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You are here: Home / Past Elections / 2020 Elections / Open Thread: Kamala Harris in Las Vegas

Reader Interactions

74Comments

  2. 2.

    Gin & Tonic

    Today I heard a take on the Bobby Vinton classic Blue Velvet that I hadn’t heard before, which really struck me with its pathos and melancholy. So here’s the Branford Marsalis Quartet with Kurt Elling doing that number. One account said that Kurt wanted it to sound like ghosts singing. Atmospherically, sort of reminds me of what Pink Martini did with Doris Day’s Que Sera, Sera.

  3. 3.

    jl

    Uh oh, trouble for Joe Biden. Trump reveals it was Biden who could have ordered a mask mandate, but didn’t.

    The President attempts to blame Joe Biden for not implementing a national mask mandate

    https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1306041359308996610

    I didn’t know Obama handed off his time traveling powers to Biden.  I wonder if Chuck Todd got this nonsense started when he tried to accuse Biden of being hypocritical, or shifty, or something who knows what, when Biden’s plan in early February didn’t include all the recommendations experts had adopted by March and April. Well, who knows? Maybe Biden messed up that time trip?

    In what kind of country is this that it treats this nonsense seriously that a first grader wouldn’t fall for? Stephanopoulos doesn’t even cut Trump off and ask him what the hell he’s talking about, doesn’t even laugh.

    Found via Josh Marshall twitter feed.

  5. 5.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @jl: Trump seems to think(I use the term loosely) that he’s running against President Biden(or maybe Obama).  He doesn’t seem to grasp that he’s the President.  Then again, he’s said he doesn’t take responsibility for anything.

  10. 10.

    dmsilev

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: That certainly seems to be his strategy with regards to law-and-order ™. ‘The rioting that’s going on now shows what Joe Biden’s America will be like. It’s pre-rioting.’

  11. 11.

    Jeffro

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: “anything bad is because of them; all solutions come from me“ kind of runs into a wall when he’s the person who (theoretically) has been in charge the past four years.

    governing’s hard work, isn’t it Donnie? ?

  12. 12.

    Jeffro

    @NickM: I sometimes wonder if his support is actually smaller than we think… Not zero, but I bet his real base is a lot closer to the 27% crazification factor than the 42% that shows up in many polls

    ah well… Just keep talking, Donnie

  13. 13.

    Amir Khalid

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    He doesn’t seem to grasp that he’s the President.

    He doesn’t seem to grasp that he’s there to work the President’s job, not just to pose for the President’s pictures.

  14. 14.

    dmsilev

    WaPo:

    Trump may do more town halls

    The president and a number of his advisers and allies are highlighting that the president is willing to take so many questions from voters, in a bid to attack Biden for his more limited travel schedule and his fewer public appearances.

    The Biden campaign supposedly responded with ‘please proceed, President’.

  18. 18.

    LongHairedWeirdo

    I remember someone once said of Jonah Goldberg that it will always be an especial pain point in the soul of every intelligent person not slavishly devoted to the rightwing that he’ll *never* have any idea just how stupid he is. I thought that was vile, and false, until I heard some quote to the effect that he wasn’t trying to say liberals were *fascists* in his book, “Liberal Fascism”.

    Well, I just realized that perhaps the most damning thing about the Woodward revelations is that Trump had no idea just how damning they were. He didn’t consider these things to be extremely important, and didn’t realize they’d make him look bad.

    And… well, I guess you can probably figure out why that bit about Goldberg came to mind.

  19. 19.

    Jeffro

    @NickM: I know, right?

    i start thinking about all the folks who don’t vote, about all the blessed ‘swing voters‘, and oh yeah the obvious majority of Democratic voters who keep having their voting rights curtailed in various ways.

    and I’ve come to the conclusion that there are really only about three die-hard trumpov supporters per state…

    …total delusion, I know, but it helps me sleep at night ?

  20. 20.

    Jeffro

    @Dan B: thanks!

    this is the guy, after all, who offered the VP slot and complete control of domestic AND foreign policy, while trumpov ran around “making America great again”, ie, posing for pictures, golfing, and offering his drunk-guy-at-the-end-of-the-bar commentary nonstop on Fox and Twitter

    hell, who WOULDN’T want that job?

  22. 22.

    jl

    @NickM: “Trump is screwing up his town hall.  The little people love him but it is not reciprocal and it shows.”

    Trump is outraged what four miserable years of a loser Biden-Harris administration has done to this country, and it shows.

  23. 23.

    jl

    @Jeffro: What Trump does seems like a lot of hard work to me. I don’t know if I could make it through 6 hours of Fox News, and a few more of cable every day.

  24. 24.

    Another Scott

    https://bluevirginia.us/2020/09/new-virginia-poll-biden-53-trump-39-warner-55-gade-38

    New Virginia polling by VCU’s Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs (8/28-9/7; a bit old, but things probably haven’t changed much in the last week) has things as follows. Note that, according to 538.com, this polling outfit scores a B/C grade and a mean-reverted bias of R+0.2 points.

