Well, well, well pic.twitter.com/WdIoMNVtO6
— ProofOfBurden (@ProofofBurden) August 30, 2022
DC talking heads in shambles https://t.co/9biPx0r7XK
— ProofOfBurden (@ProofofBurden) August 29, 2022
President Biden will deliver a prime-time address in Philadelphia Thursday on the fight for democracy in America and “the continued battle for the soul of the nation,” a White House official said Monday. https://t.co/d4mFjpwM80
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) August 30, 2022
… Speaking at Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park, the president is expected to highlight his administration’s achievements and argue that the country’s democratic values will be at stake during the midterm elections.
“He will talk about the progress we have made as a nation to protect our democracy, but how our rights and freedoms are still under attack,” the official said. “He will make clear who is fighting for those rights, fighting for those freedoms, and fighting for our democracy.” The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to preview the content of the speech…
Thursday’s speech is not billed as a political event, and given its character as a prime-time presidential address, Biden may avoid some of his sharper denunciations.
The need to restore America’s basic values, including democracy and the rule of law, has been a theme of Biden’s presidency from the beginning. He has cited it as the reason he decided to run in 2020, describing his horror at the march of white supremacists in Charlottesville in 2017, and President Donald Trump’s comment afterward that there were “very fine people on both sides.”
Biden at times has suggested a central way to combat anti-democratic forces is to show that democracy and governing can work. That prompted some Democrats to complain that he was shying away from forcefully denouncing Trump and other Republicans who falsely claimed the last election was rigged and who may be laying the groundwork to challenge future legitimate elections.
But now Biden appears to be seeking to meld the two messages — saying “MAGA Republicans” are trying to destroy democracy, and Democrats and traditional Republicans are getting things done…
The sensible angle is that the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. I do speculate that this may be a rare national election where a strong ground game really matters. Regardless, I think cautious optimism is warranted. Things are going better than we could have hoped.
— chatham harrison is tending his garden (@chathamharrison) August 28, 2022
Cope: I love the smell of flop-sweat in the morning…
"If the Dems somehow miraculously come out of the midterms on top, doesn't that really probe just how in disarray they are?"
— Mr. Sunflower Enthusiast Grift (@djdunclive) August 29, 2022
It's really something watching Republican elites escape their bubbles and discover how much people despise Dobbs, their hack Supreme Court. and the war of terror and surveillance Republicans are unleashing on American women
— Scott Lemieux (@LemieuxLGM) August 28, 2022
We are better than you. https://t.co/KUdn5y5lRc
— Environmental Services Weedle (@PartyWurmple) August 29, 2022
About yesterday:
“It’s like being at a game where your team doesn’t win. It’s still good to go.”
Spectators who had gathered in Florida to watch NASA's new moon rocket blast off took it in stride when last-minute problems forced the postponement of the launch. pic.twitter.com/xsvbWLenFW
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 29, 2022
If anyone wants to send Engine 2058s employer an outraged email, I think it works for NASA. Well, it’s *supposed* to work for NASA
— Peter Hague PhD (@peterrhague) August 29, 2022
Albatrossity
Pundits in disarray!
germy shoemangler
germy shoemangler
Geminid
I think that control of the House will come down to 20 close districts. We may not even know for a day or so.
Unless there is a Democratic wave, which I think is possible.
lowtechcyclist
It will be difficult, I know, but I’m sure I can find a way to deal with that.
@Albatrossity:
I’m loving it.
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
Yeah, I need to start following election Twitter again, so I can see which districts this one is likely to swing on.
Aussie Sheila
I think this mid term is the most important ever. If the Dems can squeeze out holding Congress and increase the Senate by two, they must, before anything else, pass voting and election reform. Even before legislating Roe. The most gut wrenching thing about US politics to me is the lack of guaranteed voting rights for everyone, and the ability of politicians to choose their voters. Even a revitalised Labor movement won’t be able to move much nationally in the absence of guaranteed fair voting and honestly counted ballots. It is shocking just how long US elites have been able to get away with such a democratic travesty and how little attention mainstream US media pay this obvious democratic deficit.
I understand that in some blue states, and even red states where African American votes are scrunched up, there may be some resistance to root and branch reform. But no long term change is possible without universal access to an honest and fair ballot.
My $0.02 worth.
germy shoemangler
Also, “how dare” Biden call them semi-fascists…
Danielx
@Albatrossity:
and how sweet it is.
Ken
@lowtechcyclist: My personal plan is to not move on from Biden in 2024, if he chooses to run again. I’ll somehow have to find a way to let go in 2028
(I assume that, unlike some recent holders of the office, Biden is aware he can’t be elected a third time.)
Baud
@Aussie Sheila:
If we get those numbers, we will pass voting reform.
Baud
The news media I’ve seen really have downplayes Dobbs. We’ll see if they were right to do so.
Geminid
@lowtechcyclist: Southern California could be interesting. Dems flipped 6 seats there in 2020, and Republicans flipped 4 back in 2020, I believe. Nonpartisan redistricting there puts a lot of districts in play.
The success of Democratic incumbents like Elaine Luria (VA), Marcy Kaptur (OH), and Sharice Davids (KS) will be key. Redistricting left them with 50-50 or slightly worse districts.
germy shoemangler
rikyrah
@Aussie Sheila:
ICAM👏🏾👏🏾
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Baud: My fury at Dobbs is cold now, rather than hot, but cold fury lasts. I will check every local race I see for a Planned Parenthood endorsement. I will NEVER cross the line of voting for someone who enabled that monstrosity.
Unrelated, but I will also check the candidate’s NRA rating.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone😊😊😊
germy shoemangler
rikyrah
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Cold rage does last. I, too, am evidence of this.😠
Josie
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Strangely enough, I would guess you will find a correlation there.
rikyrah
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Part of my persistent rage…reading stories like this everyday😠😠
@pelleggi2 MD (@pelleggi2) tweeted at 6:45 PM on Mon, Aug 29, 2022:
Texas is threatening to DEFUND hospitals that perform abortions under EMTALA laws. What does this mean ? It means that doctors do NOT have ACCESS (like me right now) to medications that prevent hemorrhage in a pregnant woman. Let. That. Sink. In. Register. Vote. #ROEVEMBER
(https://twitter.com/pelleggi2/status/1564398778068656128?s=02)
Dorothy A. Winsor
@rikyrah: Yes. Women are reminded of this decision on a regular basis, if not with their own medical care, then with that of friends, acquaintances, and news stories. It’s part of our daily lives. How do you forget something like that?
