Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

This blog will pay for itself.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

In short, I come down firmly on all sides of the issue.

Don’t expect peaches from an apple tree.

T R E 4 5 O N

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

The GOP couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

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

I really should read my own blog.

Ah, the different things are different argument.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

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

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

You are here: Home / Past Elections / 2020 Elections / Friday Morning Open Thread: Readership Capture

Friday Morning Open Thread: Readership Capture

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… “Everybody needs to chill out about the candidates, but gin up about the prospect of rallying behind whoever emerges from this process,” Obama said after a lengthy answer that defend the arduous primary process that Democrats are currently in.

Obama, until recently, rarely commented on the 2020 field, but at a fundraiser here in Silicon Valley on Thursday the President cheered on the vigorous debate happening inside the party while stressing the need to get elected and warned about some of the obstacles the numerous women candidates and one gay candidate will likely face…

The former President added it was important to draw a line between contentious arguments playing out inside the party and the need to get elected, decrying “purity tests” because “the country’s complicated.”
“Those are good arguments to have,” he said about debates of health care and climate change, “but you got to win the election.”

He also cautioned Democratic voters from getting too wrapped up in the issues they have with individual candidates, telling the audience in California that people’s “flaws are magnified” during a primary.

“The field will narrow and there’s going to be one person, and if that is not your perfect candidate and there are certain aspects of what they say that you don’t agree with and you don’t find them completely inspiring the way you’d like, I don’t care,” Obama said bluntly, “because the choice is so stark and the stakes are so high that you cannot afford to be ambivalent in this race.”…

The event benefits the DNC’s Democratic Unity Fund, a cache of money that will is being raised to eventually benefit the party’s general election campaign. This is Obama’s first event of the cycle for the DNC…

A number of Democratic candidates — including Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren — have made fighting income inequality central to their campaigns and Obama said he believes it’s one area where there is more room now for Democrats to go big.

“It is something we were aware of in 2008 and we wanted to do more about, but the first thing was putting out a big fire to make sure we didn’t have a great depression,” Obama said of the issue…

Reader Interactions

97Comments

  3. 3.

    debbie

    I’m glad my president spoke up.

    I’m enjoying listening to a Rethuglican Congressman Mike Johnson twisting himself into a pretzel trying to justify Trump’s behavior toward Ukraine. He’s going to need medical attention soon.

  4. 4.

    low-tech cyclist

    Obama: “Being a leader is identifying the power in others and unleashing it.”

     

    Then he and I agree that Joe Biden is not a leader.  Because “once Trump’s voted out, the Republicans will wake up and be bipartisan again” doesn’t identify, let alone unleash anyone’s power besides Mitch McConnell’s.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    “We will not win just by increasing the turnout of the people who already agree w us completely on everything.

    As the only candidate that everyone disagrees with, I am uniquely positioned to unify the country.

  6. 6.

    Betty Cracker

    I don’t agree at all that the differences between the candidates are relatively minor, but I agree wholeheartedly that we have to get behind whoever wins the nomination.

  7. 7.

    Another Scott

    ‘morning all.

    Good words, as always, from Obama.  I’m glad he’s out there occasionally, taking some of the attention away from Donnie.  That’s part of the reason why I have a small monthly donation to his foundation – I want him speaking up.  He should do it more often.

    Mandatory Emo Philips – “Golden Gate Bridge” (4:10)

    Have a good Friday.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I decided early on not to donate to any primary campaigns this year. I certainly am partial to a couple, and have disagreements with all, but I feel like I would rather save what fiscal resources I can afford to contribute for the one who comes out of this with the nomination, because whoever they are, they are light years ahead of trump.

  12. 12.

    Elizabelle

    Good morning, jackals.  TGIF.

     

    Yesterday’s hearings were crystal clear on the difference between the parties. Proud to be a Democrat, and Adam Schiff speaks for me.  I suspect we’re also picking up even more votes from federal employees and the military.  They see what Trump is doing and even more what a danger he is.

     

    A lot can happen in the next months.  I like our chances.

  15. 15.

    TriassicSands

    Any one of our candidates is better than the current occupant of the White House… — N. Pelosi

    That is certainly true of anyone likely to get the nomination. But I’m not sure it is true of Tulsi Gabbard. She’d be a completely different kind of disaster from Trump but she could damage the Democratic Party in ways Trump never could. Fortunately, President Gabbard isn’t going to happen.

  17. 17.