    • “Democrats Joe Biden and Mark Warner are ahead of their opponents by double-digit margins” – Biden by 14 points (53%-39%) and Warner by 17 points (55%-38%). This compares to an 11-point lead (50%-39%) for Biden in July.
    • “In the presidential race, women were more likely to prefer Biden over Trump by 22 percentage points (58%-36%) and men prefer Biden over Trump by a smaller margin of 5 points (47%-42%). This represents a shift for men, who were more likely to say they would vote for Trump in a poll released by the Wilder School in July.“
    • “Regionally, Biden has large leads in South Central Virginia (65%-22%), Northern Virginia (59%-32%) and Tidewater (56%-33%) and Trump has large leads over Biden in the West (63%-36%) and Northwest (58%-36%).”
    • “Independents are breaking toward Biden by 8 percentage points (46%-38%), with 14% remaining undecided.”
    • “In the U.S. Senate race, gender and region followed the same trend as the presidential race. And Warner enjoys a greater level of support from independents, with a 16-percentage point lead over Gade (54%-38%).”
    • “Seven in 10 Virginians (70%) say the selection of Harris for vice president will have no impact on their decision to vote for Biden…Sixteen percent said it would make them more likely to vote for him, while 13% say it will make them less likely.”
    • “Virginians are split on whether mail-in votes will be accurately cast and counted. Half of respondents (50%) said they are very or somewhat confident that, across the country, mail-in votes for president will be accurately cast and counted, while 48% said they are not too or not at all confident…Democrats were more likely to trust the process with 68% being very or somewhat confident.”

    P.S. Standard disclaimers/cliches apply: take nothing for granted, don’t get overconfident, work like the race is really close, VOTE VOTE VOTE, etc.

    Good, good.

    More, please.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  25. 25.

    Dan B

    @LongHairedWeirdo: I don’t believe it’s gross stupidity as much as moderate stupidity and blindness to their narrow world view.  They cannot believe there are other viewpoints because their self worth depends on an extremely constrained understanding of the world.  It reminds me of quite a few Mensa members.  They can be unbelievably inept socially and out of their arena but would crumble if they really could see in the mirror.

    Maybe we could call it blind stupidity.  At its root is the existential need for a stable identity to placate the fear of abandonment.  The specter of a popular black president, trans rights, pushback on police violence, exposure of rapacious capitalism, gay marriage, and other trends which effectively advanced egalitarian and just causes it feels like the ground beneath their feet is unstable.  Of course they want a con artist who plays an alpha male.

  26. 26.

    Danielx

    From twitter if I recall correctly….

    Trump is the only president to run for re-election based on the idea that he is not now and never has been president.

  31. 31.

    mad citizen

    @Another Scott: I want trump in the 30s.  I checked my state poll the other day and the two polls were trump +13 and 14.  Wtf?  Is wrong with Indiana?

    My usual background this summer has been Bad Seeds Teevee, the Nick Cave youtube channel.

  35. 35.

    Eljai

    @dmsilev: I have seen a couple younger white male reporters imply that Trump is somehow more accessible to the press than Biden.  I don’t get it.  Trump might technically spend more time standing in front of a bunch of people asking him questions, but he’s never actually answered their questions without lying, so is that really being accessible?  May as well shout your questions at a brick.

  37. 37.

    Dopey-o

    @NickM: Jeffro: It’s hard to imagine that fully 45% of the population is crazy and stupid enough to buy this guy’s bullshit.

    It’s not the stupid and it’s not the crazy. It’s the opportunity to spew hatred and ignorance unrestrained. They feel like it makes up for their empty pointless lives. They think Trump is the Champion of the Oppressed White Majority, and they love the idea that they can be be as powerful as him just by running a steady stream of hate thru their dentures.

    They are just like Dear Leader: broke, incompetent, petty, fat, stupid and their families are waiting for them to die so they can grab the inheritance and head to the casino.

  38. 38.

    dmsilev

    @Kay: I wonder whether the second debate will stick with the townhall format. Assuming that there is a second debate, that is.

  41. 41.

    Kay

    Daniel Dale
    @ddale8
    ·1h
    A crying voter tells Trump at length about how her mom, a fellow immigrant, died of cancer, and asks a question on her mom’s behalf about immigration.
    Trump repeatedly talks about how her mom died of “Covid.”

    It took a little while to figure out that he heard none of what she said- I thought “did she die of both?” Like- how would he know that, since she said “cancer”?
    I’m still not sure what happened.

  43. 43.

    jl

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: I think you right. IIRC, 5 hours of Fox News, and 3 more hours hate watching selected CNN, MSNBC and network news shows and public affairs infotainment content.

    There have been several reactionary oldsters in my family who came to that pass, and they all became simple minded sooner or later, even given their advanced age.

  44. 44.

    cmorenc

    @NickM:

    @Jeffro: It’s hard to imagine that fully 45% of the population is crazy and stupid enough to buy this guy’s bullshit.

