Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

Our messy unity will be our strength.

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

All hail the time of the bunny!

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

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

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

So many bastards, so little time.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Open Thread: Elizabeth Warren Has A Plan for That!

Open Thread: Elizabeth Warren Has A Plan for That!

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Okay, it’s not “fair”, but yay for my favorite Senator:

… By the time Warren left the stage at the “She the People” forum, thousands of black women in the audience were on their feet roaring cheers and applauding. The reaction eclipsed the response earlier in the day to Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Cory Booker of New Jersey — the black candidates in the Democratic contest. It reflected the unlikely traction that Warren, a 69-year-old white woman who lives in tony Cambridge, Massachusetts, is gaining with black women who are debating whom to back in a historically diverse primary.

“To have an ally — she’s a woman, but she’s not a black woman — who can speak intelligently and has thought about people who don’t look like you, that resonates,” said Roxy D. Hall Williamson, a 49-year-old who was in the audience. “She stole the show to me.”…

Warren has stumbled on racial issues, most notably when she was derided as racially insensitive for using a DNA test to address her past claims to Native American heritage.

But she has sought to put issues of race and class at the center of her campaign. Before announcing her candidacy, she gave the commencement address at Morgan State University, a historically black college in Baltimore, focusing on economic disparities. On the campaign trail, she has already appeared at three HBCUs: at a town hall in March at Jackson State University in Mississippi; at Allen University in South Carolina to tout her plans around student debt and a $50 billion investment in black colleges; and at Texas Southern University for “She the People.”…

Reader Interactions

123Comments

  1. 1.

    Miss Bianca

    You know, I think Kamala Harris is on beyond awesome, but Warren has had my heart and would be my primary choice. So the news that she is catching fire with black women voters warms the cockles of my crusty old heart. Warren/Harris 2020 is my dream ticket.

  3. 3.

    West of the Rockies

    Warren or Harris… I will be happy. Either way, we retain a great senator. (I don’t think they’ll align as Pres/VP.

  5. 5.

    patrick II

    Senator warren did not come up with all of these plans overnight. All of that time she was “undecided” about running, she was in her secret lair writing plans.

  6. 6.

    West of the Rockies

    @rikyrah:

    McConnell is an old and ugly 77. Kinda optimistic of him to think too far into the future. Cross your fingers; maybe he’ll die.

    I would shed zero tears.

  10. 10.

    Zzyzx

    @rikyrah: yeah that’s obvious. For all of Warren’s plans, I want to hear the one for what happens when she can’t get anyone confirmed and can’t get any legislation through.

    The Senate is broken until at least 2022 and more likely 2028.

  12. 12.

    Baud

    Today I’m out with a story on @SenWarren catching fire with black women voters. Read it 

    Good for Warren, but it’s weird to read a story about this that doesn’t cite any poll to support this conclusion.

  14. 14.

    patrick II

    @West of the Rockies:
    So, now you have me wondering what an Elizabeth Warren secret underground lair would look like – besides pictures of FDR and John Maynard Keynes on the wall.

  15. 15.

    Sab

    @lamh36: I would be so jealous but you have certainly earned this trip. We want details when you get back.Was your seating back better than going?

  16. 16.

    eclare

    @rikyrah: This is why some of these vanity candidates need to run for Senate, not pres. Hickenlooper, take on Gardner. And I so wish Stacey would jump in. WTF is Schumer doing, surely he realizes nothing gets done if Cocaine Mitch is in charge?

  18. 18.

    dm

    The PodSaveBros did a live podcast last week. When they were talking about the candidates, they mentioned Warren’s name and the audience erupted in a roar of applause that must have made the building shake. It sounded like the PodSaveBros were surprised at the strength of the reaction.

    I guess it was New York City.

  22. 22.

    Kirk Spencer

    @Baud: Anecdotal, but here in Texas I’m hearing questions about whether Biden now would treat Anita Hill any differently. I think he’s going to have to confront that issue at some point, and the answer will have a major impact on his run.

  24. 24.

    Baud

    @Kirk Spencer:

    Sure. There’s still a long way to go, and I for one still prefer a lot of people to Biden. I was just wondering what the basis for this story was other than the fact that Warren did really well at SheThePeople.

