Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

This blog will pay for itself.

America is going up in flames. The NYTimes fawns over MAGA celebrities. No longer a real newspaper.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” was supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

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

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

In after Baud. Damn.

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

Giving up is unforgivable.

Fight them, without becoming them!

They want us to be overwhelmed and exhausted. Focus. Resist. Oppose.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Innocent people do not delay justice.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

When we show up, we win.

You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2020 / Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Partisanship

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Partisanship

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Elsewhere…

GALIVANTS FERRY, S.C. (AP) — Four Democratic presidential candidates descended on South Carolina on Monday for what organizers call the oldest traditional campaign speech event in the country, taking an opportunity to continue to make their cases ahead of the first Southern vote of 2020.

On Monday, Joe Biden, Bill de Blasio, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar spoke at the Galivants Ferry Stump, a biennial Democratic event that takes place in a rural portion of northeastern South Carolina. One by one, they addressed a crowd of about 2,500 gathered in the unincorporated community of Galivants Ferry along the banks of the Little Pee Dee River…

A common stop for South Carolina’s Democrats, this year’s event is the first organized specifically for presidential hopefuls. One of them, Biden, has been here before, introduced to speak at the 2006 event by longtime friend and Senate colleague Fritz Hollings as Biden considered a 2008 presidential bid. This year, Biden was the first confirmed attendee.

Republicans are always invited to attend the stump but aren’t allowed to speak. One of them, former South Carolina governor and congressman Mark Sanford, worked the crowd as he mounts his longshot bid to challenge President Donald Trump for the GOP presidential nomination…

Democratic White House hopefuls have been flooding South Carolina for nearly a year, taking opportunities to get to know and campaign to the state’s heavily African American electorate, which plays a key role in its first-in-the-South primary and reflects those in other Southern states that follow quickly on the nominating calendar, offering candidates a proving ground to test their message. The stump meeting draws thousands of attendees from across the state, but Horry County, in which Galivants Ferry sits, is more than 80% white…

Former Romney political strategist:

Reader Interactions

106Comments

  1. 1.

    Rusty

    I am guessing that Sanders shake up of his campaign staff was a result of knowing that the Working Families endorsement of Warren was coming. Reading their statement, they think she is running a better campaign. Words are ok, being able to accomplish what you say is vastly more important.

  3. 3.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Working Families Party Endorses Elizabeth Warren. The progressive group, whose electoral influence has grown since it backed Bernie Sanders in 2016, is now supporting Ms. Warren for the Democratic presidential nomination

    Working Families Party received 1.9% of the vote in the 2018 governor’s race. It’s actually down from 2010, when they received 3.4% of the vote.

    In a close elections, ever vote counts, but let’s not turn them into something they’re not.

  4. 4.

    Baud

    On Monday, Joe Biden, Bill de Blasio, Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar spoke at the Galivants Ferry Stump, a biennial Democratic event

    Really? He’s still actually trying. He’s polling worse than Williamson.

  7. 7.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    Meanwhile, Wilmer just fired his campaign manager in New Hampshire. Which means Rose Titanic will have a new captain rearranging the deck chairs for the last four months.

    Blup. Blup. Blup.

  11. 11.

    NotMax

    All this foofaraw for a state in which the Dems have zero chance of prevailing in the general election…

  15. 15.

    JPL

    @rikyrah: Why? I would think that the larger states played an important role. South Carolina is important because they vote early and a win adds to the momentum.
    btw good morning

  17. 17.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    It should also be noted New York has a closed primary, meaning only card carrying Democrats can vote in the Democratic primary (ie no other parties are allowed to participate). And if you want to switch parties so you can vote in the 2020 NY Primary, you have to do so by October 11th, 2019 ( 25 days left).

  19. 19.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    @Baud:forget the convention, he’s taking it all the way to the Electoral College and have a “floor fight” there on December 14.

  22. 22.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Beetlejuice is continuing to try to wriggle his way out of a defamation lawsuit, claiming in a court filing on Monday that a tweet labeling a British diver “pedo guy” was not meant to actually accuse him of pedophilia.
    ……………………
    At the time Unsworth had criticized Beetlejuice’s plans to rescue the soccer players using a mini submarine, calling it a “stunt” and telling him to “stick his submarine where it hurts”. Beetlejuice responded with a series of erratic tweets calling Unsworth a “pedo guy”. He later called him a “child rapist” in emails to a BuzzFeed reporter.