JMG
Events drive politics, but not all events, since most voters (and non-voters) are creatures of habit. All polling, political science and forecasting models are therefore based on the habits, since most of the time, that’s what happens. There are events and EVENTS in politics, however, and Dobbs looks like its one of those all-caps events. Because such events are rare, they are harder for actual students of elections, let alone pundits, to account for.
It is worth noting that some poll analysts have been reduced to saying “polls underestimated Trump in 2020, therefore they are underestimating Republicans today.” For some reason, it is never considered that Democrats might be underestimated by the polls.
Thor Heyerdahl
In the words of the late, great efgoldman: “fuck ’em”
germy shoemangler
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
There needs to be a way for blue states to make their nonpartisan redistricting contingent on red states’ doing the same. Otherwise it’s just unilateral disarmament.
Hopefully any voting rights legislation next year will define some nationwide standards for the drawing of Congressional districts, and at least somewhat alleviate that problem.
germy shoemangler
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Scout211
@germy shoemangler: I posted an excerpt from that Rolling Stone article last night. Very creepy. Most of this is speculation. But it would be irresponsible not to do so, right? 😉
From downstairs:
From Rolling Stone
rikyrah
40 PAGES PREPARED BY REAL LAWYERS
Spiro Agnew’s Ghost (@SpiroAgnewGhost) tweeted at 5:56 PM on Mon, Aug 29, 2022:
🚨🚨BREAKING: Judge grants the DOJ’s request to have **40** pages to respond to Trump’s lawyers & lay out their position, giving them a huge chance to reveal more damning information. Trump’s idiotic move to ask for a “special master” will backfire no matter what now.
(https://twitter.com/SpiroAgnewGhost/status/1564386463571066883?s=02)
germy shoemangler
@Scout211:
Geminid
@Scout211: I’d love to see the dossier French intelligence has on trump!
Scout211
@rikyrah: I saw that this morning. The hearing is still set for Thursday after Trump’s lawyers submit their response to the 40 page filing tomorrow. 24 hours* to respond to a 40 page filing. Ha ha.
*Actually, that response has probably already been written and will be some version of whining victimhood with a few legal-type words thrown in. 😉
mrmoshpotato
@germy shoemangler: So Marge Three Types of Shit really is a troll – a small, trashy, 2-foot-tall troll.
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Baud
@JMG:
I believe the polls underestimated Dems in 2018.
eclare
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Amen sister.
Scout211
Some hints that Chuck Todd may soon be out as Meet the Press host. The Daily Beast.
germy shoemangler
@Geminid:
Oui Tape
Baud
@Scout211:
I’m not convinced that Welker is much of an improvement, but Todd has become a meme. The only reason he’s lasted this long is that he says what the execs want to hear about Dems.
Geminid
@Baud: The professional pundits certainly underestimated Democratic voters in 2018. Their consensus was that Democrats would pick up 15-20 seats, and they picked up 40 instead.
They lost about 11 of these in 2020, plus Colin Peterson lost a rural Minnesota seat that had been hanging by a thread for two elections.
Ken
Undoubtedly, but they may have to do some quick edits depending on what TFG has tweet-confessed to in the interim.
eversor
@Scout211:
Oh fucking god damn it. It always gets worse.
Amir Khalid
@lowtechcyclist:
I don’t understand the obsession with moving on from Joe Biden. The way things are going, he will be the Democratic party’s best shot at holding the White House in 2024 unless he’s not healthy enough to run.
kalakal
@germy shoemangler: How does she get out? Abseil?
One simple ear infection and Margerine would be unable to drive due to vertigo
Barbara
@rikyrah: Most local federal court rules require all substantive memoranda to be no longer than 25 pages without leave of the court. No doubt the DOJ has been pulling the memorandum together since Trump first filed his motion for a special master.
Dorothy A. Winsor
My guess is there’ll be a lot of furor about whether Harris should remain on the ticket, on the grounds that we want the VP to be ready to be the next president. After HRC, I’m not convinced American will vote for a woman, much less one of color. That’s unfair to Harris, but we need to win.
Ken
Starts to step out and has just enough time to say “oh fuck not again” before she face-plants.
(The repeated blows to the head would explain quite a lot.)
Barbara
@Amir Khalid: It’s not my obsession, and it’s not the obsession of people I know. It’s a press obsession because the press is obsessed with horse races and they won’t get one if Biden stays. It’s also a bit of an obsession with people who run campaigns for pretty much the same reason.
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
He’s not going to drop Harris.
Just One More Canuck
@Albatrossity: “What is best in life?” “To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their pundits”
JPL
@Geminid: I’ll pass.
Fair Economist
@Amir Khalid: The obsession is from people who want the Democrats to *lose*. Villagers, Republicans, and pseudo-leftists.
Baud
@Geminid: That’s the kind of miss I’d like to see in November. It would tear the GOP apart.
Geminid
@Amir Khalid: Some people are still upset that their favorite did not win in 2020 and want a do over. Others just want the excitement a contested primary would bring.
I think that Biden will do as he’s said, and run for a second term if his health holds up. If he decides not to, I think Democratic leaders and voters will rally around the Vice President and she will win the primary with the same coalition that Biden won with.
lowtechcyclist
@Barbara:
Yeah, I think this is it. Even after the disasters of 1994 and 2010, respectively, Clinton had no trouble winning in 1996, and Obama won by a decent margin in 2012. Unless Biden’s physical or mental health abruptly declines over the next two years, he’s our guy in 2024.
And re Kamala: after 2016, I honestly don’t know when America will be ready to elect a woman as President. I’m hoping that Biden steps down after maybe a year of his second term, so that Kamala can run as the incumbent in 2028.
kalakal
In about 1 weeks time Liz ‘deer in the headlights’ Truss will be the British PM. For those of you who don’t know about her she is truly as thick as mince. Here is Nerine Skinner doing a a parody that perfectly captures why she’s a serious challenger to flobalobs worst PM ever title
https://youtu.be/7v6KTzhzCC8
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Geminid:
A lot of folks don’t seem to realize that they lead the same coalition in the Democratic Party.