  25. 25.

    eclare

    @Baud: Just seems like he isn’t being very effective in recruiting people to run, unlike the Democrats for the House in 2018. Senator is much more prestigious and powerful than Rep, and he can’t convince anyone to run? Instead Bullock thinks he can be pres?

  28. 28.

    FlyingToaster

    @NotMax:

    Big Dig II.

    What, they’re going to dig up Cambridge, too? Wasn’t 1984 (the Red line extension from Harvard to Alewife) enough?

    If there were to be another excavation a la the Big Dig, I wish they’d dig up the old Green Line “A” route through Allston-Brighton to Watertown, put the trolleys underground, and shitcan the 57 bus. And if I had 15 Billion dollars, I’d do it myself.

  29. 29.

    O. Felix Culpa

    I am loving SPW more and more. Kamala is a close second. Not an original observation, but I like that both seem to be happy warriors.

  30. 30.

    Baud

    @eclare:

    I don’t know if anyone else could do a better job, especially when people are choosing to run for president. It would be a different thing if people simply were choosing not to run for anything rather than run for Senate.

  31. 31.

    Baud

    @gwangung:

    I figured. I don’t happen to hate this particular narrative, but I hate the idea of being fed narratives by the media.

  32. 32.

    cckids

    @West of the Rockies:

    Warren or Harris… I will be happy. Either way, we retain a great senator. (I don’t think they’ll align as Pres/VP.

    Yeah, I’d really rather whichever of them doesn’t win stays in the damn Senate. Lots of people can be VP, and it isn’t the route to the Presidency any more (if it ever truly was).

  34. 34.

    Gelfling 545

    @West of the Rockies: I just this afternoon saw a picture of him on Twitter and thought of all the good, useful people who have passed on while he still takes up space we could use for other purposes.

  35. 35.

    Fair Economist

    @Baud:

    Good for Warren, but it’s weird to read a story about this that doesn’t cite any poll to support this conclusion.

    Since when is a media story without facts weird? The only thing odd about it is being favorable to a more leftish candidate.

  36. 36.

    SFAW

    @FlyingToaster:

    And if I had 15 Billion dollars, I’d do it myself.

    Start out with about 1.5B, then file change orders if/when Blechtell Parsnips Dinklehoff fucks up the design

  37. 37.

    trollhattan

    @NotMax:
    And pizza, gotta have pizza.

    Sincerely hoping Bidenmentum is close to the apogee and we can get back to our serious candidates getting serious traction. Based on what I hear from our baker’s two dozen we’d be well advised to make sure the nominee is either Warren or Harris. The others are doing nothing for me so far, and a few are truly irksome.

  38. 38.

    Sab

    @Baud: My Congresscritter doesn’t have the nerve to run for Senator or Governor in his own state, but he threw his hat into the ring for president.

    Tim Ryan.

    Emilia please run against him.

  39. 39.

    NotMax

    Enough to make one puke and then demand, unconditionally, a thorough housecleaning.

    U.S. Border Patrol Agent Matthew Bowen called immigrants “disgusting subhuman shit unworthy of being kindling for a fire” days before he allegedly almost ran one down with his car.
    [snip]
    Bowen’s lawyer’s response to these disturbing messages? That his sentiments are “commonplace throughout the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector” and “part of the agency’s culture,” per his attorney, Sean Chapman. Source

  40. 40.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    I’ll take “roaring cheers and applauding” over some poll with trickily worded questions any day.

    @rikyrah:

    We now have our marching orders.

  41. 41.

    SFAW

    @trollhattan:

    a few are truly irksome

    On the plus side: were I to throw my hat into the ring, I bet I could REALLY piss you off. Along with most of America

  42. 42.

    trollhattan

    Meanwhile in Austria.

    All ministers from Austria’s far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) have resigned, throwing the government into chaos.

    The Freedom Party’s leader Heinz-Christian Strache, who was also vice-chancellor, was forced to resign at the weekend after a video sting. Mr Strache was filmed proposing to offer government contracts to a supposed Russian oligarch’s niece.

    The FPÖ threatened a mass resignation earlier on Monday if Interior Minister Herbert Kickl was also forced out.

    Chancellor Sebastian Kurz had called over the weekend for Mr Kickl to be sacked, saying that as general secretary of the party he should take responsibility for the scandal. The scandal broke on Friday when footage from 2017 was published in German media, showing Mr Strache and another FPÖ official proposing to offer government contracts to a supposed Russian oligarch’s niece.

