First, from what I’ve seen there’s nothing in the polls to justify the bedlinen micturating that’s happening right now. The last I saw was an aggregate one point shift away from Biden, which is meaningless unless it continues.
Second, I’m seeing “when did this happen before” stories, but “this” (Biden being pushed out, in the hopes of those writing the stories) hasn’t happened before. Both Truman and LBJ, the last two Democrats who chose not to run for a second (really more like a 2 1/2) term, quit after a poor showing in the New Hampshire primary. Biden won all the primaries except for Alaska, and it wasn’t even close.
We can argue all day about whether the Democrats should have more serious primaries. For example, I think that 2016 could have benefitted from a more robust set of candidates. But in 2024, unlike in 1952 and 1968, no serious candidate thought it was worth challenging Biden.
There’s never a shortage of politicians who hope that some deus ex machina moment will make them President or VP, short-circuiting the years of work that it normally takes to run for the office. I think we’re seeing some of that in the current panic. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, but I sure am not amused.
Baud
1952?
BR
Biden’s team needs a good audio tech. Someone who will check the mics and setup and recording levels and make sure that his voice comes in loud and clear and booming — in a way that he’s still very capable of doing when he wants to and is mic’d correctly.
A lot of the time it seems like they’re just accepting whatever crap audio that even a YouTube podcaster wouldn’t put up with.
They can buy a a good lapel mic and a good stage mic that has good low end response, maybe with some compression built in, and take it with Biden everywhere he goes. Not hard and fixes part of the optics problem.
Urza
If Democrats had a chance at winning Alaska I might be worried. Or if that 1 electoral vote meant anything.
Jeffg166
When TFG has his stroke or heart attack I wonder if the media will notice.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
PeeWee’s Secret Word of the Day:
micturating
The things I learn here…
SiubhanDuinne
Poor neglected Marianne Williamson 😢
TaMara
Are the “Dems” really panicking or is it just the punditry? Not being snarky, I’ve tuned out most of the week on news/twitter/WaPo, as the handwringing over Biden being an 81 year old cyclist who is also leader of the free world was maddening.
You know, especially in comparison to the corrupt judicials and the criminal/rapist nominee on the other side
Barbara
@Jeffg166: They’ll just prop him up, cart him around to various venues and play an automatically reloading audiofeed in the background. No one would notice.
$8 blue check mistermix
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I learned that work in The Big Lebowski.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
Stevenson.
Scout211
Open thread? I’d like to post some GOOD election news:
Nebraska abortion rights groups collect enough signatures to advance ballot measure
Every county in Nebraska! Reproductive rights are important even in red states’ super red counties. First step has been accomplished.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
🎶 “Could life ever be sane again?” 🎶
Baud
@Jeffg166:
“Massive stroke leaves Trump an invalid, neutering Biden claim that he is a threat to democracy.” /NYT
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@BR:
I believe you mentioned this during one of the threads either during or just after the debate. Glad you’re highlighting that again.
I could send Joe some Shure SM58s. Oh wait, we’re not talking a rock show. :)
In all seriousness, yeah, we’re constantly amazed at venues that get real acts and continue to use shitty mics and/or have shitty front-of-house people who don’t know how to mix vocals so that they’re clear.
Biden’s team needs to put something in the rider. ;)
RandomMonster
deus ex machina
Which is not a deuce ex machina!
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
Not an incumbent.
ETA: Never mind. Forgot Truman was eligible to run.
Lapassionara
Has anyone heard from Trump? I saw one comment praising the SC immunity decision, but nothing else. Does he have any rallies scheduled? I’m interested to see if he brings up the shark versus electric boat again.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
In the U.K. Murdoch’s papers endorse Labour 24 hrs before the election. Pathetic. After campaigning hard for the Tories the rats jump off the sinking ship at the last moment to pretend they’ve always been in front of the winning parade.
HA!
BR
I also don’t get why any Dems are taking NYT seriously anymore. Most polls are showing no movement or marginal movement post debate. But surprise surprise, NYT’s poll shows huge movement away from Biden. It’s almost like all their coverage, polling, and all the rest is designed around validating the narrative that was decided by their bosses long ago.
$8 blue check mistermix
@TaMara:
One D Rep from Texas said Biden should drop out. There was apparently a bad conference call with the House D caucus where loud complaints about Biden were made and leaked to the press. Tammy Baldwin apparently doesn’t want to appear with Biden in Michigan. Pundits are having a field day, but there are a lot of folks in the party who are apparently in panic mode.
Baud
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch:
Wait till you see US polls in late October.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@TaMara: Pundits, media-driven by far. Boring Biden’s bad for business.
They’re expecting lots of clicks and engagement when the Nazis take over, I guess? Seems short-sighted.
$8 blue check mistermix
@RandomMonster: Thanks, fixed.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Baud:
“Dump concedes defeat after plea bargain that will send him to jail, here’s why that’s bad news for Biden”
JMG
@TaMara: I don’t think the vast majority of elected Democrats are panicking. A few, but there’s a few like that in any group of humans confronted with an unexpected and serious problem. Worried? Sure. Who isn’t? If Biden isn’t quitting, they want him out there running on a daily basis in public and through the media. If Biden is thinking about quitting, they want him to decide ASAP. These are normal and valid political professional worries.
BR
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Exactly. Every crappy tech bro podcast and wannabe YouTube star has better audio setups than politicians do (this isn’t just a Dem problem, but it’s a problem now for Biden given that everyone is complaining about his voice being to raspy / quiet). They really can and should put it in the rider — there’s a whole industry around making audio sound good in venues. Not rocket science.
Gretchen
@$8 blue check mistermix: Tammy Baldwin is running in Wisconsin. Why would she go to Michigan?
Barbara
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: They need to know their telephone calls will be answered!
Splitting Image
With respect to Truman, I think the parallel is 1944, not 1948. Democrats knew Roosevelt was dying during the campaign and that whoever was Vice President would assume the Presidency at some point after the election. As it turned out, very soon after.
So what they did was not to force Roosevelt off the ticket, but to replace the occasionally Russia-curious Henry Wallace with the more reliable Harry Truman.
