking of the election. As for ‘run of the mill GOP politician’ Ted Cruz, the only people who loath Ted more than Dems is elected Repubs. As for Rubio… well, he tries to fake the ‘normal Republican’ gig but fails at it miserably. I was thinking more along the lines of Walker (who might have won the nomination in a more normal year) or Kasich (who I think might have been a challenge for Hillary but could never win the nom after expanding Medicaid thru the ACA)(KILL THE HERETIC!!!!) At the beginning I would have thrown Christie in there too but his weaknesses became all too obvious before long.

  181. 181.

    Ceci n'est pas mon nym

    @germy: I think if you use plain “whelmed” to describe the sweet spot between “under-” and “over-” it’s still a joke.

    For now.

  182. 182.

    dogwood

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    If Hillary, or Bernie for that matter, were running against some generic white-bread republican, this election would be very close. And I’m sure Hillary and her team would be the first to admit that.

  183. 183.

    hovercraft

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Got it.
    @Uncle Cosmo:
    Okay, I stand corrected, I just remember reading stories about the fresh young talent on the GOP side, and our running tired old Hillary instead of young talent like MOM. But I was with her from the get go so I never paid attention to his rep.

  187. 187.

    Mnemosyne

    @Jeffro:

    Good luck! My brother who lives in IL just had a similar repair done and it seems to have gone well.

    Funny story there: my CA brother and my mom are constantly bitching that the other one never tells them anything, and yet they BOTH forgot to tell me the date of the surgery. Family ….

  188. 188.

    nastybrutishntall

    @Chris: Yup. Been thinking the same. Or LBJ – she might enact a platform even more radical than her predecessor, despite her reputation for centrist cynicism.

  192. 192.

    JR in WV

    @hovercraft:

    This is a dead thread, which I’m just now catching up with after our power outage.

    But I’m with you and Professor NPL (Nobel Prize Laureate) Krugman, Hillary is just stone cold competent. Smart, thoughtful, knows how to prepare, taking good advice from sharp people she has surrounded herself with.

    We are so lucky~!!

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