    Betty Cracker

    @Immanentize: That’s true in a sense — they all recognize that issues A, B and C are a problem and have proposals on how to address those issues. But there are enormous vision differences, IMO — fundamental disagreements on our current state as a society and the path forward.

  18. 18.

    Elizabelle

    Also, Linda Greenhouse in the FTF NY Times yesterday, pitched to one primary reader (“umpire” John Roberts), the Supremes and their staffs, and the rest of us in the sane world.

    Can the Supreme Court Save Itself?

    Two cases threaten to reinforce its image as a political captive of the Trump administration.

    I’m often asked these days whether there is anything the Supreme Court can do to extract itself from the partisan trap into which the rancid confirmation process and the court’s own behavior have driven it.

    … But the recently argued case involving young undocumented immigrants known as Dreamers and the pending effort by President Trump to quash subpoenas seeking his tax information from his personal accountants suggest that there is something the court can do. These are extraordinary cases, to be sure, but they easily — even obviously — lend themselves to resolution by ordinary rules.
    And that would be the point: business as usual, no matter who’s in the White House. Although President Trump and his attorney general, William Barr, have excoriated lower-court judges as agents of “the resistance,” in fact it’s the judges who have been following the rules and the administration that behaves as if the rules apply only to everyone else.

    … What should the court do with the Trump tax cases? If the justices play by their ordinary rules, they will turn them down. (Whether to grant a stay is a different matter, of little consequence in the scheme of things.)

    In fact, I’ll predict here that contrary to the expectations of many people who foresee a big Supreme Court showdown over presidential power, that’s what the court will do. Certainly Chief Justice Roberts wants nothing to do with these cases. He knows that he is highly likely to be presiding over a Senate impeachment trial early in the new year, at the same time the court would be scheduling the cases for argument. Would he have to recuse himself? He might well choose to, raising the possibility of a 4-to-4 tie, which would affirm the lower court decisions and accomplish nothing beyond leaving the court out on a limb it never needed to climb.

    … if the justices don’t follow the ordinary rules of administrative law, the Supreme Court will own [mass deportations in the wake of overturning DACA] too — as it will own President Trump’s effort to keep his tax returns secret if the justices don’t steer clear of his cases. Can the Supreme Court save itself from itself? We’re about to find out.

  19. 19.

    JPL

    It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

    Am I the only one who thought of Mr. Rogers when President Obama said be kind?

  21. 21.

    Princess

    Good intervention from Obama. That’s a good line for a former president to take.

     

    Re: SCOTUS. I bet Roberts would like to sit on it for as long as possible and hope it goes away. Do they have to rule on this within a certain time?

  23. 23.

    Baud

    @Princess: They don’t have to, but they won’t sit on it.  DACA will be decided by June.  They’ll have to decide whether to take the Trump tax case by mid-January if they are going to issue a decision this term.  They could sit on it, but they won’t since there’s a stay in place.

  25. 25.

    msb

    Phew, I absolutely needed this dose of sanity and maturity from honest and well disposed adults. Thanks! (and thank God, once more, that Pelosi is Speaker.)

    P.S. Haven’t mentioned it, but new site looks great!

  26. 26.

    OzarkHillbilly

    ‘My duty as a black man’: the artist preserving gazebo where police killed Tamir Rice

    Three years ago, Chicago visual artist Theaster Gates acquired the gazebo 12-year-old Tamir Rice was shot and killed under by a police officer. The object, which Gates describes as “sacred”, has become the centerpiece of a garden, flowers blooming around the site of pain and tragedy. Gates is quick to say he does not want the gazebo. That it belongs in Cleveland, Ohio, where Tamir lived and died. But the city was set on removing the object – now symbolic of the scores of young, unarmed black men killed by our police force – from Cleveland’s Cudell Recreation Center.

    “Caring for this gazebo felt like my duty as a black man,” Gates said. “But it should not be in Chicago. It’s in Chicago, in some ways, because of the anxiety that mounts when bad things happen [somewhere].”

  27. 27.

    zzyzx

    @Betty Cracker: the way I see it is that we’re on a boat sailing in a part of the ocean filled with icebergs. The passengers are trying to decide who should be the captain. One person says “I want to just steer us to the closest land before we drown.” Another says, “I will take us all somewhere tropical before landfall.”

    Those are significant differences and normally might be important, but meanwhile 40% of the passengers and many of the crew are busy trying to sabotage the navigation equipment and are drilling holes in the bottom so we can sink faster.

    Step 1 is to make that stop. Then we can worry about improvements.

