Thank you for your support, Dean Phillips. Have a nice retirement. https://t.co/2pVKvIWxk4 pic.twitter.com/X6tqKq1UlV
— Mark R. Yzaguirre (@markyzaguirre) November 25, 2023
Minnesota’s Dean Phillips (D-WhatWasHeThinking) has a good start on winning this cycle’s ‘most entertaining no-hoper candidate‘. Be better for his own mental health if he acceded to this fact, but noooo, he’s a rich White Man and he’s gonna fight every inch of the way down…
He announced on Friday that he wouldn’t run for reelection to his House seat, and a couple of good Democratic candidates have already stepped forward. So he has plenty of time on his hands to… start personal beef with every supporter of Vice-President Kamala Harris on twitter. Not a path I’d have chosen, but you do you, Dean.
Brief recap of the original gaffe:
Congressman Dean Phillips, after getting dragged within an inch of his life, now says he “doesn’t recall” making those comments about @KamalaHarris pic.twitter.com/PhmCbmsKLT
— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) November 22, 2023
But… Many people are saying!
This is why I don’t trust a majority of White Male Democrats including Dean Phillips.
Dr. King warn us about White Liberals like Dean Phillips. pic.twitter.com/6NY4Z5Mdt7
— The Chanteezy Is Real ♉️ (@iamchanteezy) November 22, 2023
Not at all!
But just so you know, that means#WelcomeBackDonald
— Dean Phillips (@deanbphillips) November 27, 2023
Minnesota Democratic voter:
Are you eligible for unemployment if you choose to give up work like this? https://t.co/Zegj4xPbNm
— Clean Observer (@Hammbear2024) November 24, 2023
Note the number of ‘likes’ (the heart icon):
It's quite jarring to watch Joe Biden engage in successful high stakes international diplomacy on one side, and Dean Phillips get triggered by a hashtag on the other.
Talk about a guy not ready to be anywhere near the Oval Office.#DropOutDean https://t.co/ZdfGif6P0g
— That Unhinged Biden Guy (@What46HasDone) November 28, 2023
Dean Phillips will be dropping out pretty soon. #DropOutDean pic.twitter.com/2qg3Ltaj9p
— The Chanteezy Is Real ♉️ (@iamchanteezy) November 27, 2023
And just incidentally, he’s giving that Harlan Crow donation to charity, okay?!?…
NEW: Dean Phillips's campaign disclosures don't add up pic.twitter.com/1XSa8UuP3g
— Citizens for Ethics (@CREWcrew) November 27, 2023
Go home, Rep. Phillips, you’re done like burnt toast…
War for Ukraine Day 642: (Some of) You Have Questions, I (May) Have Answers
Hkedi [Kang T.Q.]
Whenever I hear about Dean Phillips, I flash back to the time when that bunch of all white, all male idiots who thought that they could turf out Nancy Pelosi as minority leader in 2017 after Trump won.
I wonder if any of those jackholes of 2017 still hold office.
sab
Sometimes (often) very rich people get into Congress as Reps when they have no business anywhere near public office because they are idiots. Senate is a bit more selective.
sab
@Hkedi [Kang T.Q.]: Well Tim Ryan lost his race for Senate, and now we have JD Vance, the most idiotic public servant in Ohio in my lifetime.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
Several weeks ago I got an email from the Dean Phillips campaign (I guess because I seem to be on the email list of EVERY Democratic officeholder or candidate) asking for my support and a contribution, and I promptly unsubscribed him. I guess there are a lot of Democratic small donors like me, since he is going away even faster than I had hoped. Thanks, AL and BJ, for letting me know who this clown was, so I didn’t just delete his email. Unsubscribing is a clearer repudiation and way to let him know how I feel.
Yutsano
Ugh. There is nothing so pathetic as the mediocre white man who happens to be rich. I hope this drains his bank account to the point where he has to scramble to save his business and fails. Go back to your gelato Dean.
EDIT: Also too: insomnia sucks.
Yutsano
Alexandra Petri.
That’s it. That’s the
tweetpost.(Should be gift link.)
prostratedragon
@Yutsano: For zhe hath oped her mouth and spakeneth the words of true knowledge.
Balconesfault
DougJ suggestion: “Phillips Campaign Collapse Once Again Demonstrates DNC Corruption”
Baud
He went “some people are saying….” on Kamala, even after admitting that it didn’t match his own experience with her. Coward.