    Mr Strache resigned the next day and Mr Kurz – the head of the centre-right People’s Party (ÖVP) – said new elections would have to be held. The resigned FPÖ ministers include the foreign minister and ministers for defence, transport, and social affairs. The FPÖ made up half of the country’s cabinet.

    A brace of thoughts:
    Wouldn’t it be nice if we could sack all of our Republicans following a single scandal involving Russians?

    What the hell are Austrians thinking, flirting with neonazis to the point of electing a bunch? Do you not remember what happened last time?

  47. 47.

    SFAW

    @gwangung:

    That would put you square in the middle of my candidates list.

    Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but that says your feelings toward various candidates run from enthusiasm to white-hot rage?

  48. 48.

    Dan B

    @rikyrah: I liked Pete’s phrase to the effect that women know where to drae the line about their bodies and their lives (paraphrasing). Do you want the government interfering?

    I’d love to hear the other Dem’s copy this frame. It fits a bigger narrative about government. Do you want it getting in the way of how you live your values or being left alone? What is government’s role in our daily lives, our families, and friends?

  51. 51.

    lgerard

    Dr. Keith Ablow, the wingnut psychiatrist who made many appearances on Fox criticizing Obama and the gays, and who famously declared that being married 3 times made Newt Gingrich “more qualified” to be president, has lost his medical license

    “The Board alleges that Dr. Ablow engaged in sexual activity and boundary violations with multiple patients, diverted controlled substances from patients, engaged in disruptive behavior, including displaying and pointing a firearm on multiple occasions in a manner that scared an employee, and procured his license renewal fraudulently,”.

    I’m sure his existence has already gone down the memory at Fox.

  52. 52.

    SFAW

    @gwangung:

    Unlike 90% of the populace, you are quite competent at reading comprehension.

    Whu-u-u-ut? Could you type that again, only slower?

  53. 53.

    jk

    Elizabeth Warren is outstanding and has my vote. I love the fact that she’s rolling out all these detailed plans. I just hope she’s got the plan to beat Joe Biden.

    Warren has more gravitas than Biden and is much a better public speaker. For that matter, Harris, Klobuchar, and Gillibrand all have more gravitas than Biden and are better public speakers than him.

  54. 54.

    NotMax

    As it’s Open Thread –

    Thought it was a mite on the sultry side Sunday. Record breaking (for the date) 92 degrees, surpassing the unseasonably high temp of 90 recorded all the back in 1951. While one day does not a trend make, expecting a roasting this summer. Anything 90 or above used to be considered rare and anomalous.

  55. 55.

    mrmoshpotato

    @NotMax: Elizabeth Warren’s Awesome Subterranean Underground Liar For Awesome, Competent Policy Writing
    or
    EWASULFACPW

  58. 58.

    trollhattan

    @jk:
    Just wonder if I could tolerate half a year of web images of Trump fans in their “Fuck your feelings” t-shirts wearing full feather headdresses and doing the tomahawk chop.

  59. 59.

    Brachiator

    Warren has stumbled on racial issues, most notably when she was derided as racially insensitive for using a DNA test to address her past claims to Native American heritage.

    Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit.

    And Warren isn’t even my preferred candidate. Not yet.

  60. 60.

    jk

    @Kirk Spencer:

    Biden now would treat Anita Hill any differently.

    Biden’s treatment of Anita Hill should disqualify him from consideration for the presidency. His recent comments about how he wishes could have done more for her are pure, unadulterated bullshit and it took him decades to personally apologize to her.
    Uncle Joe’s handling of Clarence Thomas’ confirmation hearings revealed him to be a clueless, out of touch horse’s ass.
    # Biden sucks

  61. 61.

    Millard Filmore

    @Zzyzx:

    For all of Warren’s plans, I want to hear the one for what happens when she can’t get anyone confirmed and can’t get any legislation through.

    The Senate is broken until at least 2022 and more likely 2028.

    That assumes McConnell survives the investigations that branch out from the Trump disaster. Maybe the Republicans will let him lead the Senate from prison.

  62. 62.

    Brachiator

    What’s interesting about Warren’s rise among black women is that it is her being a white woman that allows her to discuss issues of race in a way that comes across as refreshing. Black candidates discussing similar issues can be seen as pandering or locked into identity politics.