Amir Khalid
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Remember, more people voted for Hillary than for TFG. I’m pretty confident Kamala Harris will be better qualified (and saner) than any Republican presidential nominee she ever faces.
lowtechcyclist
@Just One More Canuck:
And their donors. I want to hear the lamentations of Koch and the DeVos family and all the rest of the big GOP donors, weeping over their loss of influence.
eversor
Biden will run and might win in 2024 and 2028 will be an open primary because of lessons learned in 2016. These are all good things. I’m a firm believer in contested and bloody primaries because they build an election infrastruture. We want that.
kalakal
@Baud: Absolutely. It would be a glorious sight to see, the self immolating GQP
Another Scott
@Amir Khalid: It’s the lazy American political press being lazy. They like nothing better than asking someone, “So, are you going to give us some breaking news today and announce you are going to run for President? Pretty please??!”
It’s that plus, “Democrats in Disarray!!”
Objectively, in normal times, there are only a few elected jobs as secure as being a POTUS running for re-election. Even W was re-elected after the disaster his first term was… Boring, predictable news doesn’t sell papers, generate clicks, draw eyeballs for advertisers.
(Of course, the stakes are so high that a Democratic POTUS should never take re-election for granted.)
Cheers,
Scott.
eversor
@lowtechcyclist:
The GOP is being run out of the church and Peter Theil right now. The Kochs are old news. Musk and Theil want DeSatan, they have more cash and pull than the Kochs and they aren’t old yet.
Ken
Regnery Publishing has issued a recall for Dinesh D’Souza’s book “2000 Mules”, which pushes his claims of election fraud. Cancel culture run amuck, or a publisher trying to avoid paying a few hundred million to Dominion Voting?
Tony G
@germy shoemangler: It has taken only two years for these thugs to go from “blue lives matter” to threatening the lives of law enforcement officers. The scum of the earth.
lowtechcyclist
@Amir Khalid:
I remember, but I remember that due to our crazy Electoral College system, she lost. I also remember that even though Biden won the popular vote by a huge 7 million votes, his margins in the states that gave him his Electoral College majority were razor-thin.
Our candidate has to win in this fucked-up system we’ve got, and even a huge popular vote win might not be enough one of these times.
germy shoemangler
@Ken:
Geminid
@kalakal: Even if the stakes riding on the midterms weren’t so high I’d still want a Democratic win just so I could see the looks on McCarthy’s, Scalise’s, and Stefanik’s faces at their press conference the day after.
(Now I’ll knock on wood)
lowtechcyclist
@eversor: Thanks for the nitpick.
Betty Cracker
@Scout211: Does Welker know how to answer follow-up questions? If so, she’d be a huge improvement!
@eversor: Kind of OT, but does anyone else find it suspicious that a Twitter “whistleblower” emerged just when it looked like Musk was about to lose his $1B “earnest money” from the collapsing bid for Twitter? That’s a shitload of money from which one could imagine a very large bribe being carved out.
Ken
@germy shoemangler: I wonder if the “publishing error” will turn out to be the decision to print the author’s manuscript? I guess we’ll know if the new release turns out to be a slimmed-down, 30-page illustrated children’s book.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: I think the country was Ready for Hillary in 2016 – she did win the popular vote after all.
I’m old enough to remember when the Secretary of State was a huge prestigious job that only someone with the gravitas of an Old White Male could do it. Obviously. Because that’s just the way it is, and there unfortunately just aren’t any women available to do that important job….
Until Madeleine Albright was appointed an confirmed and did just fine.
Similarly with long-distance swimmers.
Similarly with top-fuel dragster racers.
Similarly with astronauts.
Similarly with world-champion soccer stars.
Women are obviously up to the job, and the country is suffering because the Old White Men, and their enablers, at the top refuse to recognize that.
If/when Kamala runs, she’ll win. And the country will be better off for it.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
:^D
Edmund Dantes
@Scout211: have his lawyers even submitted a valid sword complaint yet or is she still letting them do this without the basic’s required of any normal set of attorneys?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Ken:
Dominion is like the Iron Bank in GoT, an unseen and shadowy force that everyone fears even if no one can quite see them. There’s another pop culture reference that’s on the tip of my neurons but I can’t quite reach
PPCLI
@Scout211: I wonder what other blackmail material from Trump’s collection got swept up in the raid.
Amir Khalid
@Ken:
What Regnery really should do is cancel publication and dun Dinesh for every last penny of whatever advance they paid him.
lowtechcyclist
@Another Scott:
But again, due to our crazy system, not enough of the country was ready for Hillary. And Biden’s popular vote margin was more than double Hillary’s, but Trump came within a hair of (legitimately) winning anyway.
That’s the bar for when the country will be ready to elect a Democratic woman as President. We weren’t there in 2016, and I don’t believe we’re there yet.
Ken
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It’s a popular trope. In Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, gods are created and empowered by human belief, and there’s an entire spookshow that rides around in black SUVs and black helicopters, intimidating people. Because there’s enough belief in that.
There’s also the Shadow (“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?”).
lowtechcyclist
@Amir Khalid:
That would likely be the best course for them, but I’m hoping they still publish, then both Regnery and D’Souza get sued for every last dime. That would be the best thing for the rest of us.
Betty Cracker
@lowtechcyclist: You could be right, but it’s tough to draw definitive conclusions from HRC’s run because so many shitty variables came together just so to undermine her bid. Some of it was stuff maybe we should have foreseen, but a lot of it was just plain old bad luck.
Ken
@lowtechcyclist: Is Regnery the one with the business model largely based on bulk purchases by PACs and similar groups, to stuff into the grift-bags at conservative events?
Another Scott
Law, shmaw. They know what they did, amirite??
We have to vote the monsters out.
(via nycsouthpaw)
Cheers,
Scott.
germy shoemangler
@Ken:
thread:
Betty Cracker
@Another Scott: I was reading about that earlier. What a sham. Actually, the entire state should have laughed its collective sunburned ass off at the ballyhooed announcement that DeFascist’s multimillion-dollar personal elections police bagged 20 allegedly fraudulent votes out of 11 MILLION ballots cast.
But the point was to intimidate Florida voters, which is why DeFascist appeared before a phalanx of sycophantic sheriffs in the state’s largest blue county. He knows what he’s doing.