The difference today is that Biden is, debate night notwithstanding, in far better shape than Roosevelt was in 1944, and Kamala Harris is not Russia-curious. So worst comes to worst, I don’t see why they should not simply follow the precedent set in 1944. Many happy returns to Biden, but if he does have to step down, VP Harris takes over. That’s it. That’s the whole story.
The other difference, of course, is that if the Democrats had bungled the succession and lost the 1944 election, Tom Dewey would not have switched sides in the war the country was currently fighting. And he supported racial and sexual equality. The current Republican candidate is not Tom Dewey, which seems to me an important consideration here.
Gretchen
It’s especially maddening that the Never Trumpers are at the forefront. They drove their own party off the cliff, lost out to a con man, and now they think we should hand our party over to them and listen to their wisdom.
Baud
@Gretchen:
Aren’t most of them doing a better job than Dems are?
Mike E
@JMG: Who’s they you keep mentioning? The fuck outta here.
Harrison Wesley
@Barbara: Sort of like the end of El Cid, except in a golf cart instead of on horseback.
West of the Rockies
@Jeffg166:
Trump has stroke. Why that’s bad for Biden.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Splitting Image:
From what I’ve read, Dewey, as you indicate, was a decent person, meaning there would be no room for him today in the modern GOP.
Of course he did convince Ike to pick Nixon as his running mate. Not everybody is perfect.
pika
@Gretchen: Tim Miller and Tom Nichols, for sure. But many of the others aren’t and are, as Baud says in #31, doing a better job of fortitude and eyes-on-the-prize than a lot of folks are.
TaMara
@Mike E: Umm…it was a derisive reference to the very vocal few that mistermix mentioned in his reply to me.
UncleEbeneezer
Reminder that there are ways to sell this ticket that are 100% positive (and also true):
We can also frame this ticket as the Best of Both Worlds (which I believe it is). We get 1.) the wisdom, institutional knowledge and know-how of Biden + 40 years of relationships built with key players in US/World AND 2.) the younger, brilliant, unflinching Harris who is not only able/ready to take over but also has the fresh perspective that helped bring Student Loans and Black Maternal Healthcare to the list of Dem priorities.
It really is Dream Team ticket that sets up a great future while protecting hard fought gains. We all can (and should) sell it that way. Flip the damn script. You wanted a fighter…we’ve got TWO!!!
Belafon
@Urza: Every state has a minimum of 3 EVs.
$8 blue check mistermix
@Gretchen: Oops – I meant Wisconsin, sorry!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Harrison Wesley:
*Snort* You Win Teh Internetzes for today.
Baud
@$8 blue check mistermix:
If true, I’m not sure if that’ll help her. Doesn’t she need black voters to come out and aren’t black voters more supportive of Biden?
cain
@BR:
They think they will get that sit down with Biden that they have been clamoring for.
Fuck them. They get nothing. Assholes.
Captain C
@Jeffg166:
When TFG has his stroke or heart attack I wonder if the media will notice.
Doubtful. At best, it’ll get a mention on page A26 of the FTFNYT, with a headline: “Trump strokes out at debate. Why this is bad news for Biden.” The front page will have a banner headline about how Biden is not qualified because he can’t climb K2 without ropes or supplemental oxygen. No one at the FTFNYT will question why they had yet another irrelevant and at best misleading headline.
BR
@UncleEbeneezer:
I like that framing. Who’s that from?
TaMara
@Gretchen:
@pika:
Tim Miller can fuck right off. I’ve lost any respect I had for him since he seemed to see the error of being a Republican. Rick Wilson has been reasonable and basically telling every to shut the fuck up about this replace Biden BS and George Conway sounds almost reasonable.
I’m not sure about any of the other never-trumpers but I’m right there with you on they can shut up and go back to work for the republicans. Because they aren’t helping here.
Old School
@Gretchen:
Should be Wisconsin. Biden is traveling to Madison on Friday. Baldwin is not rescheduling her campaigning in the northern part of the state to be there.
It seems to me she’d be criticized for either option.
Captain C
@BR: The FTFNYT should no longer be taken seriously on any political news, except for purposes of threat assessment.
BR
@Captain C:
DougJ has had their number for so long. Now they are beyond parody.
cain
@pika: I don’t remember Tom Nichols wanting Biden out on his Twitter feed.
He was calling out people angry about that moderators
Belafon
@Captain C: “Will Biden do the right thing and step down now that Trump is out of the race, or will he continue to hurt Democrat’s chances of winning?”
TaMara
@Old School: They should have a big screen and have her zoom in to shut everyone up.
Although, I’m sure the usual suspects would find a reason why that is bad for Biden
jimmiraybob
Heritage Foundation chief Kevin Roberts: “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”
Upon further review this is an open declaration of rebellion against the lawfully constituted government of the United States of America. Open insurrection. The new Confederacy of MAGA.
Too one-notey for anyone?
Captain C
@Belafon: IF TCFG wins, FTFNYT’s final headline in the Spring of 202
45: “Trump is shutting us down and sending us all to the camps. Why this is bad news for Biden. Also, Hillary’s shrill and Gore is boring.”comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Captain C:
Gore is also fat. 🤦♀️
Suzanne
If it makes anyone feel any better….. the mainstream media sucks, but I also have a feeling that they’ve never been less important. We all talk about their narrative, but, like….. I would be willing to bet large sums of money that an ever-shrinking percentage of people are reading it.
I feel like the bigger threat is social media, YouTubers, etc. Like, we know who Megan McArdle is, and Ross Douthat…… but Joe Rogan is probably shaping more political views by, like, a thousand-fold.
pika
@cain: Thank you for that–I may be misremembering something from a few days ago. I don’t have a Twitter account and even with the temporary workaround it’s hard to go back to the archive.
Baud
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
To be fair, he didn’t wt fat until after the election.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Baud: Truman deciding to not run for a full second term.
MinuteMan
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Seems like lots of high level pols are a lot worse at judging people than they seem to believe.
Mike E
@TaMara: thanks. I’m dubious about imprecise record keeping during this particular episode of ratfucking, when all we’re getting in the “free press” is “unnamed sources” in breathless stories on Biden being advised to step away and sitting office holders supposedly “declining” to go to campaign events when another reality is at play.