This guy seems like someone who’s easily manipulated by others. Someone talked him into this idiotic primary challenge. I also hear Steve Schmidt or the Bernie guy in every one of his talking points.
Baud
@Balconesfault:
Too late. Philips already went there pre-collapse.
Nukular Biskits
Good early mornin’, y’all!
What is it about rich white guys that makes them think their financial success somehow entitles them to political office?
And I say this as a not-so-rich white guy.
Tony Jay
*** JACKAL NEWS WHERE NEWS GOES BROKE ***
Nukular Biskits
@Tony Jay:
You sure this wasn’t DougJ using a pseudonym?
Tony Jay
@Nukular Biskits:
We’ll never know. I hear Glem no do puny interview circuit.
Nukular Biskits
@Tony Jay:
I used to read Glern back during the Iraq War/W Administration. Something happened to him to the extent that makes me wonder who hurt him so badly that his every utterance is an attack on the “shitlibs” (as DougJ would sarcastically note).
Whoever that person was/is, I’d like to buy them a beer.
Baud
@Nukular Biskits:
I don’t know. But there seems to be a lot of people, mostly white guys, that think they’re the best things to happen to libs since sliced bread, and react badly when they don’t receive the worship that they expect.
Jay
@Tony Jay:
Chef’s kiss,
You continue on to the next stage of Hell’s Kitchen.
Tony Jay
@Nukular Biskits:
Nobody hurt Glenn, he was always a prolix self-promoter who just happened to be railing against the excesses of the American Empire back when that Empire was headed by the Tesla Model 3 of US Administrations. He’s gone completely anti-Democrat because most Administrations since then have been Democratic and many Democrats saw through his shtick years ago and tell him so, vehemently. He’s also a racist POS, hence the Trumpy-Humping.
Glem, OTOH, just does it all for the money. Those class A hookers and blow don’t pay for themselves, y’know.
Shalimar
@Nukular Biskits: Greenwald got very defensive when it turned out the Firedoglake PAC he co-managed with Hamsher to support liberal candidates mostly used their money to pay him a salary and didn’t actually have enough left to give to any candidate. If he did change and wasn’t always neo-nazi adjacent scum, that may have something to do with it.
Jay
@Tony Jay:
What’s a “Class A” hooker?
Pee tape?
lowtechcyclist
What BlackKnight10k said: there’s no public appetite for a challenge to Biden. And that’s despite the best efforts of the media to create such an appetite. He’s our guy, period.
He’s also the best President of my lifetime. That should kinda count for something.
Baud
@Jay:
Licensed and bonded.
Tony Jay
@Jay:
Next up, Meghan McGargle dishes on why Rosalynn Carter’s lifetime of service to others was actually performative do-goodery that arguably set the liberation of women back decades.
*** JACKAL NEWS – AWFUL PEOPLE 24/7
lowtechcyclist
@Shalimar:
I don’t know if that legally constitutes fraud, but I’m big on not letting the lawyers own our vocabulary. So by any reasonable colloquial meaning of the term, that’s freakin’ fraudulent.
I must’ve tuned out all those folks – Glem, Hamsher, etc. – by that time, because I missed this episode.
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
We live in a society that desperately wants to take us for granted.
Tony Jay
@Jay:
Turns up in her own car, works on account, and drops her rates 30% if your wife watches from another room.
Matt McIrvin
@Tony Jay: When Trump got in, ramped UP the drone war that was Greenwald’s primary case against Obama, and instead of going back to criticizing a Republican administration, he mostly went after the supposed hypocrisy of anyone attacking Trump… that should have made it clear what was going on.
Shalimar
@Tony Jay: “Hooker” is a weird way to describe Glenn’s decades-younger Brazilian husband, but credit for recognizing his high class.
Baud
@Tony Jay:
You can’t afford not to take that deal.
Tony Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
Didn’t it just? Almost like the same sources and forces that give suck to Glenn’s One Million Words To Say Uppitty substack are the same sources and forces who nourish MAGAworld’s prejudices.
@Shalimar:
They play Rugby in a lot of Brazilian high-schools. Maybe it was when idly thumbing through the Universidade de São Paulo’s online newsletter that Glenn stumbled across the artistic portfolio of action shots that brought their star hooker and future Greenwald-Spouse to his attention.
Tony Jay
@Baud:
I know! I found it through Swagbucks but was foiled by our lack of convenient roadside parking.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist:
Based on my conversations with Democrats I personally know, most are not enthusiastic about voting for Biden at all–they see it as a grim duty they will undertake with distaste–unless they, themselves, are over 70. Then they often think Biden is fine and is a target of ageism.