Barbara
@Ken: I am so glad Dominion is going after these people. Normally, like Trump, the RW noise machine goes after individuals whose ability to punch back is constrained by fear and resources. How they ever thought they could treat a well-resourced commercial entity with a lot on the line the same way is just beyond me.
germy shoemangler
Scout211
F-POTUS finally hired an attorney.
Bill Arnold
@Geminid:
Bill Palmer published this useful list, with links, yesterday:
Here are the competitive Democratic House midterm candidates you should support right now (August 29, 2022)
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
I know this would never happen and arguably it should never happen….but does anyone else like the idea of Biden running and winning in 2024….then maybe a month in, resigning so Madame Vice President could take his seat? Just for the brains exploding alone I’d love to see it.
Edmund Dantes
@Fair Economist: and don’t forget the conservative Dem house members in Minnesota. Or are we going to ignore that little tidbit of centrist wankery?
https://www.minnpost.com/elections/2022/08/minnesota-democrats-in-congress-split-over-support-of-biden-in-2024/
geg6
@Baud:
She’s pretty much as terrible as Todd. I can’t stand her and, whenever she comes on my TV, I change the channel or mute it. Just awful.
Edmund Dantes
@lowtechcyclist: after year two if we were to do it. We want her to be able to run for re-election twice. Not once.
ian
@Ken: That is a wonderful book. If any of our jackal commentariat needs new reading material, I highly recommend it.
Betty Cracker
Does anyone know what time Biden’s address is tonight? This is one I definitely want to watch!
Omnes Omnibus
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain: I am not going to speculate, guess, or toy around with anything to do with 2024 until after the November election.
Edmund Dantes
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain: see my above. You want to do it after year two. So the person gets to run twice and not once. You can get 10 years as president. 2 years on a previous president term. And 8 years via normal election
Brachiator
This gets right down to the real nitty gritty. Media pundits have ignored the issue, but it gets down to deciding what kind of nation we want to be, and whether democracy will continue.
Trump was a flashy piece of trash who played to voters’ resentments. He promised to look for (or create) enemies to vanquish, but most of all, to hurt the “right” people on the way to making America great again. In exchange, people just had to accept a crude, insecure bully who treated the government as though it was a bauble he had won in a deal.
Some people don’t want to acknowledge what Trumpism is really all about. The GOP leadership is in deep denial. They think that clinging to Trump will guarantee their dreams of perpetual tax cuts and a small government that does nothing but oppress targeted groups and polices sexuality and behavior in the name of the Baby Jesus.
The average Trump supporter is in a deeper denial, believing that his future success and happiness is absolutely dependent on fucking over people he thinks are unworthy or shouldn’t even be allowed to live in this country.
You could denounce these dopes all day long and it wouldn’t matter.
It comes down to those people who are willing to look at where we are now, and who are willing to reject Trumpism and its variants. Like the old union song says, “Which side are you on?”
Biden is a good man. I look forward to this address.
Geminid
@Edmund Dantes: Minnesota Representatives Dean Phillips and Anfmgie Craig are not conservative.
karensky
@Albatrossity: Toadally!
eversor
@Another Scott:
SECSTATE was always odd because the GOP loved SECDEF more. This is just like how in the IC there are the analysts and the operations group, the GOP loves operations and hates the nerds.
Haspel was the first woman CIA director.
The Moar You Know
F-POTUS finally hired an attorney.
@Scout211: I’ve always wondered how an attorney would handle a situation where said attorney would require reasonable prepayment for the entire term/effort of their services.
kindness
Too many media people are still projecting conventional wisdom in proclaiming Republicans will gain seats in the midterm elections. Just because. Honestly, women are pissed and are voting. The bulk of us (and many Independents) are pissed and voting. I know gerrymandering works against Democrats but I don’t think Democrats are going to lose the House. I suspect we’ll actually gain seats there. Because we’re all still pissed at Republican’s hopes of Gilead.
Ken
@The Moar You Know: “This covers my pro bono service for the next 50 years.”
Omnes Omnibus
@The Moar You Know:
You make the client put up the money in advance and bill against it. You tell the client that you representation will not be begin until the money is in your client account. It’s not like lawyers have never had to do this before.
Geminid
@Bill Arnold: Thanks, that’s an interesting list.
I noticed they left Henry Cuellar (TX-28) off, even though his race is rated a tossup. I guess they worried that some Democrats are so mad at him that their animus might rub off on the others.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: Today he gives a speech in PA on gun safety at 3:15.
Thursday primetime is when he gives the speech about the soul of the nation.
eversor
@kindness:
It’s the CHRISTIANS hope of Gillead. The GOP donor base does not care. But each Sunday their voters come out waving their bibles after praying to the cross and they want it. Christianity corrupted the GOP and conservatism, it destroys all it touches in enough time. Orban, did it all for the Jesus. Putin, in bed with the church.
The root problem is that religion, always was, always will be. And until people get that through their heads and start directing their wrath at Churches and realizing that “good Christians” are worse than “good conservatives”, “good Republicans” and possibly even “good Nazis” we are fucked.
Take out the Church. Full stop. Strip down laws and go after them. Make the cross into a swastika, make the bible mein kampf. Because we cannot do that, we are over.
UncleEbeneezer
@Amir Khalid: It’s a GOP/Russian talking point meant to depress Dem turnout that some normies and anti-Dem Lefties are foolish enough to parrot.
Betty Cracker
@JPL: Well, that explains why I can’t find it today! Thank you! (Time has no meaning for me anymore…)
Amir Khalid
@eversor:
Oh no, not this nonsense again.
Omnes Omnibus
@eversor: Woohoo! Bigotry for breakfast.
@Amir Khalid: It’s endless.
JPL
trump has been on a 24/7 meltdown. The DOJ is responding to the quack judge today.
Does anyone else, wonder if the timing of the speech on democracy that President Biden is going to deliver on Thursday is related to trump and the DOJ.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: I thought it was Thursday
Tony Jay
@eversor:
So, just out of interest, is there a specific wingnut site you’re producing these amateurish ratfuckerisms for, or is this a wholesale operation churning out the underbridge equivalent of NFTs for emerging fucktard markets?
Bear in mind, you’re a very silly person either way.
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It is. I was mixed up about the time of the speech or what day it is or both.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: With trump’s and Graham’s warnings about riots if trump is arrested, I find Biden’s timing suspicious. The Fulton County attorney general said she won’t finish her investigation until the end of the year, so it’s not that.