Splitting Image
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Yeah, Dewey kind of screwed the pooch at the end there. No one is perfect, as you say.
I was mainly trying to get across that while a President in poor health is a potential problem, it’s a problem the system was built to deal with from the beginning. The Presidency is just about the only major office in the world where you elect a spare just in case something happens to the original. People are freaking out about the one part of the system that’s working as intended.
Now the Supreme Court? That’s a problem worth worrying about. And of course that the entire Republican party has gone fascist.
TaMara
Politics Girl bringing the heat (as always)
NotMax
TR could have chosen to run in 1908, also too.
BTW, incumbent president Franklin Pierce was denied his party’s nomination for a second term.
BR
@Suzanne:
I agree. Biden should do chats on every random YouTube channel and all the rest. Speak directly to the people and have trust in an ability to communicate human to human.
Baud
@NotMax:
Still bitter about Pierce.
TaMara
@Mike E: I figured it was just a misreading…😉
NotMax
@Baud
Especially because Buchanan got the nomination.
“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
rikyrah
@BR:
the days when Doug has to go..
” I can’t top this”…..
Shake your head in disgust
Mike E
@Baud: Core constituency … it’s why Black voters are calling bullshit on the “concerned advice” that so many pundits are putting out now. What a revealing moment in US history we are wading through!
twbrandt
Gov. Whitmer is joining other Democratic governors for a meeting with Biden at the White House on Wednesday. She has been and continues to be vocal in her support of Biden.
ETA: A lot of elected Dems, like Whitmer, are not panicking.
Betty
Kimberly Atkins-Stohr is putting it straight on the Nicole Wallace show. Democrats, get a grip and fight for Biden-Harris.
Chris
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch:
Am I misremembering, or has English Newscorp always been much more mercenary than American Newscorp? ISTR that they hopped on board the “Republicans good, Democrats bad” train pretty early here and never left it, but that over there they’ve been willing to back either Labour or Tory politicians so long as the politician’s sufficiently obsequious (even if they still prefer Tory over there).
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@pika: yes, Rick Wilson and Stuart Stevens are standing solid and they are both real pros. Rick is sort-of the devil, but he is on the right side in this election and I trust his political instincts more than most pundits. He is a very practical operative. See also Simon Rosenberg (not that he is an R), with his hopium chronicles.
UncleEbeneezer
@BR: The quote is PropaneJane on Twitter. The second paragraph is my own formulation. Feel free to use, spread etc.
We have a choice here.
Mike E
@TaMara: my pie shelf is packed these days! Thanks also for posting politicsgirl’s bit on MVP, aside from her using the word “incremental” to describe Joe’s presidency I think it’s well done (like a lot of her content).
Ryan
What, you don’t want to run Johnny Unbeatable? My God man, look at the name!
Baud
I should change my nym to Baud Unbeatable.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@BR: I cancelled my subscription to the NYT today and was pleased to see “concern over news coverage ” was one of the choices for why, plus they had a box where I could discuss my reasons. I told them!
Lobo
Biden Old, a tale of three groups.
Trump is a conman.
Republicans &Media: Yawn
Trump is a rapist.
Republicans & Media: Yawn
Trump is a felon.
Republicans & Media: Yawn
Marginalized Groups(Vote for ham sandwich over Trump. In real world, Biden has been great for us better than a ham sandwich ;) )
Biden had a bad night.
Marginalized Groups: Shake it off. Let’s go!
Privileged, Prominent and/or Powerful so-called Progressives(often white)
Biden had a bad night.
P., P, and/P people: OMG! Sky falling. Find Johnny Unbeatable. Do something. Panic!
Sigh!
Suzanne
@BR: I think that Biden should go on some of the other media, too. Like, FTFNYT. Fuck 60 Minutes. He’s better in a more conversational setting.
I was thinking about some of the Obama/Biden memes from a few years ago. Those were hilarious and made him appear just incredibly genuine and cool. I know that guy is in there! Show off that guy! We all love that guy!
Juju
@Jeffg166: Trump already uses undertaker makeup, so I’m going to guess no, they will not notice.
Baud
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan):
Excellent. Proud of you.
Chris
@$8 blue check mistermix:
Yeah. It’s pundit-driven (and it has been for four years), but it’s successfully panicking enough people who damn well ought to know better. Hopefully not irreparably.
...now I try to be amused
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
I learned the word in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, in a Vogon poem:
Chris
@Gretchen:
Are they? From what little I’ve seen, ex-Republican types seem to be handling this better than a lot of lifelong Democrats.
Gretchen
@Baud: no, I don’t think the never-Trumpers are doing a better job than the Dems. This would have blown over if the news media, including the never-Trumpers, were sounding the alarm about 2025, the Supreme Court, all the lies Trump spewed at the debate, Trump’s mental fuzziness. But, having lost all the elections they were responsible for, they want to tell us how to win. I think a chaotic convention and a leaky Trump White House will be easier for them to write and podcast about, and self-interest is winning.
EZSmirkzz
That sad fact of American politics is no one will remember this July next August. Coat Hangers and dollar bills are going to leave welts for a long, long time.
Like Yogi Berra said, it ain’t over till it’s over.
Give ’em hell, Joe!
ETA, The butter wouldn’t melt so you can shove it up your pie ;)
...now I try to be amused
@Baud:
Johnny Unbaudable!
Gretchen
@Chris: Handling it better how? Taking one bad debate and leveraging it to make it easier for Republicans to win? That’s not how I want it handled.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Baud: Thanks. Fuck them. There isn’t one story or opinion piece on the front page today I would waste a click on.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@twbrandt:
Bingo. Others with a national profile, like Newsom (not my favorite Dem by a long shot) are being team *Democrats* in this situation as he’s flying to MI to campaign for Biden.
Doing stuff like that as a Democrat for the leader of the party in a situation like this, helps skeptics like me of any specific candidate, better support them down the line.
JML
Not really true, though. Few people knew what FDR’s health was really like and he and his staff took great pains to hide how sick he was.