(I do think it’s odd that so many of the people worried about Biden’s age were 2016 Bernie supporters.)
But none of them have any appetite for Dean Phillips. Who they want to vote for is the Johnny Unbeatable of their imaginations, not anyone realistic. Sometimes they have a name they bring up, who is never anyone who’s actually running.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
I don’t think it’s odd at all.
The ballot doesn’t care about your feelings.
Ben Cisco
A reminder that a good bit of the bitching about Biden is not necessarily about him. Dean gets what he deserves. You love to see it.
Tony Jay
@Matt McIrvin:
I’ll have to check my files but I’m pretty sure that Johnny Unbeatable (Daredevil Stunt-Man & Firewalking Coach) is one of George Santos’ confirmed aliases.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
I think there a lot of Dems who think they’re avant garde rebels but who in fact deeply care about what society thinks of them and can’t handle it when the NYT and others go negative on our leaders.
MomSense
@Nukular Biskits:
He was always terrible especially to anyone who pointed out he supported George W and wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt in Iraq.
His brilliant legal career was defending a Nazi from charges of incitement of violence on free speech grounds. He got in a bit of trouble for some of his means which included unauthorized recording. A little ironic no?
I’m just relieved he is finally recognized as an ass here because it was no fun being one of a handful who never bought the shit he was selling.
EarthWindFire
It’s the over-70 Dems I know who are most concerned. It comes up right after they tell me what a fantastic job Biden’s doing. And they can be concerned without being ageist because they’re old too. (I had this exact conversation with my mother a week ago but have had similar ones with my father and neighbor.) I usually remind them that he has Kamala and they pipe down.
brantl
The media horseshit about Biden nauseates me. He has been as good a president as anybody, and a hell of a lot better than most of the last 9. His boss was the rare exception, and I think they were about even. The media won’t let it be a story, how well the Biden administration has been doing the job. I’ll vote for Biden, and gladly. His only misstep so far? Not calling out the murder that Israelis are doing now.
Matt McIrvin
@EarthWindFire: I’m pretty sure the over-70 Dems are all going to get out and vote for him, though. Old people vote by habit. It’s young people who are fickle about it and need extra motivation.
Matt McIrvin
@brantl: In actual policy terms, Biden is a better President than Obama. That’s nothing to do with them personally–had Biden been President from 2009-2017, he probably would have governed much like Obama did. It’s just that the party’s policy center has moved.
Steeplejack
@EarthWindFire:
I thought Kamala Harris was the (unspoken) reason why a lot of them are concerned about Biden’s age.
EarthWindFire
@Matt McIrvin: Agreed. I also think the over-70s Dems know better what’s at stake since the WWII fascist era isn’t as much of an abstraction to them.
2liberal
The husband died in May this year.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Miranda_(politician)
EarthWindFire
@Steeplejack: Not with the Dems I personally know. But I firmly believe Biden’s age has been made a “problem” so uppity woman memes can be made legit for the campaign (did you know she’s a ni-clang?)
Ohio Mom
For argument’s sake, let’s say Kamala Harris isn’t “prepared to step in.” In my lifetime, was that crook Agnew? Dan Quayle? Mike Pence? What a coincidence, all Republicans.
And those are just the obvious unfit ones, some of the others may have floundered terribly if they’d been thrust into the presidency.
Steeplejack
@Ohio Mom:
Forget vice presidents—Harris is more qualified than some presidents we’ve had. Dubya and (of course) Trump spring to mind.
Ben Cisco
@Ohio Mom:
And not the only one, either.
Another Scott
I assume that Manchin has been watching Phillips’s campaign implosion and has been trying to find a way to get the press attention without turning into (more of) a joke before he retires. Probably why he’s still holding back and being coy about his intentions…
Sinema needs to speak up pretty soon too, right??
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right…
Cheers,
Scott.
RevRick
@Ohio Mom: Exactly! And let’s not forget Sarah Palin. But I think part of the problem is that we overvalue the President as part of our system of government. They aren’t kings, after all. They have to negotiate with unruly Congresses, for one thing. But even though they are in charge of the Executive Branch, they don’t do things on their own. They require a vast army of Cabinet members and assistants to implement policy. And Biden has assembled a super competent team to get things done.
I have no fear that should anything happen to President Biden, God forbid, that Kamala is more than capable of filling the office. I’m sure she would keep Biden’s team. Her big task would be to select a new VP.