    Beetlejuice’s lawyers have argued these statements were simply insults, not accusations. They reiterated that on Monday, saying “pedo guy” was a common insult used when Beetlejuice was a child in South Africa and is not meant to “accuse a person of acts of pedophilia”.

    “There is no evidence that Beetlejuice intended or believed that his July 15 tweets, that Mr Unsworth was ‘sus’ or ‘pedo guy’, would be interpreted as fact,” the filing said. “To the contrary, the evidence is that Mr Beetlejuice believed and intended his statements to be read as what they were: bare insults.”

    Well, it’s an argument, not sure how convincing it is but when you’re a lawyer with a lemon for a client I guess one makes lemonade.

    This defense comes despite follow-up tweets from Musk, which said “bet you a signed dollar it’s true”, implying he indeed believed Unsworth was a pedophile. Lawyers for Musk said said in Monday’s court filing that while his initial tweets were intended as a joke, he continued to call Unsworth a “pedo guy” in subsequent tweets because of “disturbing information” allegedly uncovered in a private investigation funded by Musk himself.

    “The investigator reported that Mr Unsworth was a fixture in Pattaya Beach, Thailand – a locale notorious for prostitution and child trafficking, that he had a taste for young Thai girls, that he whoremongered his way through the go-go bars of Thailand, that his only friends were his ‘sexpat’ peers, and that he married his Thai wife when she was a teenager, after starting a relationship when she was a young girl,” the response from Musk’s lawyers reads.

    BESIDES, LOW AND BEHOLD HE REALLY IS A PEDOPHILE!!!!

    Then again, maybe his lawyers are the idiots here. I await discovery where this “report” will be shared and the “investigator” is deposed. S/He’d better hope his/her lawyer is better than Beetlejuice’s.

    ETA Linky: Beetlejuice claims he didn’t intend to accuse British diver of pedophilia

  25. 25.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @JPL: For the record, S Carolina for DEMs is important because it is the first primary where there is a large constituency of black voters who generally have the final say of who wins or loses there.

  36. 36.

    germy

    If you take Bernie at face value the argument is that Elizabeth Warren secretly opposes Medicare for All but more than a half-dozen Republican Senators can be persuaded to support it. I see no flaws in this theory t.co/hCj8ci11F4— Scott Lemieux (@LemieuxLGM) September 16, 2019

  39. 39.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: very similar to Lexington, KY; to where my younger son announced I should move because I’ll be entering my dotage at some time in the apparently near future. Nope. I’m more inclined to move to Iceland.

  43. 43.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: he can’t. He’s got a new job with the city, and it’s a good one. I appreciate his (and his brother’s) concern; they’re just about 20 years too early on the “what about mom” discussion.

  45. 45.

    zhena gogolia

    I hope Major Major Major Major didn’t brave that crowd. I get a panic attack just looking at that picture.

  46. 46.

    Betty Cracker

    @OzarkHillbilly: I don’t have anything written down. Sometimes I go to the trouble of simmering a chicken to make broth, and sometimes I take a short cut and use rotisserie chicken and store-bought broth. Always onion, celery and garlic, but even the sausage is optional!

    @Lapassionara: To be honest, my grandma’s wasn’t very good either. She wasn’t much of a cook. But it’s a great basic dish to make your own and can be wonderful (and easy!) if cooked with care, IMO.

  49. 49.

    satby

    So of course the purchase of this booth at the Farmer’s Market was just approved and I’m already positive I’ll regret it. The middle vendor (who insisted on the space I wanted) is now trying to maneuver to get all the granite topped cabinets in all three spaces that the previous owner left. The third vendor promised them to me for free, now I have to pay to relocate them because of her trying to get them out from under me. She’s going to suck as a neighbor. UGH!

  50. 50.

    Baud

    @satby:

    I agree. But those tweets reference a specific allegation against Warren, which I don’t think I’ve seen from him directly.

  53. 53.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: I am sure the day will come when My oldest will say something similar. I’m just going to reply that when I bought this place it was with the intention of dying here and I’m not going to be denied that.

  55. 55.

    Butter emails!!!

