Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

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

No Kings: Americans standing in the way of bad history saying “Oh, Fuck No!”

The words do not have to be perfect.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

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

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

The arc of the moral universe does not bend itself. it is up to us to bend it.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

Peak wingnut was a lie.

Everybody saw this coming.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

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

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

You are here: Home / Elections 2024 / 2024 Primaries / Late Night Open Thread: Other 2024 Protest Vote Alternatives

Late Night Open Thread: Other 2024 Protest Vote Alternatives

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If you thought Marianne Williamson’s candidacy was risible, behold the GOP alternative!

Pretty clearly, even more than Williamson, Ramaswamy’s ‘campaign’ is less about politics than about raising his media profile, and I wish the GOP joy of him. Just imagine the epic debates between him and Andrew Yang, while literal dozens of supporters wrangle in the audience.

Speaking of grifters, No Labels is working their usual corner as well:

I don’t trust Third Way either — they have the stink of the Goo-Goos upon them — but it’s not a bad article, although written at approximately a middle-school level.

Reader Interactions

54Comments

  1. 1.

    Chetan Murthy

    AAAAAhahahahaha!  This Ramaswamy jamoke is *such* a relief, after Raj Shah,  Kash Patel, Seema Verma, Ajit Pai, [memory failing me].  Such a welcome change!  Dude, spend your fortune, get as many GrOPers as possible to spend theirs!  You go, little guy!  Ha!

    As an Indian-American, I fully support imbeciles like this contesting the GrOPer nomination!

    Ha!   Too fucking hilarious!

    P.S. My dude, you should check the back of your FUCKING HAND, compare it to a paper bag, fucknugget!  And maybe visit East Incest, TX, *without* your personal security detail, and see if you still wanna be a fucking GrOPer, you fucking idiot!

  2. 2.

    raven

    Damn, I got a spinal injection yesterday and, as usual, I can’t sleep. Thanks for a fresh tread AL!

  6. 6.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    “I know Marianne,” said Bernie Sanders. “I’m sure she’s going to run a strong campaign and raise very important issues.”

    Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, by contrast, was firm in her support for Biden when asked about Williamson’s campaign.

    “I think that President Biden is going to be the Democratic nominee, and he’s going to be re-elected,” said Warren, saying she supported Biden because he’s “accomplished a tremendous amount in the last two years, and he’s got real momentum to keep on delivering for the American people.”

  8. 8.

    sab

    My sister has spent her life doing art history from China. Her kids are biracial (Chinese American). Her whole life is about let us get along and see each others’ culture.

    I am not happy to see a new cold war start up, but I do think China started it. But I am often wrong.

  9. 9.

    raven

    @sab: My buddy was a trainer with the Bejing Ducks for a year about 10 years ago. He got deathly ill there and still suffer from it. He also has a Chinese-American spouse and two bi-racial kids.

  10. 10.

    sab

    Not meaning to be rude, but who is this Ramaswamy guy and will America ever even hear of him? We don’t all listen to Faux.

  11. 11.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @sab: I’m not sure if I’d blame China as a whole.  This seems to be driven by Xi.

  12. 12.

    JPL

    Mitch has been hospitalized after a fall.   I for one hope that he’s okay, because the next Senator from KY could be worse.   Has trump sent his wishes yet?

  14. 14.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    I can hardly believe we’re at the point where we’re saying “the alternatives are worse” about Addison Mitchell “Moscow Mitch” McConnell. (Stipulate the paint-stripping expletives here, because if I start, I won’t be able to stop, and I don’t want to melt my keyboard speaking ill of the unfortunately-not-dead-ages-ago.)

  16. 16.

    JPL

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: True!

    He was at a private dinner in a hotel, but no one is saying with who.  Maybe  he was with a young aide, like others before him, but that is just gross.  Most likely he was with a lobbyist who promised him great sums of money.

  17. 17.

    Shalimar

    @Chetan Murthy: And wives. And children.  I usually agree with Bernie on most issues most of the time, but good god, anyone he even knows turns out to be an asshole.

  18. 18.

    Geminid

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: McConnell actually has been very forthright in his support of Ukraine, and he helped ensure that $44 billion in funding for military aid was included in the Omnibus spending bill that passed right before Christmas.

  20. 20.

    Geminid

    The Libertarian Party’s candidate may prove to be the “alternative” with the most reach. They consistently win ballot access in all or almost all 50 states. Gary Johnson won ~4.5 million votes in 2016, over twice as many as he won in 2012. That might have made the difference in Trump’s very close Electoral College win.

    The LP is under new leadership after the “Mises Caucus” took control last summer. They’ve dropped their abortion rights plank and adopted language suggesting an “alt-right,” white nationalist tendency. That would possibly win more potential Republican voters than Democratic, but if the money’s right they could choose a candidate with the intent to poach Biden voters. They could only make a difference if it were a close election.

  22. 22.

    Amir Khalid

    It was always my understanding that the FBI, being mostly a law-enforcement agency, was institutionally right-wing. Why does the GOP hate the FBI now?

  23. 23.

    Jackie

    Does anyone have a clue who would become Minority Leader should Mitch retire? I hate to say it, but I hope the fall was minor and he’s hospitalized strictly as a precaution.