What does scare me is that that God-damned fascist would surround himself with incompetent toadies eager to do his bidding of cruelty and destruction.
lowtechcyclist
@Matt McIrvin:
I think there might’ve been some significant differences, in areas where the location of ‘the center of the party’ really didn’t matter so much.
While I don’t think Biden would have gone as far in 2009 as he did in 2021, I think he’d have been less prone to being buffaloed into settling for proposing a too-small stimulus to Congress. (I think Atrios was right on target with his criticism of the whole ‘negotiating with themselves’ within the Administration before Congress was even involved.)
The fact that the economy was still in the shitter in 2010 (unemployment actually got worse from mid-2009 to mid-2010) was a big reason why 2010 was such an electoral disaster. Which we’re still stuck with the consequences of, in gerrymandered legislatures in competitive states like Wisconsin and North Carolina.
And while Biden might’ve run on leaving Iraq and finishing the job in Afghanistan like Obama did, I suspect he would have realized many years earlier that we needed to just GTFO, and wouldn’t have stayed once he knew there was no point.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist: I interpret Biden’s relative dovishness as a consequence of being part of the Obama administration and seeing its foreign policy operate from the inside. In the GWB era he was relatively pro-war like the median Democrat.
espierce
@lowtechcyclist:
It was all downhill at FDL after TBogg hit the bricks.
lowtechcyclist
@Matt McIrvin:
Well sure, so as President he would have seen his own foreign policy operate from the inside. And it would have had the same effect on him as President as it did as VP. And he’d have been in the position to act on it. It might have taken him a few years to come around on it, but less than eight, I’d expect.
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: I heard a bit of a show on C-Span a few days ago that was interesting. It was talking about, among other things, The Grand and Glorious Surge in Iraq. I think Obama played that just about perfectly, given all the constraints. He, Obama’s OMB guy who later became chief of staff, said that Obama made the generals present him a plan and said that it had to be specific before he would sign off on it. The OMB guy was at the meeting to talk about the costs and what it would mean for the rest of the budget.
The OMB/CoS guy said that the original Surge plan from the generals was to last for 10 years. It would have cost multiple $T according to the OMB. It was unrealistic in the extreme.
As I remember the time, Obama said something like “give me a plan for 18 months, and that’s it”. And that’s mostly what happened, as I remember it. And McCain was happy, and the press was happy, and Obama got no credit for standing up to the generals and saying “NO”.
Anyway, the times were different. I don’t imagine that a Biden presidency in 2001-2009 would have been that much different because Summers and all the rest of the banksters, St. Petreaus, and the “OMG it has to be less than $1T!!!11” senators, and all the rest were still out there. Moscow Mitch still wouldn’t have let a liberal replace Tony on the SCOTUS, also too.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@Hkedi [Kang T.Q.]: You may be talking about the effort by a few Democratic Reps. to oppose Nancy Pelosi as Speaker. That worked out between the 2018 midterms and the beginning of the new Congress in January.
The three most prominent dissidents were Seth Moulton (MA), Kathleen Rice (NY) and Tim Ryan (OH). Rep. Moulton is the only one still in Congress.
Shalimar
@2liberal: That is a shame to hear. Joking aside, Miranda seemed much more consistent and positive in his beliefs than Greenwald and I wish he were still alive.
Kathleen
@Ben Cisco: I agree. It’s more about (clears throat) “his choices”.
waspuppet
LOVING that CNN’s chyron is “BIDEN CHALLENGER” when “PHILLIPS” would not only fit but is actually shorter.
You’re not a chyron name, pal.
BruceFromOhio
@Shalimar:
Wow wow wow, what a jolt from the time machine. Gives rise to many “where are they now?” wonders.
BruceFromOhio
@espierce:
That was how I found TRex, and then Balloon Juice.
NoOneYouKnow
@Yutsano: And we did read it, and lo, it was good to us, and we hailed it, saying amongst ourselves, this prophet is not honored among us, and these things are true, for we have witnesses.
And many rejoiced in the gift link, and appreciated Yutsano.
Elle from Minnesota
On behalf of the state of Minnesota, I’d like to apologize to the rest of the country for the political existence of Dean Phillips. As an embarassment to the state, he’s almost neck-to-neck with the ‘My Pillow’ guy.
WaterGirl
@Elle from Minnesota: I’m sure you’ve got some keepers, too. But you might need several of those to balance out those two.