    @germy:

    I suspect that Warren is ultimately willing to compromise on her Medicare for all position. She’s just not going to retreat from it at this point, because 1. She’ll lose some support to Bernie and 2. Bernie isn’t capable of defending Medicare for all so Republicans will be able to use it to hammer Medicare’s popularity while at the same time making Biden’s plan the far left position. Republicans will naturally roll out their sensible alternative of selling the blood of 9 poor people to Peter Thiel in exchange for free aspirin for a 10th.

  56. 56.

    waratah

    @OzarkHillbilly: When I think of South Carolina I always think of the person that said at one of Beto’s first rallies there that when they looked at the candidates they want a winner and one that will take the electorate vote. I have not heard very much talk about the ability to take the electorate vote in our primary.

  58. 58.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    “Who do you like more, the country or the Hispanics?”

    What does that even mean? Are “the Hispanics” not part of the country? Is he supposed to like the country more than his wife and kids, assuming they’re Hispanic?

  59. 59.

    Lapassionara

    @Betty Cracker: I would like all the same ingredients if it was a soup on a rainy day, but having the rice cooked in with the chicken resulted in an over-cooked glop of rice with chicken and sausage bits in it.

    I think chicken bog is beloved in South Carolina because of tradition, and not because of taste. YMMV

  60. 60.

    Jeffro

    One of my relatively progressive FB friends is arguing with me that VA is a purple state (I’m saying it’s a blue one). I’m thinking about recent election results and statewide offices; I think she’s noting that (due to extreme gerrymandering) the GOP has the thinnest of holds on the legislature. Plus she may just be ‘averaging’ all the blue cities and college towns against the red rural areas.

    Different criteria, I suppose. I’m just glad it’s blue. ;)

  61. 61.

    Jeffro

    Also, I see that #MillenialRetirementPlans is trending on Twitter, and the best one I’ve seen yet is

    4 words: pumpkin spiced paper straws

    =)

  64. 64.

    Princess

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: That’s exactly what it is supposed to mean. He means Hispanics are not part of this country and the guy s supposed to prefer his country over all. Or, as some might say, “uber alles.”

  65. 65.

    Nicole

    I tagged onto a thread late last night about this, but I went to the Washington Square Park Warren rally yesterday, and it was absolutely packed. I waited in line 3 hours for a picture but she was still going strong when I got there. Everyone stayed very pleasant and enthusiastic. And when one of the volunteers patrolling the line collecting trash came by and I offered to give him two dollars if he could get me a bottle of water, he offered to go find me one for nothing, found one and brought it back to me. I hate standing in line, I hate, hate, hate it, but I had a really fun time last night and the time flew by.

  67. 67.

    Amir Khalid

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Beetlejuice is clearly in denial over his inevitable defeat in this lawsuit. His ego is directing his lawyers to make these ridiculous denials, instead of relying on their lawyerly acument to minimise the damage he has done to himself. Irresistible force of personality, poor judgement, and lack of self-control are a dangerous combination.

  77. 77.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Trump at New Mexico rally quizzes Hispanic supporter who, he said, “looks more like.a WASP than I do.

    Of course Trump, because like most white Americans you are a German-American and it rankles you

  79. 79.

    Ken

    BTW did I inadvertently activate a pie filter? Several comments up there refer to “Beetlejuice” and seem to mean Elon Musk. Background?

  81. 81.

    evodevo

    @satby: Well,to be sure…it’s probably cheaper than Iceland lol – it’s a nice town, but not too much to do, if you aren’t a horse person…I live near there and have for 40 years…

  82. 82.

    Amir Khalid

    @Ken:
    Donald Trump’s mother was from Scotland, which is one reason he is especially despised by Scots. His paternal grandfather Frederick (né Friedrich) Trump emigrated to America to dodge the draft, and made his fortune in the US as an owner of restaurants and brothels. The Slavic connection in his family is through Ivana, I think.

  84. 84.

    O. Felix Culpa

    Went to the Trump counter-demonstration – called the New Mexico for All Community Event – in Albuquerque yesterday evening. The paper said there were hundreds present, but my guess would be closer to a thousand or more (the press seems to regularly lowball attendance estimates). The event was good-natured and clear that Trump was not welcome here. It was held away from the convention center to minimize the chance of violence (Proud Boys etc. are in town) and to avoid feeding his ego by giving him negative attention, which he thrives on at least as much as from cheers.

    ETA: The convention center where the rally was held had a designated fenced-in demonstration site, which many of us felt could be dangerous should things go awry. Egress would have been problematic at best. Turns out there were a few shouting matches between Trumpsters and demonstrators but the police prevented contact between the two groups.