    Now there’s a strategic argument over whether a, “I have an amazing view of America that I want to direct us towards,” will win more electoral college votes than, “I will make the insanity stop,” and that’s a fair one to have, but right now we need to get Queeg out of power.

  28. 28.

    Sloane Ranger

    Just been watching CNN’s New Day. The Repub they had on said that support for Impeachment was going down in swing states. He cited a recent poll in Wisconsin.

     

    Is this true or was the poll taken before the hearing started/ended?

  30. 30.

    NotMax

    Not everyone’s cup of mayhem (perhaps not anyone’s) – noting that TCM will be showing low-rent studio Hammer Films’ contemporaneous attempt to out-psycho Psycho, Maniac, at 2 a.m. Eastern time on Saturday.

    Not a recommendation, merely a notation for the filmicly curious.

  31. 31.

    zhena gogolia

    @Elizabelle:

     

    I’ve had a strict rule not to think about Trump once I lie down to sleep. Last night I couldn’t adhere to it. I kept thinking about those hearings. Seeing in real time how utterly dishonest and morally bankrupt every single Republican member of Congress is has really shaken me. Of course I knew it intellectually, but seeing it demonstrated has been devastating. Also, — thanks to the WB, we know what crap they’ve been pulling with Ukraine. Now multiply that by X number of other important countries.

  32. 32.

    Elizabelle

    @Sloane Ranger:   Suspect it’s just that it was said by a Republican.  Don’t take anything they say at face value.

    That was amazing at yesterday’s hearings:  Schiff at least twice cautioned the witnesses about responding to claims embedded with in questions from the GOP panelists, because they were often false.  The Republicans are big on misrepresenting facts or manufacturing falsehoods.

  33. 33.

    sherparick

    By the way, I cam across this story about some of Steve Rattner’s private equity heroes, the guys Elizabeth Warren would put out of business,  “improving the economy” in this way.
    New Barnes & Noble Owner ‘Purged’ Older Workers, Suit Says < Caution-https://www.law360.com/employment/articles/1222143/new-barnes-noble-owner-purged-older-workers-suit-says?nl_pk=695f66c0-a4f9-42d2-9e9c-e35f5cdea146&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=employment > 
    Barnes & Noble’s new “vulture fund” owners have implemented a cost-saving strategy that depends on the “ruthless and unscrupulous purging” of workers over the age of 40, a former worker said in a proposed class action filed Wednesday.

  35. 35.

    Elizabelle

    @zhena gogolia:   I have been reading a lot about the coming of the Nazis and thinking “we are here.”  It’s the complete disregard for the rule of law and democratic norms, and hollowing out our government.  I think enough of us see the danger to stop it.  It will be hard work, though.

     

    Have very few FoxWorld FB friends, but it was appalling to see them all cackling about Shitty Schiff and how he’s not finding anything.  They really are purposely misinformed.  I think they’re also all evangelicals.

    Dog help us.

  36. 36.

    Baud

    @Sloane Ranger: Any one poll can have noise, even if it’s a legitimate poll.

     

    Doesn’t really matter.  Dems have to do this even if the voters decide they want to give Trump a pass.

  37. 37.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Sloane Ranger: Support for impeachment is going down, in general. It’s not a huge drop, but basically as the story drags on, people with conservative/centrist leanings go back to supporting Trump.

     

    Not a lot is happening with public opinion. I do not think we can expect anything like the shift that happened with Nixon because everyone to the right of center is in a sealed bubble in which nothing can affect them.

  38. 38.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @sherparick:

      Age discrimination is quite common. It happened to my wife at 60 and me at 55. The trick is, they do it in ways that give the appearance of legitimacy. I would be very surprised if B&N screwed the pooch by not adhering to “best practices”.

  39. 39.

    Shalimar

    He’s right.  As horrible as they would ve compared to the other choices, even a vanity billionaire like Steyer or a Russian asset like Tulsi would be a big improvement over Trump and Republicans.

  40. 40.

    Betty Cracker

    @zzyzx: I get that a lot of people see it in those terms. I don’t. The boat has been sinking for a long time in my view, the sabotage will continue without significant checks on the saboteurs, and periodic bailing and patchwork is inadequate to keep the ship afloat for much longer.

     

    But I suspect those who see it as you do will prevail, and I will dutifully line up to vote for the candidate y’all select because better to limp along in a leaky boat than plunge straight to the bottom.

  41. 41.