Geminid
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sounds like there will be good weather for the President’s speech. The Philadelphia weather forecast for Thursday is a high of 86° with a 2% chance of rain.
JPL
Apparently, trump is still in middle school, because he continues to brag about Macron’s sex life. Rolling Stone magazine has a tape of trump, but I haven’t listened. Not sure I will.
Ken
I wouldn’t think so, since POTUS has been pretty clear that he’s not involved with, much less coordinating timing with, the DOJ investigation. The speech will probably touch on TFG’s disgraceful behavior, and that of the Republicans who are still supporting his false claims, because that’s the most recent and visible symptom of the danger.
That said, I wouldn’t mind if partway through the speech Biden says “I’ve just been handed a bulletin… Former president Trump has just been indicted by the state of Georgia for election fraud, and by the state of New York for every other kind of fraud.”
Josie
@eversor: Oh, good grief. The GOP was corrupt, misogynist, and racist long before they discovered religion. You need to study up on your political history,
BruceFromOhio
@germy shoemangler: OUI OUI tape!
Cameron
@eversor: Not real big on the First Amendment thingie, are we?
Another Scott
@JPL: This “news” (re TFG and Macron) is the near the bottom of the list of least surprising things in the world. You know that TFG is still sore about the various times he was on the losing end of their handshake.
He’s such a petty, small, stupid, vain man.
Cheers,
Scott.
Chip Daniels
Slightly OT, but data points for the benefit of voting Democrat, always up and down the ballot:
California lawmakers make a deal on livable wages and affordable housing in two bills sent to Newsom
and
California Legislature passes bill to protect fast-food workers
https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2022-08-29/california-senate-pass-bill-fast-food-workers
The point here is that while neither of these bills is earth-shattering or radical, they ARE measurable improvements to the lives of millions of people, and proof that having a Democratic supermajority allows states to be progressive.
We pay a lot of attention to national races and the big-fucken-deal things like ACA and the college debt forgiveness, but often overlook how important it is to control the states and local jurisdictions where the most immediate and measurable impacts are felt.
Baud
@JPL:
It’s France. You’d probably gin up more outrage talking about what flavor ice cream Macron likes.
BruceFromOhio
@Bill Arnold: ugh, three toss-ups in OH. The semi-fascisti in this state have been busy busy busy vertically fornicating the maps, and this does not bode well. Kaptur was in a pretty safe D until now.
Chetan Murthy
@Tony Jay:
So say we all.
Urban Suburbanite
Seattle’s unaccomplished councilmember turned sub-mediocre mayor is really flailing now. His kissing up to police has kicked up to a new level, he’s been lashing out and making a bunch of threats he doesn’t have the juice to follow up on, including threatening to take out most of the city council. The anti-homeless measures he’s obsessed with have accomplished little aside from paying out generous OT to police, the piles of money he’s thrown at SPD have accomplished nothing (and even Rantz and his mascara-d eyebrows know it), so now it’s time to play victim, drop names, and really kiss up to the cops.
*As much as I hate linking to anything with Rantz’s name on it (although I doubt that lazy twat actually wrote any of it), it’s the only actual reporting on this tantrum.*
https://mynorthwest.com/3610734/rantz-seattle-mayor-privately-blasts-homelessness-groups-inexperienced-council/
Baud
@Chip Daniels:
Not sure how this hurts trans people, but if you say this is good government, I’ll take your word for it.
JWR
@Scout211:
Five unnamed sources? That seems quite a lot, and for some reason, gave me a chuckle. ; )
Geminid
@Chip Daniels: And unlike the gerrymandered supermajorities in red states, California Democrats won their supermajority fair and square, on a neutrally drawn district map.
JAFD
@The Moar You Know: Old lawyer joke on the subject: “I’d like to request a postponement. I haven’t been able to reach my witness, Mr. Green.”
Barbara
@Baud: I remember controversy over the outcome of the annual competition to designate the best French bread, when it turned out the winning bakery was run by a man of Algerian descent. OTOH, there is an emerging backlash in France to the culture of “vive la difference” when it serves as a get out of jail free card for men taking advantage of women and adolescents. Just speculating that since Macron is married to an older woman, like signifcantly older, it seems unlikely he is chasing adolescents on the side. Everything else seems to be considered kind of ho hum.
Scamp Dog
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain: Nah, make it a day or two past the two year mark so she can run twice. Ten years of a Harris presidency!
JPL
@Scout211: There’s no way trump is paying the legal fee. The RNC is paying and asking him nicely not to campaign
Since trump is quoting Q as a valid source, whatever message they sent, didn’t work.
Jinchi
TFG never did understand the relationship between stones and glass houses, did he.
stinger
@Baud: Dobbs affects the day-to-day lives of women. Most of us won’t forget just because it’s not headlined in the media.
AWOL
@Ken: Good news. They’ve lost quite a bit of dough. For an August 30 release, the book went to bed around mid-May. They’ve already paid a fortune for paper, distribution, marketing. If the jacket has effects, it’s a small fortune now for publishers to put out. The vetting lawyer at $400+/hour probably fucked up, so they have to get a new vetting lawyer to endure reading this shitbird’s rants. They’ll also have to pay extra to the text and jacket printers to rush this hot garbage out for the rubes.
Matt McIrvin
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I’m saying it now: Biden will not drop Harris and barring health problems not currently in evidence, he will run again in 2024 on a Biden-Harris ticket. Whether he can actually win reelection is beyond my ability to predict.
But all of the alternatives to doing this are such a bad look that they would probably doom us–it doesn’t make sense to just hypothetically swap someone else in to get higher poll numbers and assume everything else is equal; it wouldn’t be. Dropping Harris for some other Johnny Unbeatable would alienate a huge chunk of the Democratic base. Biden dropping out for anything other than egregious health reasons would be trumpeted as a Democratic admission of failure.
JAFD
@Edmund Dantes: “have his lawyers even submitted a valid sword complaint yet”.
Took me a minute or two to realize this meant ‘_sworn_ complaint’, not a merger of the Trump plot track and the George RR Martin universe ….
Suzanne
@germy shoemangler: Dude. It took that person how many viewings of “The Silence of the Lambs” to figure out that it is have a major theme about every way men (dis)regard women?! Literally that first scene as she steps into the elevator with some male superiors and she looks up at the ceiling…..