  86. 86.

    TomatoQueen

    @Jeffro: I’m in Alexandria and agree strongly with your friend. It’s easy to live in blue Northern VA and mistake local power and influence for real change, but it hasn’t happened yet; if you look at the local color map for 2016, the red places dominate the blue everywhere but the People’s Republics of Alexandria and Arlington and Fairfax County, all of which are huge population centers and the sources of most of the wealth of the state. All that blue notwithstanding, at a minimum there is the next election cycle to get through before the colors flip, and there is plenty of RWNJ, Confederate fantasizing, and downright perversity standing in the way. I am hopeful for 2020 but not confident, as fuckery abounds.

  87. 87.

    ThresherK

    Having lost pop vote once since 1988, D’s hardly need my advice…

    Stuart Stevens is an unfamiliar name. Being an R strategist and saying things like the above are probably why he doesn’t get on TV!

  88. 88.

    Cacti

    @Baud:

    Edward Snowden says he would like to return to the US if he is guaranteed a fair trial

    Fair also = he isn’t charged with the statutes he knowingly and willfully violated.

  92. 92.

    Kay

    The GOP’s health care plan is fake, rip-off insurance:

    Fewer than 100,000 people had such plans at the end of last year, according to state insurance regulators, but the Trump administration says that number will jump by 600,000 in 2019 as a result of the changes. Some brokers are taking advantage, selling plans so skimpy that they offer no meaningful coverage. And Health Insurance Innovations is at the center of the market. In interviews, lawsuits, and complaints to regulators, dozens of its customers say they were tricked into buying plans they didn’t realize were substandard until they were stuck with surprise bills.

    This is so tailor made for Elizabeth Warren it’s like they designed it for her campaign.

    It’s health insurance, corruption AND a consumer scam, all rolled into one!

    She is going to be LIVID :)

  93. 93.

    Yarrow

    @ThresherK:

    Stuart Stevens is an unfamiliar name.

    Really? I’ve known of him for years. He was a top strategist for Romney’s 2012 campaign and worked on other campaigns before that. Seems to be one of those “Republican strategist” names that comes up a lot.

  95. 95.

    Nicole

    @Baud:

    You’ll never have to stand in line at a Baud! 2020! rally.

    Baud, forget standing in line; I’m still lobbying to be your VP. Aren’t you getting my calls? My texts? My emails? My candy grams? Didn’t you see me standing outside your window last night? Was it the flowers? Did they make me look too eager?

  96. 96.

    Another Scott

    @Frankensteinbeck: I’m not willing to check, but I had the impression that Donnie was riffing on his “Hispanics love me” stuff, because, obviously, everybody loves him. “Some, I’m sure, are good people” after all. So the candidate obviously should have said, “¿Por qué no los dos?!”

    :-/

    Just another day ending in “y”.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  98. 98.

    Elizabelle

    Cokie Roberts has died. Some say.

    I liked her so much more before I realized what a “both sides” enabler she was.

    ETA: Somehow I don’t think we are going to have a memorial thread for her, as we did for the irreplaceable Ric Ocasek.

  100. 100.

    gwangung

    @Baud:

    Bernie doesn’t adjust to Democratic rules. Democratic rules adjust to Bernie.

    If’n I recall, this is a state law, applied to both republicans and democrats.

    I know, I know….details….not important for the big picture….

  102. 102.

    PJ

    @Elizabelle: Cokie Roberts, who implied that Obama was un-American for going on vacation to Hawaii (where he grew up). I have no nice words to say at her passing.

  103. 103.

    Elizabelle

    @PJ: She wasn’t always that bad. I think. She is a DC insider who could not find her honesty as the rightwing burrowed in. But you’re right. She burned her legacy with that idiocy. And many others.

  105. 105.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Elizabelle:

    Just coming here to say that.

    In Cokie’s early days with NPR, back in the ‘70s, I admired her very much and, in fact, viewed her (along with Susan Stamberg, Linda Wertheimer, Jackie Judd, Nina Totenberg and the rest of NPR’s “founding mothers”) as role model.

    But I really started to sour on her once she became a TV personality, especially as a Sunday morning pundit. By the Obama years, I couldn’t bear to listen to her. Not sure whether she changed, or I did, or both. Probably both.

    Nevertheless, I wish her a peaceful rest, and condolences to her family and friends.

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