    This makes no sense. And identity politics is bullshit made up largely by stupid pundits and lazy, racist white people.

  64. 64.

    eclare

    @jk: I didn’t think he had personally apologized, just that BS “wish I could have done more”. Gee, I didn’t realize that being fucking chair of the Judiciary committee meant that your hands were tied.

  65. 65.

    Cacti

    @Brachiator:

    It’s based on the inherently racist presumption that when a white politician speaks to racial issues, they speak from a neutral, universal perspective, rather than a white racial perspective.

  66. 66.

    Brachiator

    @Kirk Spencer:

    Anecdotal, but here in Texas I’m hearing questions about whether Biden now would treat Anita Hill any differently. I think he’s going to have to confront that issue at some point, and the answer will have a major impact on his run.

    There’s nothing that he could say or do to appease those who impose the mighty filter of hindsight to condemn him for capitulating to the Republicans and failing Anita Hill.

    A front pager posted part of an analysis by two journalists who wrote a good book about the hearings who concluded that Biden had tried to be fair. But apparently he should have known that the Republicans were devils and thoroughly rejected any attempt to be anything less than a vigorous opponent of Thomas’s nomination.

  68. 68.

    debbie

    @eclare:

    His statement to the effect that he was sorry if she didn’t feel she was supported (or something similar) was a classic Republican non-apology apology. If he can’t own up to providing a direct and sincere apology, then he’s no better than any GOPer.

  69. 69.

    jk

    @eclare:

    According to the New York Times, earlier this month, Biden called Hill to, as the Times put it, “express his regret” for what she went through in 1992, when she testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee (which Biden chaired at the time) about Clarence Thomas’s history of sexual harassment.

    Hill told the Times that she left the conversation “feeling deeply unsatisfied.” The paper notes that she “declined to characterize his words to her as an apology,” and also said that she could not support Biden’s presidential run.

    https://www.thecut.com/2019/04/joe-biden-non-apology-anita-hill-2020.html

    I can’t wait until the actual voting starts.because I’m sick to death of all these assholes on cable and in the blogosphere trying to anoint Joe “shit for brains” Biden as the fucking nominee.

  72. 72.

    Eolirin

    @Cacti: He wasn’t running for president, and we weren’t voting for him.

    He’s failed very badly both of the previous times he’s run for the nomination. It’s only the coattails from being Obama’s VP that are making this run possible.

  75. 75.

    Cacti

    @Eolirin:

    Laughably false. If you voted for the D ticket, you voted for Biden to be the constitutional successor to Obama, in the event that the worst happened.

  77. 77.

    trollhattan

    Oh goody.

    Scientists believe that global sea levels could rise far more than predicted, due to accelerating melting in Greenland and Antarctica,

    The long-held view has been that the world’s seas would rise by a maximum of just under a metre by 2100. This new study, based on expert opinions, projects that the real level may be around double that figure. This could lead to the displacement of hundreds of millions of people, the authors say.

    The question of sea-level rise was one of the most controversial issues raised by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), when it published its fifth assessment report in 2013. It said the continued warming of the planet, without major reductions in emissions, would see global waters rising by between 52cm and 98cm by 2100.

    Many experts believe this was a very conservative estimate.

    Ice scientists are also concerned that the models currently used to predict the influence of huge ice sheets on sea levels don’t capture all of the uncertainties about how these are now melting.

  78. 78.

    Dan B

    @NotMax: Sorry about the heat. The hottest temperature recorded in Seattle was 96 degrees until sometime like 2007. We moved in August 2009 and it had topped 102 early that week. It’s been high 90’s or 100 every year since. The gas furnace was failing so we installed ductless heat pumps and laughed we would use the AC one day a year. We’ve used it for 20 to 30 days a year since. A couple years were for heat and dangerous forest fire smoke.

    The jet stream has been especially crazy warped this year, a prediction of the climate heating crisis as arctic regions heat rapidly. It’s the reason SoCal is cold and rainy and the SE is flooding.

    For Hawaii the equatorial region is expanding. Hawaii is at the edge of the tropics so that might explain the increased heat. There’s a mild El Nino but I don’t know how that effects the mid Pacific.

  80. 80.

    Cacti

    @Major Major Major Major:

    “I like someone else better” is a perfectly valid reason for anyone not supporting him in 2020.

    But the Anita Hill mental gymnastics routine is worthy of an eye roll.