I saw that movie far too young — maybe age ten? — and I picked that up. I feel like this is why diversity in criticism is so important.
Lecter is the consumptive, hungry male gaze incarnated into someone who literally eats people. And who, while in the institution, can literally only look. It’s so not subtle.
James E Powell
@lowtechcyclist:
It’s hard to gauge because no matter how many people say they would vote for a woman for president, a substantial portion always come up with objections for this particular woman.
An African American man won, but it really had to be that specific man, no? It’s like Obama had the combination to the safe. My model – just speculation on my part – for the image & public personality of the woman who can win it is Ann Richards. I don’t know if the resistance to a woman fades as the voters get younger. I do not trust polls on this question.
stinger
@lowtechcyclist:
After 3 years, so she can have two full terms of her own.
Geminid
@BruceFromOhio: Well, at least one of Ohio’s three tossup districts is held by a Republican. In OH-1 Democrat Greg Landsman is trying to unseat Steve Chabot. With the exception of one term 2009-11, Chabot has represented the 1st district since 1995.
Matt McIrvin
@Suzanne: Elizabeth Nelson is a woman and fairly young. She may not have been born when it was in theaters.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist:
This is the kind of thing that pundits love to speculate about in almost every presidential administration but that never happens (unless one counts Nixon, but that was under threat of near-certain impeachment and conviction).
If Harris succeeds to the Presidency in this way it will be because Biden either died or became obviously incapacitated.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@JAFD: I just figured it was one more legal term I didn’t know. I was perfectly willing to believe lawyers routinely filed “sword complaints” with the court.
JPL
@JPL: Update! Politico has an article stating that the RNC is not paying bills associated with the Mar-a-Lago search. I still don’t think he’ll foot the bill.
stinger
@Omnes Omnibus:
[licks lips, rubs tummy] Pie!
Layer8Problem
@Chetan Murthy:
Seconded.
Villago Delenda Est
I cannot state within the bounds of civility my loathing for the Village pundits.
mrmoshpotato
@eversor:
Nominated.
mrmoshpotato
@Villago Delenda Est:
Fuck civility, and fuck the Village pundits.
JPL
@mrmoshpotato: Wonder what Lindsay had to say about trump gossiping about others’ sex life.
Jinchi
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain: There was a lot of discussion about that when Biden won the nomination, but I think it’s fundamentally a bad idea with a good chance of backlash. Politicians don’t really get an incumbency boost until they’ve won an election on their own merits.
If Biden stepped down due to legitimate illness or incapacitation it would be one thing, but to deliberately quit after winning re-election he would look like he was simultaneously playing games with the presidency and implying that he didn’t think Harris could win it without him.
Ken
Yes, but it would have some complex Latin term that disguises its origin in a 3rd century Roman legal practice. Sort of like when your doctor uses a Latin medical term that translates to “blister on the small toe”.
StringOnAStick
@kalakal: Speaking as a fellow short woman (the ONLY thing I have in common with Marge) those giant trucks are impossible to see out of safely if you are less than standard guy height, because that’s who they are designed for. I would argue that even a standard height guy can’t see well enough out of a jacked up monster like that to safely drive it as well. That’s how little kids and pets get run over in driveways and for no discernible reason other than some moron wants a giant truck to rub in everyone’s face.
Montanareddog
@Another Scott:
Also, bitter because, unlike his loser-self, Macron got re-elected. And did so by defeating a Trump-sycophant Nazi
Ken
“We said we’d cover fees for civil lawsuits….”
A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno)
@TurnItOffAndOnAgain: No, Biden should resign Jan 21, 2027 – that way Kamala can be elected twice. A president can only serve a max of ten years.
misterpuff
I think it “quiet quit” NASA.
Ken
@Jinchi: Yeah, who does Biden think he is, Senator Grassley?
(Rumor has it Grassley is only running for re-election so he can step down next January and have his grandson appointed to the office by the governor.)
Matt McIrvin
@Jinchi: Yeah, it’s a bait and switch, basically–not something that would ever endear the beneficiary to voters. VPs who succeed for the usual reasons have it bad enough. LBJ got a boost from grief over the assassination of JFK that helped him pass landmark legislation and win reelection, but that aura was gone by 1968.
Zzyzx
@stinger: Democrats need to control Congress before I’d play that game or no replacement VP would ever get appointed and we’d be in danger.
topclimber
@Amir Khalid: I will say right out that I don’t want an 86-year President, which is what Biden will be if in office in 2028. That’s not a knock on Biden, but a concession to reality. If the Presidency gave Obama gray hair, what is it doing to a guy who will turn 80 two weeks after election day 2022?
ASSUMING the midterms create a stronger Democratic Congress that works with Joe to deliver even more than our narrow majority did, America 2024 is going to love Joe way more than today’s 45% approval ratings. Partly this is true because voters tend to like Presidents the most when they retire.
He will be perfectly positioned to cash in on voter goodwill and pass the torch to Kamala or another moderate liberal.
If the only way Dems can win in 2024 is with Biden at the head of the ticket, what do you think 2028 will look like? The GOP will have four more years to rehabilitate itself and hoodwink the famously inattentive majority of independents that they deserve a chance again. Because, shockeroo, the corporate media will be cheering it on.
We need the Presidency in 2024 and again in 2028.
Another Scott
@Jinchi: +1
Plus, you know that the press is going to start up the “Lame Duck!!” stuff on Wednesday November 6, 2024. The best thing for him and her and the country is for him to continue being president (if he’s able), her to continue to do things that bring visibility and show competence, and for both of them campaign hard for Democrats in every race in every election. Trying to personally campaign and govern effectively at the same time is very, very difficult – especially if you’re fighting suspicions that you were given an “unfair” advantage because you’re not good enough on your own… She doesn’t want to be thrown in that situation voluntarily.
Biden (and Harris) should continue to ignore advice from the pundits on Twitter. (“Hey, just because you defeated an incumbent president and beat his party worse than anyone since Hoover doesn’t mean that you know what you’re doing. Listen to me, anonymous guy on Twitter who’s never been elected to anything…!”)
Cheers,
Scott.