    Elizabelle

    WaPost:  kudos, Borat!  We already knew you were a good guy, but wow:

     
    ‘Your product is defective’: Sacha Baron Cohen slams Facebook for allowing hate speech
     

    In his roles as characters like Borat and Bruno, actor Sacha Baron Cohen is famed for tricking real people into making outlandishly bigoted comments on camera, turning their prejudice into the butt of his jokes.

    But on Thursday night, Cohen didn’t need any of his on-screen personas to rip into America’s biggest social media organizations for facilitating the kind of racism and hate he regularly lampoons.
     

    In a speech at the Anti-Defamation League’s Never Is Now summit, Cohen spoke in his own voice as he skewered social media companies he called “a sewer of bigotry and vile conspiracy theories,” taking aim at the leaders of Google, YouTube and Twitter for not more actively removing hate-speech from their platforms. But he reserved his most biting critique for Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, whom he called “unaccountable” and compared to Julius Caesar during the Roman Empire.

    “I’m just a comedian and an actor, not a scholar,” said Cohen, who was accepting the ADL’s International Leadership Award. “But one thing is pretty clear to me: All this hate and violence is being facilitated by a handful of Internet companies that amount to the greatest propaganda machine in history.”

     

    …. “Zuckerberg said that social media companies should live up to their responsibilities,” Cohen said. “But he’s totally silent about what should happen when they don’t. By now, it’s pretty clear they cannot be trusted to regulate themselves.”

     

    …

    Cohen suggested subjecting social media platforms to the same regulations that most other media, from newspapers and cable news to television and movie producers, have to follow and holding Internet companies accountable for the harm their products cause.

    “In every other industry, a company can be held liable when their product is defective,” he said. “When engines explode or seat belts malfunction, car companies recall tens of thousands of vehicles at a cost of billions of dollars. It only seems fair to say to Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, ‘Your product is defective, you are obliged to fix it no matter how much it costs and no matter how many moderators you need to employ.’”

     

    We will need to put Fox News on a leash, too.  They are killing our democracy.  On purpose, for money.

     

    I find it very interesting that Shep Smith donated half a million to the Committee to Protect Journalists.  He knows it is dirty money, even though he did his best while swimming through the sewer in which he worked.

  42. 42.

    Baud

    @Matt McIrvin:

     

    Yeah, we don’t need consensus, and we certainly don’t need their permission.  What we need is 50%+1 of the vote in as many states and districts as we can feasibly get.  Kentucky and Louisiana are hopeful signs that we can achieve that, but we have to keep our eyes on the prize.

  43. 43.

    Immanentize

    @Betty Cracker:

    I will dutifully line up to vote for the candidate y’all select 

    WHOA! You aren’t also participating in the selection? Is it all rigged against your choice or something?

  44. 44.

    Baud

    @Elizabelle:

     

    Cohen suggested subjecting social media platforms to the same regulations that most other media, from newspapers and cable news to television and movie producers, have to follow and holding Internet companies accountable for the harm their products cause.

    This makes no sense.  No media is legally responsible for harms caused by their content, so long as it’s not defamatory.  In theory, the FCC can yank broadcast licenses if they get too extreme, but that’s a small slice of the media environment.

  46. 46.

    zzyzx

    @Betty Cracker: what sucks for me is that if I could wave a wand and magically make a candidate win, I’d be closer to Warren than Biden/Pete. Hell, I might make Jayapal (my Congressional representative) president and let her have her complete way with everything.

    I just don’t believe that there’s a secret wish for progressive policies in the heartland and they’re voting for conservatives/staying home because we’re not appealing to it. A Warren election feels like a much higher risk to me and some movement in my direction is better than massive movement away from it.

    I do understand the opposing argument which is why I’m largely trying to stay out of the primary wars.

  47. 47.

    NotMax

    Made it through the first two episodes* of the new SF series on Prime, The Feed. Shan’t be continuing that exercise.

    Glitzy yet threadbare by-the-numbers-predictable attempt to cash in on the success of Black Mirror‘s technology is malevolent shtick.

    *Admit to having to force myself to make it all the way to the end of the second episode as was by then getting distracted by the relatively greater entertainment value of watching ice cubes melt in my glass.

  50. 50.

    Betty Cracker

    @Immanentize: Who said anything about rigging? I’m acknowledging mine is probably the minority view within the party, so I suspect I’ll be voting for a Democrat in the general whom I did not support in the primary. Is that still allowed, or are we required to swear a blood oath or something?

  54. 54.