  81. 81.

    Mike J

    @FlyingToaster:

    Not a lot of “Underground” in Cambridge except for the Red Line….

    I’ve played the Infocom game, “The Lurking Horror”. I know all about the steam tunnels under the Miskatonic Institute of Technology.

  82. 82.

    jl

    ” Black candidates discussing similar issues can be seen as pandering or locked into identity politics. ”

    OTOH, a bunch of rich white pundits were running around saying Harris wasn’t ‘authentically’ ‘black’.

    I’m just glad that the Democratic primary field is so good, that there are a several people who can arouse enthusiasm from diverse communities for good and solid reasons.

  83. 83.

    germy

    ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) – Ed Cox, the longtime chairman of the New York state Republican Party, will step down to raise money for President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign.

    Trump’s campaign announced the move Monday. Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale called Cox a “fantastic” state chairman who will help ensure the Republican president has the financial resources necessary to compete in 2020.

    Erie County Republican Chairman Nick Langworthy is now poised to take over as New York GOP chairman when Cox steps down in July.

    Langworthy had launched a bid to replace Cox, who some Republicans blamed for the party’s recent election losses.

    Monday’s announcement came after several local party chairmen announced their support for Langworthy’s challenge.

    Cox, an attorney, has led the state GOP since 2009. He is the son-in-law of former President Richard Nixon.

  85. 85.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    South Carolina Poll — Columbia S.C. newspaper: The State — May 16 (link)

    Uncle Joe……..42%
    Kamala………..10%
    Pete……………….8%
    Warren………….8%
    Wilmer…………..7%
    Booker…………..4%

    Hhahahahhahahahh .. I just get a kick out of seeing Wilmer’s collapse in the polls.

  86. 86.

    Dan B

    @trollhattan: The reports from Antartica this year are disturbing, from research in the Austral summer. The same may be true about Greenland this winter when the summer research starts coming in.
    The West Antarctic ice sheet is thinning at a rapid rate from both warm ocean currents and from surface melting. If they collapse we’d see an amount of ice melt from the glaciers behind the ice shelves equivalent to Greenland. 20 feet of sea level rise if it all melted. It was believed it would take 200 years for it all to melt so Don’t Panic!!! or something.

    I still believe that an agricultural catastrophe will be first. Floods and droughts happen fast compared to ice melt. Of course they aren’t as riveting narratives as collapsing glaciers and flooding coastal metropolises. Collapsing towers in Shangai, New York, and Mumbai are more dramatic than low population farmsteads.

  87. 87.

    Immanentize

    @Eolirin:

    No one cares who the VP is.

    Dick Cheney on the white courtesy phone. Memories are short these days.

  88. 88.

    jk

    @Cacti:

    I liked Obama but I believe one of his biggest mistakes was selecting Biden as his running mate. Biden was wrong on the Iraq war, wrong on the crime bill, and, contrary to his bullshit stump speeches, has always favored banks and credit card companies over consumers.

    Biden has also said some incredibly stupid shit about Republicans and I hope someone in the debates will try to hold him accountable for this nonsense.

    Former Vice President Joe Biden predicted Tuesday that Republicans will have an “epiphany” and start working with Democrats once President Donald Trump is out of office.

    h/t https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/14/politics/joe-biden-republicans-trump-epiphany/index.html

    And then there’s this gem from 2015:

    During an event at George Washington University in October 2015, Biden said he thought former Vice President Dick Cheney is a “decent man.” “I actually like Dick Cheney, for real,” Biden said at the time. “I get on with him. I think he’s a decent man.” The former vice president also said Cheney was “extremely helpful” in teaching him about the requirements of the office after the 2008 election as he transitioned into the role. “He was extremely helpful and gracious about the office, and the legal parameters of the office,” Biden said of Cheney.

    h/t https://www.businessinsider.com/joe-biden-dick-cheney-comments-resurface-amid-2020-campaign-2019-5

    Bottom line for me, Joe Biden is a tone deaf, out of touch buffoon with no fucking clue. He does not deserve to be the Democratic nominee. I’d take Warren, Inslee, Harris, Booker, Klobuchar, Gillibrand, Buttigieg, O’Rourke, Bennet or several others in a heartbeat over a dope like Biden.

  90. 90.