And remember, even to this day there’s a real question as to whom FDR wanted as his VP since he gave two names (Harry Truman and William Douglas) and there are questions as to which one he actually named first…
Gretchen
@pika: Tim Miller and Tom Nichols are who I was specifically thinking of. Who are the never-Trumpers who are doing better?
Tim Miller helped Jeb Bush lose and thinks he’s the expert.
Tinare
Republicans would never act like this. And people wonder why they get elected when their policies are very unpopular. Because they unite behind their candidate even when he is a convicted felon. Dems in disarray is a meme for a reason. So sick of this shite.
UncleEbeneezer
@Mike E: This is why I’ve been trying to remind anyone who wants to fancy themselves an ally to the Dem Base (Black voters), listen to that community because they are begging you to sit down, STFU and get behind our candidates. This is your chance to step up by biting your tongue and chilling the F*** out.
And NO, cherry-picking some Hyper-Progressive shit-poster tv personas like Nina Turner or Briana Joy Grey, who’ve always hated Biden and the Dem Party, is not the flex you think it is. Of course no group is a monolith, but it’s quite easy to see how unpopular their radical views are within their own community.
Seeker
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I actually like Newsom. He’s no Beshear but he can talk and on balance seems competent
Gretchen
@UncleEbeneezer: I love this idea! Play up the institutional knowledge and long relationships of the old guy, the fresh ideas and vigor of the young’un. I’d like to seem more of Madame VP bringing her prosecutorial experience to the attack dog role that job usually involves. Let’s see some Spiro Agnew energy (without all the felonies).
Trollhattan
This could be…fun? Because if there’s one thing I know, Marshawn Lynch is funny as hell and has no filter. “I’m all about that action, boss.”
pieceofpeace
@BR: Absolutely! Set up isn’t tough, standard performative attention on a checklist, always rechecked. Like that done for, ohhh, say T. Swift.
A Ghost to Most
Just keep swimming.
BR
@Suzanne:
Yeah agreed. And even when he’s just telling the story of his life, he’s compelling. The interview he did with Howard Stern of all people was really personal and dare I say touching.
Gretchen
@TaMara: George Conway (the guy who was seen all dressed up at the Trump White House) is saying Biden should step down.
Chris
@Suzanne:
Yes and no.
On the one hand, the fact that fewer and fewer people read the MSM doesn’t mean they don’t still shape the debate. They set the narrative and even among those who don’t follow them, the things like “POLL SHOWS BIDEN DOWN TEN POINTS!!!” are generally referencing some MSM outlet or other. And then there’s the general fact that just because a person doesn’t seek out their coverage doesn’t mean they won’t still get it. We still see the headlines when in line at the grocery store, we still see the TV in the doctor’s waiting room, we still hear at secondhand from people who do follow the MSM, etc.
On the other hand, I agree that the way social media has turned has been a huge and possibly underappreciated part of molding public opinion. It wasn’t a right-wing puke funnel in 2008 or 2012 – you could find right-wing things, if you were of that inclination, but plenty of the other things too, and Obama used it well enough that if anything it probably helped him (while sailing under the MSM’s radar, especially in 2012). But it’s absolutely a right-wing puke funnel today, to a point that wasn’t even true in 2016 or 2020. I see it on Facebook constantly – the algorithms cram right-wing junk everywhere into my feed, and most of it isn’t even political in the partisan sense, but it’s all people losing their shit about Woke Hollywood or Taylor Swift or whatever.
Sister Golden Bear
An abortion right amendments appear to have just qualified for the November ballot in Nebraska and Arizona. Ii’s also on the ballot in Florida (I can’t remember if there’s more states as well.)
Meanwhile the godbothers are pissed that Trump’s campaign is blocking two hardline anti-abortion delegates from the GOP platform committee.
Let’s spend our energy hammering of Trump bragging about how he overturned Dobbs.
As well of course as Trump promising vengeance on anyone who dares say anything less these laudatory about him. Part of his appeal in previous elections was his claim that he was challenging the angry of the little guy. Hammer on how he’s only interested in himself and personal revenge.
O. Felix Culpa
We didn’t give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor, and I’m not giving up now.
That is all.
schrodingers_cat
OT BS bros are calling Harris a coconut, what is that all about? And these people are going to have her back as the nominee if she is at the top of the ticket? Give me a fucking break.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
Brown on the outside, white on the inside?
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Sister Golden Bear:
This came up in a thread yesterday. Abortion rights amendments are on the ballots in:
Colorado (easy passage)
Florida (requires 60% of vote to pass, good ole Floriduh)
Maryland (easy passage)
New York (easy passage)
Nevada (no clue)
South Dakota (no clue but only needs 50% +1 to pass)
and now AZ and NE.
Every one of these will provide a clear Dem boost in that state although how much, wtf knows.
Betty Cracker
@Suzanne: And soon! IMO, anyone who dismisses the genuine alarm among Dems as a completely media-driven phenomenon is gaslighting. It’s real.
People need to see SOTU-caliber Biden all over the place for the next couple of weeks. Pelosi said it’s fair to ask if the debate performance was an episode or a condition. The campaign needs to show rather than tell.
Jackie
Et tu, Clyburn?
piratedan
I think the closest parallel to what we’re witnessing is what happened to Howard Dean… one fateful YEEEAAHHH!!! and his candidacy was done. Didn’t matter what his policies were, media broadcast that and responded with a NOPE!!!!!!!!!!
Biden, who’s managed a very good public persona throughout, has one shaky debate and the entire media has NOPE!!!D again and they will continue to do so because of their beloved optics and their inability to be able to find fault in any narrative they push.
kind of coming belatedly to the conclusion that the fault in all of this may be ours, namely in that we expect the media to inform us, even-handedly on issues that concern us. The media believes that their purpose is to generate viewing traffic for advertisers so they can sell us whatever the fuck they can and has no other ethical or moral purpose.
JWR
@jimmiraybob:
While we’re at it, if we’re now a dictatorship, why not just use it to outlaw dictatorship, nonreviewable by any court, supreme or otherwise?
Baud
@Jackie:
I wonder if he thinks Kamala would win and the mini would give it some legitimacy.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
They say he’s going to Wisconsin in Friday. And that’s when the interview with ABC is.
piratedan
@Betty Cracker: yet, he gave a perfectly normal campaign appearance in North Carolina the NEXT DAY. He sounded lucid and better at the Debate after-party.