  27. 27.

    Gvg

    @Amir Khalid: I guess not right wing enough to overlook things like breaking the law and trying to overthrow the government. The delusional true believers have told themselves ALL law enforcement and military are really on their side and when the time comes will just join them. It’s a little bit true here and there day to day but not when it’s full daylight full attack on the legitimate elected government etc. So they have reached the point of finding out and are but hurt over being prosecuted and even called names and shot at by cops…the fbi tends to lead investigations that cross state lines and find these felons, so they are getting blamed right now. Good. Hope the right leaning FBI agents are noticing too.

  28. 28.

    Anyway

    @Baud:

    I’m here for the Third Way vs. No Labels action.  Centrists in Disarray!

    There are two different ratfucking centrists groups?! All this while I thought they were the same entity. So much oligarch money out there to kneecap Ds

  29. 29.

    Anyway

    @Chetan Murthy:

    AAAAAhahahahaha!  This Ramaswamy jamoke is *such* a relief, after Raj Shah,  Kash Patel, Seema Verma, Ajit Pai, [memory failing me].

    Wonder what Bobby Jindal is up to these days… don’t think he was very adept at wangling some of that sweet RW oligarch moolah …

  31. 31.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @JPL:

    I for one hope that he’s okay, because the next Senator from KY could be worse.

    There is no possible fucking way that McConnell’s replacement will be more destructive than the Gravedigger Of American Democracy.  No.  Fucking.  Way.  Crazier, yeah.  Worse for the country?  Absolutely not.

  32. 32.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Geminid: What boggles me is that this is true, and there are worse Republicans in positions of power. He’s the grave-digger of American democracy, he packed the Supreme Court to the point where it no longer bears any semblance of justice, he can’t be trusted to keep to his word unless you’ve got a knife to the throat of someone whose welfare he cares about, and there’s still worse out there.

  35. 35.

    bjacques

    I’m wishing Mitch a full recovery, after a long convalescence at home, say 22 months

  38. 38.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR:

    there’s still worse out there.

    Who?  Seriously, who?  Crazier, sure.  But McConnell started the total obstruction now considered normal in the GOP, when a black man became president and his old Southern patrician ass decided the country needed to be punished.  McConnell has a talent for abusing norms that is very, very rare.  Trump was nothing without McConnell backing him.  McConnell was the lead in accepting Russian money, the acknowledged master of Republican fundraising.  His replacement GOP leader won’t have a fraction of his caucus control.  Or his ability to work the press.  DeSantis would be a flailing loser in McConnell’s job.  His replacement will inevitably be an incompetent.

    There are no worse options.  None.

  41. 41.

    schrodingers_cat

    @lgerard: Could be but he is independently wealthy. I know an MIT chemist who works for Ramaswamy’s company. This is a vanity campaign to raise Vivek R’s media profile. He is just another toxic CEO to do so.

  43. 43.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @schrodingers_cat: Yes. I’m always surprised at non-white, non-male, non-cishet types who align themselves with their haters, although I probably shouldn’t be. There are always outsiders who want to cozy up to power, even though it rarely ends well for them.

  50. 50.

    billcinsd

    @Geminid:That might have made the difference in Trump’s very close Electoral College win.

    I guess it might have but it is very, very unlikely to have made a difference in Trump’s electoral college win. About half Johnson’s voters would not have voted for either of the two major party candidates. The other half slightly favored Clinton but not enough to change the result.

  51. 51.

    Geminid

    @billcinsd: The reason I say that the Libertarian vote might have made the difference in 2016 was that it was so abnormally large that year. Gary Johnson got 4,490,000 votes in 2016, 3.3% of the vote. In 2020, the Libertarian vote reverted more to the norm; Jo Jorgenson received 1,865,000 votes, 1.2%. That was ~2,600,000 less than Johnson.

    In 2016, Trump won Pennsylvania by slightly under 45,000 votes; Johnson had 146,715 votes, 66,000 than Jorgenson won in 2020.

    Trump won Wisconsin by 23,000 votes in 2016; Johnson had 106,674, 68,000 votes more than Jorgenson’s total of 38,491 in 2020.

    Trump won Michigan in 2016 by a little under 11,000; Johnson received 172,136 votes there that year, 60,000 more than Jorgenson would receive in 2020.

    We’ll never know how those extra Libertarian voters would have voted in a two person race, or if they would have voted at all, which is why I said they might have made the difference. They may have been swayed by a dynamic peculiar to that election, though: a front runner who had been subjected to decades of character assassination, and who was also widely assumed to have the election sewn up. So I wonder how many of the Johnson voters decided that they had a “free” protest vote and cast it for Johnson instead of Clinton, who they might have backed as the lesser of two evils had they thought Trump actually had a chance.

    But like I said, a third party candidate can only be a spoiler in a very close election. We’ll get to see if the Libertarians or some other group make a real effort to promote a candidacy designed to peel off soft Democratic voters in 2024. I think the money will be there for them if they try, and so will the candidate.

    Personally, I think the 2024 election will be close only if the economy regresses. If the economy is strong, I think Biden will win by a margin that even a strong 3rd Party showing would not overcome.

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