    Zinsky

    Good advice from the King of Chill.  God, I miss him…

     

    Anyway, now that Trump’s true character is boldly on display for the American people, I think the Democratic presidential candidates should willfully ignore Trump and if and when they do have to refer to him make sure they use descriptors like the “criminal president” or the “degenerate in the White House. Messaging is so critical now and the American people need to be reminded every day that he is a criminal, a degenerate and a fraud.

  57. 57.

    Immanentize

    @Betty Cracker: I was snarking, but if your candidate is one of the top six or seven, I think there are miles to go before we sleep.  BTW when I say “candidates” generally, I do not include the 1%ers.

  58. 58.

    Immanentize

    @Baud: sad story — as I was walking to the train today (which I am on), I saw a neighbor, an older gent, from a few blocks away walking his Scotty.  Normally, he is walking two happy energetic black Scotties and I asked him, “only one?” He said the other was taken by a Warren canvasser.

     

    No, he really told me, the other one, young, got very sick and had to be ushered on.  It made me quite sad

  60. 60.

    Betty Cracker

    @Immanentize: I’ve been pessimistic lately, so I’m convinced Biden will be the nominee. I’m kinda bitter about it, tbh, but I’ll get over it.

     

    ETA: Poor Scotty. :(

  62. 62.

    Spanky

    @debbie:

    I’m enjoying listening to a Rethuglican Congressman Mike Johnson twisting himself into a pretzel trying to justify Trump’s behavior toward Ukraine. He’s going to need medical attention soon.

    My religion prevents me from providing that to him.

  63. 63.

    geg6

    @Immanentize: 

    Don’t know when Florida’s primary is, but mine is so late in the process that I basically won’t have much say at that point. I’ll probably end up going with whoever is winning at that point, regardless of my own feelings about each of the candidates right now. Pisses me right off, I have to say.

  64. 64.

    Immanentize

    @Betty Cracker: If it is comforting, I really don’t think he will be.  I thought he would be at the beginning of the week, but not now.  The Ukraine stuff is hurting not helping him and his performance at the debate was not good.

  65. 65.

    germy

    Pre-Debate, in which MSNBC *physically hides* a woman holding a sign that says…

    “Bernie won Michigan”

    …MSNBC was in the process of interviewing a “fiscally responsible” voter, who suggests that we cut social spending.

    The banality of cable news.pic.twitter.com/kZGcNDXt6b

    — Samuel D. Finkelstein II (@CANCEL_SAM) November 22, 2019

  66. 66.

    Elizabelle

    I don’t think people are turning to conservatives and yearning for moderates, necessarily.  I think we get a lot of disinformation from the loudest voices.

     

    I think there’s a lot of understanding that the edifice is wrecked.  The FTF NYTimes attacks Warren, and ignores Kamala, and acts like Mayor Pete is the new shiny thing.  Also warns its readers:  the Democrats will raise your taxes, even if you’re not rich as Croesus.

    But I think a lot of voters are ready for change that makes the playing field more level.  And that their vote should count for something.  They see the failing institutions too.  They might realize that what’s good for Wall Street is not necessarily good for Main Street.

  68. 68.

    Elizabelle

    @Betty Cracker:  I don’t think it’s going to be Biden.  I really don’t.  He and Bernie are placeholders, and we would be better if they both were out.  Albeit, I think Biden is holding down Bernie’s numbers.

  70. 70.

    Lapassionara

    Also, from this date in 1963, the assassination of President Kennedy. More than 50 years ago. I still remember it clearly.

  72. 72.

    germy

    yes, Buttigieg's policy offerings are hollow and ineffectual, but sometimes you have to do what's politically expedient: nominating the guy who is mayor of Indiana's fourth most populous town and is currently polling worse against Trump than any major candidate

    — Law Boy, Esq. (@The_Law_Boy) November 21, 2019

  76. 76.

    Woodrow/asim

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’m staying out of the primaries as well, focusing on other candidates.

    We’re just so…obsessed with POTUS, for good or ill, as a Party/movement. This was exactly the crap that we saw go down in ’07/08, and although I think it worked out for the best overall, there were some seriously rough patches. And post-election, Obama did no one any favors with his timidity in deploying OFA on the State/Local level.

     

    (Also: my 1st comment on the new website!)

  78. 78.

    Desargues

    Apologies for barging in with this, but I would like to bring this petition to your attention. We’re all animal lovers here, and they need our help:

    https://petitions.whitecoatwaste.org/nih-primates/

     

    Also, warning: the page plays a video that I found very upsetting. Not sure how to stop it from playing.