That’s all been lost in the noise, because if those appearances were anything but “normal”, there is NO WAY IN HELL that it wouldn’t have been seized upon to drive this narrative.
UncleEbeneezer
@Sister Golden Bear: Yes! There are 11 states with Abortion Rights on their ballots.
Baud
@piratedan:
Good point.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: That’s the slur I am familiar with, but supposedly there is some other context to that statement which ID
MSM is happy that they can flog their favoritest story evah, Ds in disarray.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@piratedan:
Better late than never. Welcome to the club! Monthly meetings, bring a hot dish, 3rd Wed. This month’s club activity is throwing darts at pictures of Tapper & Bash.
Chris
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Is there still time to get them on there in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania?
Trollhattan
@piratedan:
If Donny had (D) after his name then any of what, ten-thousand Things Donny Did would have cratered the career prospects of any Democrat. Any.
Funny how that works.
Jackie
@Scout211: That’s wonderful news!
Sister Golden Bear
@TaMara:
Pundits in search of that sweet, sweet Dems In Disarray and “exciting” brokered convention fixes. Plus has beens, never wases, and people out of power within the party looking to take advantage of the situation for their own benefit.
Meahwhile Biden raised far more funds than Trump this week, yet another poll (Reuters) today showed no change (the race remains tied), the markets didn’t react to the debate, and Black Twitter is “fuck this noise, we’re riding with Biden.”
So yeah it’s the pundits and other political junkies who are whipping up the panic.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Chris:
I have no clue. BallotPedia has a list of those remaining that might make it:
https://ballotpedia.org/2023_and_2024_abortion-related_ballot_measures
Suzanne
@Chris: The thing that’s scary about social media is that you can have no sense of scale or relative importance. I have had this experience where, on every platform, some “major” story was being pushed at me. And yet, my husband, who is also exceedingly online and very much on #TeamBlue, will never have seen it. For whatever algorithmic reason, it just wasn’t pushed at him. It’s not just political content, either. It breaks us up into these niches and distorts everything’s relative impact.
I have a 20-year-old and a 13-year-old, and both of them are pretty aware for their ages (as you would guess)….. but they both live in these entirely different media landscapes than I do. Same with their friends. They don’t watch network news, they’ve probably not touched an actual printed newspaper since the last time they did a craft. But they show me YouTubers and my son has, like, a zillion Insta followers. They listen to podcasts a lot.
FWIW, in recent years, most of my healthcare clients have been getting rid of television in waiting rooms. Moving to curated/branded content. Because everyone hates the Fox News shit.
Jackie
@Lapassionara:
For once, he’s staying quiet, letting Biden’s collapse (snark) be the headlines.
TCFG has mentioned he thinks Biden should stay in the race…🙄
Chris Johnson
The thing is I don’t care if he DIES.
Chaos is the enemy. Staying on track is the remedy.
Wait and see if he dies, then Kamala is the President and they can scramble to appoint a Veep. It looks right now like the RT Left is consolidating behind Mayor Pete. I can only assume that is because they have still got time to suddenly discover he’s gay after it’s too late to pick someone else.
Stay on track and keep the team together. It looks like October Surprise came in July and everybody nefarious is hammering the same plan to win it for Trump, and I think that is because, post-Dobbs, they are that desperate. So plausibility, reputation etc. are all disposable now. It’s all hands on deck to protect Trump and make enough of a noise, that if little green men come and help him stage a coup, there’s plausible argument that it’s not simply an invasion.
rikyrah
@Baud:
She can ask Mandela Barnes how distancing himself from Biden/Harris worked out for him.
Sister Golden Bear
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Newsom would drown his own mother to become president. The fact that he’s still actively Team Biden speaks volumes.
@Trollhattan:
I looked forward to his Beast Mode political commentary.
Gretchen
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: twice as many signatures were turned in than were required to get abortion rights on the ballot in Missouri. Now the question is whether forced birth fanatic Secretary of State can figure out how to keep it off the ballot anyway. Signature gathering was delayed because he disagreed about the language of the amendment. He wanted to ask if voters wanted to allow “dangerous and unregulated abortions until live birth.”
rikyrah
@Sister Golden Bear:
Missouri and Maryland
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
UH HUH
UH HUH
lowtechcyclist
@…now I try to be amused:
That was painful to read even without the aid of a Poetry Appreciation Chair.
Trivia Man
Truman had a unique wildcard- grandfathered in as an exemption to the 22nd amendment. Voter leeriness of ANOTHER 4 term president may have weighed on him. Finish the ear, tidy up loose ends, retire.
apocalipstick
@Seeker: Governor French Laundry would bring a fair amount of baggage.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Some are like Stuart Stevens but the Bulwark guys are not.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Sister Golden Bear:
+1
@Gretchen:
I don’t miss Misery one bit.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: Are you an intern for DougJ?
Suzanne
@Betty Cracker:
It is real. It may be cynically created and exploited, but the fear is real.
I had a thought while I went running. I was thinking about my own experiences witnessing my grandparents aging and declining. (I lived with my grandparents until I was sixteen and my BioDad was entirely absent from my life, so my maternal grandparent relationships were much closer to parental in nature.) And now I am in initial stages of a caregiving role for SuzMom, and I have no siblings to help, and there has been some family dramatics that make this difficult. I think that’s part of why this discussion is really painful. On the one hand, seniors often feel denied their agency and their contributions dismissed. On the other, if you’ve ever had to take someone’s car keys away….. this feels incredibly ominous.
Shalimar
I saw a headline earlier (only read a few graphs of the article) from a former assistant to Cuomo who said that there are basically 2 days left where the big warchest Biden/Harris have accumulated could be moved to an alternate candidate. I didn’t read the rest because I don’t care about the details. To me, passing over Harris would convince enough of our base not to bother showing up that it basically amounts to giving up on 2024 completely. But if there is some kind of deadline Thursday or Friday, it could be why the anyone-but-Biden/Harris people are freaking out now.