    True, at most only ~27% or less actually buy Tump’s B.S. – let’s call it the gullible half of 45% (or 22.5%) of the electorate who will vote for him.  The other half of that 45% who don’t buy his B.S. will cynically vote for him anyways because he either gets them (or certainly would if he could) a couple of things that are important to them – whether it be lower taxes for the rich, deregulation for business, support for charter and “religious freedom” exemptions from laws, appointment of anti-abortion judges, etc. etc.  They don’t like his rough edges, but they are happy to take what he’s willing to bring or try to bring to them that they know or believe a Democrat in the White House won’t.

    In short, they’re willing to make a bargain with the devil to get what they want, to hell with the consequences for everything else.

  45. 45.

    clay

    @Eljai: It’s also a sign that Trump just doesn’t spend enough time doing his actual job, along side the countless TV watching and golf trips.  Biden is too busy to bullshit at reporters for hours on end.

  46. 46.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    MSNBC doctor from Indiana says Jared Kushner should spend less time talking to his plastic surgeon and more time talking to doctors in hospitals dealing with COVID. Brian Williams clearly uncomfortable. I wonder if our Hoosier doctor will be back…

    IIRC, he’s the same one who made trump a “COVID Manual” out of construction paper and held it up for the cameras when trump told Jonathan Swann that all the books and manuals said you shouldn’t test too much.

  49. 49.

    prostratedragon

    @Another Scott:  Ah. I noticed the haze here in Chicago late afternoon and was wondering. I recall that smoke from the Australia fires last year or whenever covered much of the Earth eventually.

  52. 52.

    L85NJGT

    idk – here the local GOP is just trying to hold onto the county. There was a Monmouth Florida poll today that had a pretty significant slip for Trump when they included the Libertarian. l suspect the under count and third party bleed in the ‘burbs will pull him under in states you wouldn’t expect. It’s what happens to disliked incumbents.

  54. 54.

    prostratedragon

    I don’t think it is or ever was 45 per cent of the whole electorate, either. Millions have had their votes actively supressed or denied because of felony convictions. And then there are those who could be helped by this new product, as seen recently on Colbert’s show:

    A New Miracle Drug

    It sounds as if tonight’s town meeting might have provided at least a few folks out there with a loading dose.

  58. 58.

    prostratedragon

    A reminder from Spocko about Louis DeJoy and the USPS situation. He confirms what I suspected, that the Postmaster cannot be impeached by Congress, but can only be removed by the Board of Governors. Something for the next Congress to look into; Postmaster General used to be a cabinet position, which made it subject to impeachment.

    Spocko has the info to send postcards to the BoG, which I will be doing when my stock arrives in a couple of days.

  59. 59.

    BruceFromOhio

    In a post for Kamala Harris, I was hoping for some actual comments about Kamala Harris. So here is one.

    I wanted to vote for her in the primary SO FUCKING BAD it was like a step off a nasty cliff when she had to drop out. Then Biden asks her to be running mate and holy shit it is GAME ON.

    Biden/Harris 2020

  64. 64.

    RaflW

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Ingraham’s an awful hack. But she can see reality, even if it is just to be able to denounce it.

    One does wonder, given the galaxy brains running the Trump campaign, what guardrails they put in for selecting the voters who asked the questions.

    Any other GOP outfit, I’d expect them to negotiate the narrowest possible rules while still being able to claim the selection was ‘unbiased’. But these morans? Did they even think to vet the people? Hahah.

  66. 66.

    Ruckus

    @Jeffro:

    governing’s hard work, isn’t it Donnie?

    How the hell would he know, he never done one second of it..

    Golfing is hard work for him and look how bad he is at it.

  67. 67.

    RaflW

    @BruceFromOhio: On the topic at hand: I am guardedly hopeful that Kamala will fend off the Obama-Biden era orbit of advisers who made the very bad call to not go after the Banksters and the GW Bush malefactors.

    I know things are more complex than just this, but I do believe that that leniency 12 years ago was akin to the Senate not even censuring DJT earlier this year. It laid out a welcome mat for more abuse of our norms and systems.

    We need to perp-walk the folks who are routinely breaking the law in Trumpland. Fair trials, yes. I’m not a “lock ’em up” tit-for-tat person. But there’s plenty of real criming to uncover and prosecute. Ms. Harris has the background to make it an objective of the Admin.

  68. 68.

    Ruckus

    @Eljai:

    May as well shout your questions at a brick.

    The brick is smarter. And does more work in one day than trump has done in his entire life.

  70. 70.

    Ruckus

    @Kay:

    This is his typical type of response.

    He attempts to steal the spotlight by changing the question to fit his desired, abet extremely stupid, line of “thought.”

    It all has to be about him and him alone. He’s just not capable of real thought or emotion.

  72. 72.

    Ruckus

    @West of the Rockies:

    Well he does keep producing the shit for him to step in….

    Hard to get away from it when one of the world’s largest shit machines is with him 1000% of the time and lives in that malfunctioning waste recycling plant on top his shoulders.

  74. 74.

    J R in WV

    I was also relieved when Biden chose Harris for his VP, for several reasons. We do need someone prepared to prosecute the felons at the top of the administration, just for one.

    I was also disappointed when she dropped out so early, but maybe that was the correct decision given her information set. Maybe she will get a chance to do a huge lift for the nation!

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