     

    Thank you, all. Please spread the word, if you can. I wish we can help these poor animals somehow.

  79. 79.

    Betty Cracker

    @Elizabelle: Some polling does seem to suggest Biden is holding Sanders’ numbers down, but I don’t understand how that works. There’s no logic to Biden being the top choice and Sanders the second. It has to be a name recognition thing, right?

  80. 80.

    Another Scott

    @Baud: Dunno.

     

    I generally think of FB and the rest as kinda like a letters-to-the-editor page of a newspaper.  (Especially those sites that are “free”.)  Newspapers have no responsibility to print every letter they get, they can shorten letters they do publish, etc.  FTFNYT has no obligation to print every crank conspiracy letter they get, even if it wold drive clicks and eyeballs.

     

    Terms of service for internet companies matter and they can be made sensible via legislation.

     

    I don’t know where the line should be drawn, but it’s clear that FB and other companies that thrive on driving up micro-targeted disinformation and strife for clicks and ad revenue are a danger to democracies all around the world.

     

    SBC may be wrong about the remedies, but I’m not so sure at first glance.  IANAL.

     

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  83. 83.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Elizabelle: 

    Also warns its readers: the Democrats will raise your taxes, even if you’re not rich as Croesus.

    Does that line still work with millions of Repub voters who know damned well they had a tax bill when they were used to getting refunds?

  85. 85.

    sdhays

    @Elizabelle: I have to say I’ve been shocked by the disappearance of Kamala in the media. I saw an NPR right up which mentioned other candidates specifically having “a good night” and only mentioned Kamala in the context of Joe’s flub about having the endorsement of the “only” African-American woman Senator. And they spent a paragraph or two about how Mayor Pete withstood criticism.

     

    It’s really disgusting.

  87. 87.

    Formerly disgruntled in Oregon

    @sdhays: Gee, could be that the media still has significant biases against someone like Kamala.

    An independent, strong liberal black asian californian woman like Senator Harris.

    The media has made up a narrative around her early debate performances and polling that has allowed them to disappear her.

    Will they cover her comeback? Will they allow her one?

  88. 88.

    rikyrah

    @zhena gogolia:

     

    Seeing in real time how utterly dishonest and morally bankrupt every single Republican member of Congress is has really shaken me.

     

    Really?

    I got over it in 2017, because it was obvious how corrupt Dolt45, and their unwillingness to do anything.

     

    Either they are spineless, corrupt or compromised. However it came to be, they’ve decided to not honor their oath to The Constitution. They are traitors and should be treated accordingly.

  89. 89.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @geg6: Our primary is late too – June 2nd – and we are a small population state with only a few delegates, so unlikely to have a major impact. Unless no candidate has a clear majority at that point (which is possible) and we end up with a brokered convention. I’m not sure I want things to get that interesting.

  90. 90.

    glory b

    @Elizabelle: Actually, there is an Emerson poll out this a.m., which shows that support for impeachment has dropped 5 points (I think this was among independents). However, the survey was taken last week and this week, so many of the persons polled hadn’t heard this week’s testimony).

  91. 91.

    Formerly disgruntled in Oregon

    @O. Felix Culpa: I personally think that situation is likely. There is no clear path to one candidate catching enough fire that they take a majority, not while Bernie hangs on, and multiple other candidates duke it out for first place. First place does not equal a majority in this scenario.

     

    I also think that the candidate in the lead would attract enough also-rans with delegates to band together with them to form a majority prior to the convention. Who’s going to form that coalition?

  93. 93.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:  Who’s going to form that coalition?

    I wonder that too. In my dream world, Biden loses steam somewhere along the line and drops out. Bernie too (although unlikely). Then the women (that is, Warren, Harris and Klobuchar; not Tulsi) band together and choose one among themselves to be the standard bearer. I have my preferences among those three, but I strongly prefer a female candidate this time around.

  95. 95.

    Soprano2

    @debbie: Was that the interview where Steve Inskeep asked him about a president asking the state of Louisiana to do a hypothetical investigation of himself? I snorted, I laughed so hard at how nonplussed Johnson was by the question.

  96. 96.

    Uncle Cosmo

    1. @Lapassionara:  One of those events (Pearl Harbor, death of FDR, Kent State, Challenger, fall of the Wall, 9/11) where you remember exactly where you were & what you were doing when you heard. I was in speaking with my 8th-grade guidance counselor when the loudspeaker outside the office opened up & after catching a couple of words I interrupted him & said, I think we ought to listen to this…

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