Scout211
Not quite. See my #11. They have submitted the signatures, far more than required. The deadline was today. All the signatures still have to be verified before it will qualify for the ballot.
MinuteMan
Biden campaign sent text from Joe: he’s running!
Baud
@Shalimar:
Makes sense. But it’s not as if there’s an obvious alternative person to move it to. It would have to be someone generic, like Michelle Obama, who apparently scored highly on some poll.
Baud
@MinuteMan:
👍
rikyrah
I don’t believe it’s that complicated.
They can’t BOTH SIDES it…so, they’re going to try and ignore it.
Tiff4Mahogany_44![]()
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NATO MEMBER (@tiff4mahogany) posted at 1:11 PM on Wed, Jul 03, 2024:
I have a feeling the MSM doesn’t know how to cover this Epstein stuff.
And that’s why you guys should walk away.
It’s not an affair. It’s not sexual harassment. It’s pedophilia at worst & hebephilia at “best”.
It’s so horrible they can’t approach it.
MHO.
(https://x.com/tiff4mahogany/status/1808564286211440657?t=v-tPjo-hBnFnMFXvmh7cNQ&s=03)
UncleEbeneezer
@schrodingers_cat: It’s a variation of “Oreo.” A racist term used to insinuate someone isn’t Black enough. Not something White Progressives should ever use.
Splitting Image
@Trollhattan:
If Trump had been elected dogcatcher as a Democrat, the New York Times would have called for the entire party to be shut down.
prostratedragon
Biden signs new regulations for federal workers on heat conditions.
Mike E
@piratedan: Occam’s Razor slices our indolent media’s baloney fine… the “free press” is welding a sledgehammer these days which trumps any measured reasoning, unfortunately.
I know Baud has called for breaking the stranglehold broadcast programming has on us, but with public education at a nadir, we mustn’t beat around the bush in our interactions with potential voters. Keep calm, and sally forth!
Shalimar
@Betty Cracker: I think the alarm among Dems is media-generated, which is what pisses me off so much. Yes, people were genuinely disappointed with Biden’s debate performance. It would be an issue with people who don’t trust Harris or Biden’s team and they would be watching more closely in the next 4 months. But the freakout and he-must-quit-now shit is because media and Republicans have been priming this pump for all of this year and have turned it into the only news available since the debate. Fuck them.
Betty Cracker
@piratedan: I did see accounts of the rally and after party in the news, which of course noted that they were scripted events. It’s good that POTUS is doing the ABC interview and campaign event in the Midwest. Maybe throw in a few town halls. Do more interviews. Biden is the only one who can fix this.
zhena gogolia
@cain: he wrote a big article in the Atlantic on it: the end of the Biden era. That’s when I canceled my subscription
Jackie
@Baud: I was kinda wondering that, too.
Still, those “hyperboles” have to upset Biden 😟
UncleEbeneezer
@rikyrah: And Jamaal Bowman.
Jeffro
@MinuteMan: I was just gonna say…HE’S ALL IN!
LET’S GOOOOOOOOO DEMS!
Dobbs. “Immunity”. Progress on climate change. Making the rich pay their fair share. It’s OUR turn to take the mic!
schrodingers_cat
@UncleEbeneezer: MAGA like but from the left.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Jackie: Mini-primary
I can see you know who warming up his wagging finger.
SuzieC
What is the Epstein stuff? i haven’t seen an explanation anywhere.
cmorenc
@mistermix:
In highlighting stable poll numbers post-debate, it’s important to consider what the anticipated advantage to Biden of setting up the first debate so relatively early in the cycle was: to provide a reassuring positive contrast for the voting public side-by-side with Trump, with the effect of moving poll numbers in Biden’s direction. The hope was that Biden would be able to put on a similar-quality performance as at his State of the Union Address, which had mostly defused the age/competence issue in the interim. And as a bonus, Trump was considered the one most at risk of losing ground by showing his ass or committing egregious gaffes at the debate.
Instead, Biden’s stumbling performance highlighted his greatest vulnerability with the normie voters he was hoping to attract: is he too old to competently be President the next 4 years? While Biden didn’t lose very many voters he already had, he not only failed to gain any ground, but now he has a hill to climb to defuse the impression too many normies saw with their own eyes. And so, while it’s good that Biden didn’t lose significant ground, it’s now more of an uphill battle to restore confidence in him with the extra margins of normie voters he needs to win reelection. So, we’re fooling ourselves by thinking *nothing* much happened wrt Biden’s standing with the electorate from the debate
Don’t shoot the messenger, here. I just gave $100 to the Biden campaign last night. I’ll back him, assuming he stays firm on staying in. But if he does step aside, I’ll back Harris or whomever takes his place.
jimmiraybob
@JWR: It seems like someone occupying the White House with absolute immunity for official acts could easily within his Constitutional mandate declare the Federalist Society and all the other organizations supporting Project 2025 as insurrectionist organizations. Shut them down. Seize assets.
Splitting Image
@Chris Johnson:
All of this.
Steady as she goes.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
DougJ is having a good day:
There is only one way for Biden to win in November: get Sotomayor to retire and put Donald Trump on the Supreme Court. https://x.com/DougJBalloon/status/1808507425823048075
Biden is too old, Kamala is too black, Newsom is too slick, Whitmer doesn’t smile enough, and Buttigieg is too gay and too McKinsey. Democrats have no good options. https://x.com/DougJBalloon/status/1808536947083686148
JWR
@Chris:
I freaked out about this for a few hours after the debate, but as long as this nonsense goes on unabated, it threatens Biden and starts shaping up to have the horns of another butter emails or a Benghazi, something that could actually derail the campaign. Here’s hoping the governor’s meeting and Friday’s sit-down with the Clinton blowjob guy will put an end to all this. But it’s out there, and the media has its teeth out for blood, They’re not about to let go until all the votes are counted, so the Dems had damn well better get on the same page.
Mike E
@UncleEbeneezer: ugh. I had a trumper at work lecture me (he was a proud confederate Merkin) during the ’20 election on how KH wasn’t really Black …I waited for his rant to end, took a beat, then said, “We are all out of Africa, to be honest.” He smiled then went his way to work somewhere the fuck else in our building. I had plenty of practice dealing with these clowns from ’16 onward.
schrodingers_cat
@Gretchen: Rick Wilson, Stuart Stevens.
delphinium
@Betty Cracker: Honestly, I think part of this too is that folks had incredibly high expectations for Biden to “put Trump down for good” in this first debate. And when that didn’t happen due to various reasons, shock & panic set in.