Montanareddog
@A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno):
I confess to being unfamiliar with the details of the relevant amendment. If, FSM forbid, the coral canker were elected in 2024, he could not run for re-election in 2028 as that would make 12 years?
mrmoshpotato
@Scout211:
Groomer perves. And fuck NBC and Press The Meat.
SiubhanDuinne
@eversor:
Oswald Mosley : Judaism :: Michelle Malkin : Islam :: Eversor : Christianity
A lot of us on this forum are religiously unaffiliated, or backsliders, or apostates, or heathens, or some flavour of atheist/agnostic/other. But you are the only one who routinely champions burning the Bible and essentially conducting a holy war (or anti-holy war) against Christians and Christianity.
Please knock it off. It’s tedious and hateful. I can’t speak for other commenters, but I will say that your rabid and zealous anti-Christian diatribes have turned me off to the point that I now pretty much discount everything you say on any subject. It’s a shame, because I think you have some smart and insightful things to say, but dragging your hatred of Christianity into every discussion no matter what the topic is just self-defeating.
Zzyzx
@Montanareddog: yes, that is the case:
“No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, “
Barbara
@Jinchi: This seems obvious to me too. It would be a way of evading electoral choice and for that reason it is a bad idea.
Elizabelle
@SiubhanDuinne: Thank you. You said it much more gently than I (or a lot of us, I suspect) would put it.
Those screeds drag the whole blog down.
Matt McIrvin
@Ken: In law it’s as likely to be medieval French. Something like “writ of espée esclastante”.
Barbara
@SiubhanDuinne: Yep. It’s tedious and hateful and if it keeps up I am definitely going to use the pie filter.
Omnes Omnibus
FFS, people have been gaming a one term Biden or a Biden resignation since before he was elected. It’s like everyone wants to look past him. He is doing fine. He is healthy. If these things change, then we can worry about what to do. For now, let’s not write off an extremely effective President.
mrmoshpotato
@misterpuff:
Haha! As opposed to Antares
Scout211
@Omnes Omnibus: 👍 👍👍👍👍👍 (Multiple upvotes)
Geminid
Michael Paulauski reported a new article by Gallup headlined “U.S. Approval of Labor Unions at Highest Point Since 1965.” Author Justin McCarthy writes about a new Gallup Poll:
Gallup has been asking this question since the 1930s. McCarthy writes, and approval of unions was at ~75% in the 1950s. Then it declined after to hit a low point in 2009.
@MichaelPaulauski writes a very interesting Twitter feed. He self-describes as “DemSoc leaning anarchism” but his clashes with other people on the left have earned him the pejorative nickname “Walmart Mike” (in his twitter header he says he works in “Walmart devops, opinions are my own”). A resident of Hoboken, New Jersey.
Paulauski and Magdi Semrau did some tag teaming this weekend on the issue of lefty support for the BBB bill, and the fur was flying!
Mike E
Good lord, it’s as if pie is no longer on the menu here. Sheesh.
@Omnes Omnibus: semi term will replace semi fascism on media feeds!
Kropacetic
@A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno): I’ll do you one better. Biden shouldn’t resign.
Omnes Omnibus
@SiubhanDuinne: Funny, I just call him a bigot.
Elizabelle
@topclimber: Get over yourself. Do you want Nancy Pelosi to throw herself down the stairs, too?
It’s phenomenal to have such skillful leadership. Youth is frequently overrated.
We need all the skill and luck we can muster.
mrmoshpotato
I don’t.
Another Scott
@topclimber: Yeahbut…
Biden’s mother lived to 92, his father to 86. Jimmy Carter is 97.
It really depends on how he holds up, but it’s not impossible for him to be doing well in his mid-80s and beyond.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Ken
Hence the workaround: do away with elections and just remain in the office forever.
topclimber
@Geminid: I want to see the look on Stefanik’s face when she realizes she has lost NY-21 to Matt Castelli.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: Recent Presidents have tended to live a very long time–medical science can’t work miracles, but if you get the absolute best health care the modern world can offer, as these people generally do, it certainly helps.
Peale
@Montanareddog: He’ll claim that his first term didn’t count because evil Democrats prevented him from doing what he wanted.
Plus, we’re well on the way to tin pot dictator land here anyway, so just do what tin pot dictators do and deem a new constitution passed even if it didn’t technically follow the process.
topclimber
@Another Scott: Given how climate change will ravage the world in the next decade, I want someone in their prime. It’s not a matter of how long you live WITHOUT the pressures of the Presidency (Jimmy Carter), it is how much you can bring to the job at a time the vast majority of people have much more than a step.
mrmoshpotato
@topclimber:
I’ll take it after all that Biden has accomplished in less than 2 years! I mean, he’ll be 164 years old at the end of his term, but OK!
Kropacetic
@topclimber: Well, if Biden is going to move on, the time do do that would be before 2024. That said, I think he’s doing great. This is the best Joe Biden the world has ever seen. I’m here for it and hope it continues.
Matt McIrvin
@Peale: When Trump was in office, one of his favorite rally lines was to give bogus reasons that he was entitled to run for a third, fourth or fifth term (amounting to “someone did something unfair to me so I get extra shots”). Complete nonsense but the crowd ate it up
Brad DeLong was just talking about Napoleon III aka Louis Bonaparte, and comparing his personality cult to Republican ur-fascism. Bonaparte was elected president of the French Republic but imitated his uncle and declared himself Emperor in order to evade a term limit. And… contrary to Karl Marx’s angry predictions, it stuck–he was actually quite popular up until the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, which broke the spell.
livewyre
@SiubhanDuinne: Kicking and screaming against pluralism and in favor of arbitrary authority comes in many forms, apparently. Not whether force should rule, but whose. It seems to me that what a given commenter implies should happen to Black churches is a pretty good indicator of one’s posture toward democracy in general. Not exactly inspiring of trust.
Omnes Omnibus
@topclimber: The individual doesn’t matter, just the actuarial tables?
catclub
@Ken: from “2000 Mules” to “2 mules for Sister sarah.”
Uncle Cosmo
Presume the Democrats take the Senate and hold the House this year. President Uncle Joe runs the table with the backing of the next Congress, coasts to victory and expands the majorities in 2024, puts the legislative program in high gear with MVP at the point person – then he resigns effective 21 January 2027, leaving MVP to take office as POTUS one day short of half the remaining term, thus eligible for two succeeding terms. That would cause more explosions on the Far Wrong side of the aisle than a Ukrainian HIMARS in a Russian ammunition dump…
(ETA: Dantes beat me to it at ##93 & 97 supra, dagnabit…and godDAMN I hate hate hate trying to edit a comment in Text mode!)