    Mike in DC

    @Eolirin: This is sarcasm, right? 3 deaths in office in the last century alone. That’s about once every 4 or 5 presidents.

  92. 92.

    Dan B

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Go Kamala! Slow and steady wins. She never looks like she breaks a sweat. Wilmer so often comes across like you would need goggles and a towel if you were in the front row. Whoever does his Facebook feed is great – good stories but they rely too much on the ‘We are being abused.’ storyline.

  93. 93.

    Eolirin

    @Mike in DC: Note that you’re you’re having to use a hundred years as your time frame, when life expectancy is below 80. A once or twice in a lifetime event is very rare. Having fewer deaths and more relections because of fewer deaths lowers the total number of presidents. It almost never happens.

  94. 94.

    NotMax

    @mrmoshpotato

    From a spoof ad during the swingin’ sixties:

    “Flexopneumohydroservosystematization & Control, better known by its acronym, Flexopneumohydroservosystematization & C.”

    ;)

  95. 95.

    Brachiator

    @jk:

    I liked Obama but I believe one of his biggest mistakes was selecting Biden as his running mate.

    I know. It cost him the election. He should be impeached, retroactively.

  96. 96.

    Gvg

    @Brachiator: no actually it does make sense in the context that Racism Makes sense. I noticed it especially when Obama was running and President. He was not allowed to be an enthusiastic champion of black Americans. He had to be so so super neutral and not say the really obvious stuff that might hurt the emo white majority. I have seen it before with other leaders too. Until rights are fully accepted, a lot of the tough stuff said to white blind people, works best coming from a white person. The backlash tuneout la la la I can’t hear you is less. Various minorities sometimes say and get listened to, when they are in a position of authority, such as elected to high office.
    It’s not right, but I have seen it too often. We aren’t typical here.

  99. 99.

    Dan B

    @jk: Inslee is my governor. He’s been very good and people on his staff stay for years, decades even. It speaks to his character. And Climate is my top priority. Civilization won’t survive on our current track.

    He gave a $8 billion+ tax break to Boeing with no requirement to keep, or add, jobs in WA. It’s an achilles heel, one of the dumbest political errors ever. Boeing and the unions would have tried to crush him but why couldn’t it be a few billion with a jobs promise? Now we are seeing the deadly impact of shareholder and executive greed and they aren’t even headquartered in Seattle anymore.

  100. 100.

    Mike in DC

    @Eolirin: Also, Nixon resigned, making it 4 VP successions in the past 100 years. Plus at least 2 close calls–Ford and Reagan survived assassination attempts, and Reagan was senile in his second term.
    Seems kinda relevant to me.

  101. 101.

    Eolirin

    @eclare: Okay, that’s fair. Palin probably did make more of difference to the ticket in both directions. But I’d argue that that was a special case, given how horrible of a candidate McCain was. Palin was effectively the top of the ticket in that race.

  102. 102.

    jk

    @Brachiator:

    Thanks for your snark, I appreciate it.

    My larger point is that when you place Biden’s Senate record beside that of Warren and the other candidates it’s a very shitty record.

    Are you comfortable with someone so fucking dumb with respect to his views of the Republicans? Seriously, the Republicans will have an epiphany after Trump leaves office? Biden needs to pull his head out of his ass and wake the fuck up. And in what motherfucking universe could Dick Cheney be regarded as a decent guy?

    We have many candidates who are smarter and have better judgment than Biden.

  103. 103.

    Gvg

    @Mike in DC: the differences in the Presidential candidates has usually been so stark that there is way I have felt I could weigh the choice of Vice President as changing anything. All I could do is complain if I didn’t like it. You could have voted for McCain or Romney instead of Obama. Would that have been better? Their VP choices were in my opinion, worse than themselves. The Presidential candidate is definitely going to be President at least for awhile. The VP might be, but usually isn’t.

  104. 104.

    NotMax

    @Mike in DC

    It’s not like a light switch where all of a sudden it is turned on. Reagan wasn’t firing on all cylinders during his first term either. Painfully clear sustained decline to those who were paying attention at the time.

  105. 105.

    Kirk Spencer

    @Cacti: Sorry I’m late to this. Allow me to rephrase an earlier statement as I think it may clarify.

    There are candidates I will not vote for, and even vote against, during the primaries. Should they win or have won the democratic primary, however, they would have received my vote in the general election.