I’ll also say that the Biden is ‘old’, ‘feeble’, ‘is in cognitive decline’ has been a part of RW and mainstream media for awhile now and we have all been marinating in it. So, yeah, not completely media driven but boy have they had their thumbs on the scales.
Shalimar
@SuzieC: What I have seen is Epstein’s phone logs from discovery in an earlier case (either 2008 or one of the civil suits) were released. He and Trump were really close for decades. He had dozens of contact numbers to get in touch with Trump.
Jackie
@prostratedragon: Oh, dear! What the heck does Biden think he’s doing?
Presidenting while president???
Mike E
@SuzieC: “client 174” or some such, who is You Know Who recorded in ledgers sexually assaulting 12 and 13 year old girls trafficked by that monster
NotMax
@Jackie
FWIW, he’s been Pravda-ing like crazy*, including such items as live televising of military tribunals against the membership of the J6 committee. And whining the debate coverage has turned to focus on Biden rather than it’s rightful place praising God’s Gift to Mankind.
*Yes, even crazier than usual.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@SuzieC:
More than you ever wanted to know:
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/epstein-documents-trump.html
That provides a lengthy background on everything. The latest is that some grand jury testimony was released a day ago and shows the Orange Fart Cloud apparently had a far closer relationship to the pedophile pimp than was previously disclosed.
But as always, IOKIYAR.
Mike E
@cmorenc: it’s more a question of this relentless drumbeating, bordering on concern trolling…and getting called out as “gaslighting” when pointing out our media environment is corporate-captured and normalizing fascists. We know the score.
MinuteMan
@Splitting Image:
I thought that’s what they’re already doing though maybe with a touch of subtlety.
Baud
@Shalimar:
Oh man. The media frenzy over this is going to sink Trump.
Steve Crickmore
Biden has beaten the odds before, more than once. We admire fighters over quitters and I think of poor Senator Al Franken who was drummed out of office, by the weight of public pressure resigning over a sexual harassment scandal, probably quite unnecessarily. Biden has spent enormous energy and made a strong personal commitment to his re-election as have so many other Democrats and his support cast. Biden more than anyone knows it is a long journey.
You’ve got to know when to hold ’em
Know when to fold ’em
Know when to walk away
And know when to run
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hx4gdlfamo
kalakal
@Chris: In the UK NewsCorp runs separate editions for England & Scotland. It’s quite common for the Scottish edition of The Sun and the English edition to run the same story but from completely opposed viewpoints
Shalimar
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: This should be dominating at least the New York Times front page since Trump and Epstein both lived there when all of this happened. But I guess there is no room since we have to have a separate story for every Democrat who comments on Biden’s senility.
JaySinWA
I don’t think it’s that they can’t both sides it. It seems like Epstein’s contacts run through a lot of people in power. As the tweet says “It’s so horrible they can’t approach it” combined with the threat from those in power who would be implicated.
The aftermath of a complete Epstein expose could have devastating impacts on governments, rich people, and otherwise influential people that pulling on individual threads threatens the whole Jenga tower collapsing.
Shalimar
@Baud: Trump’s ship doesn’t run on electric batteries. He’ll be fine.
gwangung
@UncleEbeneezer: Coconut has generally been used for Hispanics. Banana for East Asian Americans.
And, as you note, it’s for IN-community use by that community. You don’t use it if you’re external to the community, even if you’re non-white. Asians don’t use Oreos; Blacks don’t use “banana.”
I don’t know what the hell anybody not Black or South Asian would use that term.
delphinium
Also, just from my own experience with an aunt and grandfather that had Alzheimer’s, they could not function well in crowds at all. Any more than 2-3 people talking to them made them retreat because they couldn’t follow the conversations. Definitely not Joe.
Eyeroller
@schrodingers_cat: Who are those people? Does “coconut” have any connotation of Asia or is it just that coconut hulls are brown while the interior is white? I really cannot keep up with these slurs.
(Coconut palms seem ultimately to be native to the Malay archipelago but I’m sure these idiots don’t know that.)
NotoriousJRT
@Gretchen: THIS. Ever-loving this.
Eyeroller
@schrodingers_cat: They were operatives who knew how to win, even if it may have been dirty sometimes.
schrodingers_cat
The MSM and bro band has now moved on from Joe bashing to Kamala bashing.
NotMax
@gwangung
Ah for the days of macaca being sufficient to harpoon a campaign.
//
Seeker
@apocalipstick: Every dem will be disqualified for some reason…his lapse of judgement hypocritically eating at a restaurant? Welp, can’t be president then.
Pitchbot said it better:
schrodingers_cat
@Eyeroller: On some searching apparently this is related to some anecdote Kamala H was recounting about her mother.
Bros are circulating it and mocking KH.
O. Felix Culpa
@schrodingers_cat: Ah, they’re pre-disqualifying her. At least it gives us a preview of attacks to come.
Baud
@O. Felix Culpa:
Pretty sure pre-disqualification comes with party registration.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@BR:
Biden snubbed them when they demanded an interview to see if the Old Gray Bitch approves of him. Since then it’s been nonstop attacks, one after another in an attempt to inflict damage. Freedom of the press is the only freedom that wealthy people can buy and own, with the ability to turn it to their own purposes.
That freedom is what they are using against us.
OT: It’s 106 here on the south Oregon coast about 400 feet from the ocean. It got down to 60 last night. I take it this is the new normal I’ve been hearing about…
Suzanne
@Eyeroller: A quote from Kamala Harris at an event last year, in which she said, “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you,” is starting to go viral today….. and most of the people spreading the meme are Harris supporters.
Miki
@Betty Cracker: Thank you for this. I have felt the gaslighting and have added it to the pile of excrement that had me yelling and crying as I drove to the Farmers Market this morning.
I want, want, want and hope, hope, hope it’s just an episode, not a condition. But I know what I saw.