Omnes Omnibus
@Uncle Cosmo: Running the government to troll the GOP is as dumb as their attempts to do the reverse.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Montanareddog: 22nd Amendment. You can only be elected to the Presidency twice, and if you serve more than 2 years of someone else’s elected term, you can only be elected once.
James E Powell
@Baud:
The people who own NBC want to improve ratings, but they don’t want to improve the show itself.
Tony Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
What’s the relevant quote?
“It wasn’t a proper empire, but we had a devil of a good time.”
With ‘we’ doing a heroically load-bearing job in that claim.
ian
@topclimber:
I was just sampling long pig at the butcher. Choice is just as good as prime. The select might be less tasty.
topclimber
@Elizabelle: Well argued! It is true, I just can’t get over myself. It’s the jackal in me.
PS Nancy may well step down if 2022 goes our way.
JWR
@Omnes Omnibus:
This, seconded, thirded, and that is all.
Matt McIrvin
Generally speaking, I am not fond of government by One Weird Trick. To the extent that our political system has legitimacy at all, it comes from people believing it’s going to work in consistent and predictable ways. Pundits and political-drama writers live on the drama of counterintuitive and unexpected things happening. That’s not what you want when running a country, even if it means you have to live with some suboptimal situations.
topclimber
@Omnes Omnibus: I prefer to deal in probabilities rather than wishful thinking. We are in unchartered waters with an 86-year-old President.
MisterForkbeard
@AWOL: All Regnery will say is that there was a “publishing error” and refuses to say what the error actually was. I’m glad it’ll cost them money, but Regnery survives off of massive largesse from conservative donors and PACs who use it to legally bribe and pay any right-wing culture warrior or elected official they want to.
Regnery will unfortunately be just fine.
persistentillusion
@lowtechcyclist: Yes, please ltc! I have interacted with members of the Regnery family. Years ago, working for a bank in the same small Chicago suburb, I witnessed their happy acceptance of swindling an aged family member when simply doing the right thing and taking care of the family member was too onerous. Absolute slime balls, all of them.
Matt McIrvin
@Tony Jay: I do get the impression that Napoleon III was actually pretty competent, and threw the people enough liberal-reform bones to keep them tolerably happy for a couple of decades. And since he was literally the first President of France (well, in some sense), it wasn’t as if there was a strong republican tradition he was violating–it was sort of the “George Washington decides to become King” scenario. But military overextension eventually got him.
Omnes Omnibus
@topclimber: Well, there is a lot more at play than just one person’s age.
Jinchi
@Montanareddog: Correct, although TFG would scream at the injustice, he can only legally serve one more term as president.
cain
@Baud: and look at what got him – followed the company line and he still getting booted in the end. He made himself into a joke and that’s his final award. Not sure where he goes from here.
Paul in KY
@JWR: Would be funny to have some no-BS evil-lawyer-that-took-the-job that goes in to meet with TFG & he starts to bluster/BS and the person just cuts him off with ‘Shut up! That mouth is what has got you in this situation..this meeting will not commence till I get word the check has cleared…from now on you will only tweet or communicate what I want you to communicate’, etc. etc.
Probably would be bad for us, but would be funny to see someone just verbally slap his sorry ass.
HRA
As a senator Joe Biden wrote a paper on climate change and presented it to the Senate. It can be found in Google.
Paul in KY
@James E Powell: Ann would have been a fine candidate. I loved her!
Paul in KY
@Matt McIrvin: History is doomed to repeat itself. The first time in tragedy and the second in farce (as in Napoleon III).
Kropacetic
Yet their predictions and “wisdom” are so conventional. We need better media.
Timill
@Jinchi: Butbutbut… he’s already been elected twice, or so he says…
Jinchi
@Timill:
Good point! Based on a literal reading of the text,
he’s less than 6 months from talking himself out of the job.
He’d better get rid of those “President of the United States” podiums for a bit if he really wants the job again.
piratedan
@Bill Arnold: I would humbly suggest forwarding that to WaterGirl, as she’s busy assembling political activism items that we can use to help support those in need.
piratedan
@James E Powell: tbh, I would enjoy a non-partisan show, where the host actually knows and understands the subject matter and calls their guests out when they try and sneak in some boiler-plate bullshit propaganda, but that would almost guarantee that there are no GOP guests ever after the 2nd or 3rd time it happens.
Kropacetic
@Jinchi: Don’t be sure. Trump didn’t act as President even when he nominally had the job.
Peale
@Matt McIrvin: He would claim that Hillary stole the election from him even though he won, so the first election never took place. So he’ll claim that since he lost the popular vote due to all the illegal voting, 2016-2020 Hillary was President or that the office was vacant because no one technically knew who won because of Democratic shenanigans. Because he would do that at all his rallies.
Actually that’s a likely claim. In 2032, just sew so much chaos that no election tally can be relied on and declare himself interim president until we get to the bottom of things.
WaterGirl
@Betty Cracker: I think it’s Thursday, but maybe I’m wrong about that.
edit: from the Washington Post
President Biden will deliver a prime-time address Thursday on the fight for democracy in America and “the continued battle for the soul of the nation,”
Matt McIrvin
@Peale: Much like the way that in January 2021, they were relying on left-wing counter-protesters to show up and start some kind of bloody fracas with the insurrectionists, so that they could send in the National Guard and declare an emergency in the midst of which the vote certification could be interrupted, effectively maintaining the coup for at least a while. Who knows who got elected? Washington is in chaos!! But the counter-protesters didn’t materialize.
prostratedragon
@Matt McIrvin: LBJ not a good generic example because of the Vietnam War. Without it he’d probably have won another landslide against Nixon.
SiubhanDuinne
@prostratedragon:
Absent the Vietnam War (and all the directly-related social upheaval domestically), I wonder whether Nixon would even have run in 1968.
Pointless speculation, I know.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Damn straight sister! And I’m 70 yo, so it’s not a personal problem for me, luckily.
The Lodger
@JAFD: Are you needling us again?
Ruckus
@SiubhanDuinne:
I have 2 people pied. Guess who is one of them.