    Joe Biden falls into that category, both during the primaries in which he as run and as the potential president aka vice presidential candidate during the general.

  107. 107.

    jk

    @Dan B:

    That’s very disappointing information to hear because I’ve been impressed by Inslee. If it ever came down to a choice between Insee or Biden, I’d go with Inslee.

  109. 109.

    jk

    @Cacti:

    Of course I voted for Obama twice, but I hoped like Hell that nothing would happen to him that would cause Biden to be elevated to the presidency.

    2020 is a different fucking story. Biden’s Senate record sucks, he’s too damn old, and he’s out of touch with respect to his views of the Republican party.

  110. 110.

    Dan B

    @Kent: You are probably right since they all seem to be in trouble already. Miami and Tidelands especially but Miami has the towers that would be high drama. Shanghai may be a sleeper because the ground is subsiding from the weight of the skyscrapers. Just the weight!

    It’s also my opinion that we can’t have good physics understanding in the general public when there are CGI images of skyscrapers in 60 or 200 feet of sea level rise. They are always standing intact!*#@!! Are these seaworthy structures? What do waves do to the bottom five floors of a 100 story tower? Maybe some central cores would remain but not all. And what about a decade of storms as the water goes from 1 foot to 6 feet?

    Also, lets add airports. San Francisco, Oakland, La Guardia (never been there), Narita, etc.

  111. 111.

    Dan B

    @jk: Me three! Inslee is not perfect but it seems like the huge payoff and the indelible taint of the Max will be a tough one.

  113. 113.

    Immanentize

    @jk: Which is why, I am certain, you will not vote for Biden in the primary! Neither will I.
    But I find you to be particularly unpersuasive if I was inclined to.

    It’s almost like you are channelling Trump’s “1% trash heap” slag more than anything else

  114. 114.

    Immanentize

    @Dan B:
    Houston will be a big test site. At water level. Designed to create wind vortexes that keep water drenching systems hanging over head. Plus questionable build quality and site choices.

  115. 115.

    jk

    @Immanentize:

    I’m opposed to Biden getting a free ride for his past actions and statements. Serving for 8 years as Obama’s vice president should not give him a pass from scrutiny of his long Senate record.

    Go visit Elizabeth Warren’s website and it should quickly become clear that she has better policy proposals than Joe Biden.

  116. 116.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Dan B: Inslee is not going to be president and that fact has -zero- to do with a tax giveaway to Boeing.

  117. 117.

    Brachiator

    @Gvg:

    no actually it does make sense in the context that Racism Makes sense. I noticed it especially when Obama was running and President. He was not allowed to be an enthusiastic champion of black Americans. He had to be so so super neutral and not say the really obvious stuff that might hurt the emo white majority.

    Again, no. The idea that Warren is some kind of blessed Race Whisperer, while Harris is possibly pandering is bullshit.

    And this is irrelevant to the notion that Obama may have pulled his punches when discussing race. Obama was sensitive and eloquent, but white racists feared and misread him anyway.

  119. 119.

    geg6

    @jk:

    So you’re going to sit it out if he’s the nominee? If so you can’t be taken seriously. If you plan to vote Dem for president, you will have no choice but to vote for him if he wins. So which is it?

  120. 120.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Dan B:

    La Guardia

    If I remember from a few years ago, at least coming from Chicago, flights go over water on landing. Could be an issue.

  121. 121.

    Brachiator

    @jk:

    Thanks for your snark, I appreciate it.

    You’re welcome.

    As another poster noted, your argument against Biden is weak. And you claimed that Obama’s choice of Biden was a mistake. This really means that you just didn’t like it.

    I also went back and saw that news stories generally agree that Biden kicked ass in the VP debate. I can’t find anything to corroborate your opinion.

    Biden is not my guy, but if primary voters like him, you are going to be in quite a spot.

  122. 122.

    Ramalama

    @trollhattan: When running against senator centerfold Scott brown, she gained momentum when some of brown’s supporters made native American war cries outside the state house in Boston. You know, to mock Warren. I seem to recall this turning the race in her direction. Remember: she ran and won against an incumbent in a state that had never elected a woman for the senate. Might also work with racist arseholes nation wide?

  123. 123.

    tam1MI

    @jk: On the “up” side, Biden’s candidacy has caused Wilmer’s to implode. I will forever be grateful to him for that, at least.

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