Show me more, Joe, but all of it has to be 100% better.
Jackie
GQP Texas House member = Chip Roy on Faux.
Eyeroller
@Suzanne: It seems to be a pre-existing slur but mostly aimed at Southeast Asians and maybe Hispanics. Wikipedia has a “helpful” list which defines it as:
“Named after the coconut, in the American sense, it derives from the fact that a coconut is brown on the outside and white on the inside. A person of Hispanic/Latino or South/Southeast Asian descent who is seen as being assimilated into white American culture.”
Suzanne
Here’s a Vox Explainer on the whole coconut tree thing.
It’s seemingly starting from the KHive today.
Sister Golden Bear
@Suzanne:
No disagreement, and yes Biden definitely needs to address it. But I’m a bit doubtful this is actually a widespread panic among normies. I’m just not seeing evidence that it is — so my POV is Dems need to rally around Biden.
Acknowledge he had a bad night, like we all sometimes do, but make the point that 1) folks should watch Biden’s other appearances and you’ll see he’s up to the job, 2) switching candidates at this point would guarantee a Trump win, and 3) that while Biden sounded old, Trump sounded like Hitler. A demented Hitler, but when people tell you who they are, believe them.
NotMax
@Eyeroller
Fun fact.
Were it not for a shipwreck Palm Beach might still be known as Lake Worth.
Suzanne
@Eyeroller: I’ve heard it as a slur for Puerto Ricans before. But the specific context today is coming from the coconut tree thing.
NotMax
@Jackie
An amendment the text of which he apparently has never read.
Jay
@Jackie:
Our former Prime Minister, Jean Chretien had several masterful skills,
one was beating the crap out of people who broke into the official residence at night,
another one was choking out a protester who assaulted him before his security detail could react,
and the last one, was responding to a stupid hypothetical question, or a stupid question by the media, with his particular Franglaise accent, “that’s a stupid fucking question”.
JWR
ICYMI, 6 minute interview with Heather Cox Richardson on last night’s PBS News Hour. Here it is on Youtube:
gwangung
@Suzanne: It’s an extremely dumb thing to use as a criticism because of the racial overtones.
JWR
@Jackie: Cow Chip Roy. What a guy.
delphinium
@Miki: Sorry, this just isn’t realistic, like all candidates there will be some future missteps that the media will then blow out of proportion (even if Joe wasn’t old). How will you feel then? Media dem-bashers and their surrogates have been playing this game for a long time now. At the very least, can we not so willingly go along and also not have such unrealistic expectations for our candidates?
O. Felix Culpa
@Baud: Heightened by lady parts and pigmentation.
schrodingers_cat
BS supporters are making memes about the coconut tree quote supposedly supporting KH-BS ticket. It feels like mockery to me. But what do I know. I defer to the commenters of the most diverse blog on the internet.
An example:
Emma Vigeland
Me, shedding my toxic Bernie Bro baggage and embracing the warmth of Momala’s embrace beneath the coconut tree
Trivia Man
@BR: Agree. FTFNYT and i bet the top 100 random podcasts combined have 1) more listeners
2) more engaged listeners
3) will hammer home and repeat all the highlight clips every day
theturtlemoves
@schrodingers_cat:
The Bulwark has been unreadable and their podcasts unwatchable for the last week or more. I was starting to like those folks but they’ve reminded me this week that they all still think Reagan was awesome and both Sarah and Tim somehow managed to be Republican operatives while gay, which does not speak well of their priorities or judgement.
Old School
@Miki:
Or….?
ColoradoGuy
I was the one that mentioned that CNN fucked with the mike equalization (I’m a retired audio engineer … been doing this since 1973). What I heard from the TV audio was Biden’s mike had a lowpass filter set to 3 kHz, with what sounded like a 12 dB/octave slope. Overall level was about 2 dB lower than Trump’s mike. Trump’s mike had a slight presence boost in the 1~3 kHz range, maybe 1~2 dB worth.
(I think the lowpass filter would show up on a spectrum analyzer, but most folks don’t know how to interpret the display.)
As with the deliberately engineered Dean Scream, this was a planned media op. The real Leni Riefenstahl’s of the Trump campaign are the sound engineers, and Trump is enough of a media pro to treat them well. Meddling with the sound is what they do, and it’s quite plausible they interfered with CNN’s sound techs … or had their own sitting at the sound desk.
bbleh
@Chris: @JWR: I donated immediately, and I almost never donate to big campaigns.
And the NYT headline is truly a parody of itself. At this point, they’re only slightly distinct from Fox.
NotMax
@O. Felix Culpa
Line taken from Recipes of the Donner Party?
//
schrodingers_cat
@theturtlemoves: I blocked them a long time ago. I only found out because my mutuals were quote tweeting Bulwark cons.
schrodingers_cat
@bbleh: They are worse than Fox because too many Dems and independents think that they are an honest broker and that they are liberal. No one thinks Fox is liberal.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@delphinium:
+1
H.E.Wolf
Trivia time: That slur was mentioned in a season 2 episode of “Veronica Mars”, in Spring 2006: one of the Latina students says it’s used to disparage her and some of the other Latino students. :-(
Suzanne
@Sister Golden Bear: I still think Biden’s media strategy, debate prep, all his image management, etc. has been so bad. For a while now. First of all, don’t debate Trump. It’s a shitshow and there’s no way for anyone to do well in that format. He lies and lies and lies, there’s no way for anyone to keep up, and Joe has never been a facts-and-figures guy. Second of all, if you’re genuinely sick, cancel. This is the age of the video clip, don’t let them catch you looking bad. And, like, saying that he had a cold…. Not really reassuring. If he had a cold, say so upfront, so you manage those expectations! Third of all, debates don’t show off what people like about Joe. Town halls, or interviews with the Pod Save America people, or other more casual, conversational formats are better for him. And it takes, like, 10 positive impressions to make up for one bad one, so it’s time for a blitz.
The strategy of being pretty closed off to media and others is also not serving him well right now. Pointing to the SotU is not especially helpful when the event was months ago and the concern is decline over time.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@ColoradoGuy:
Thanks for the additional info.
Everybody should have their own sound board person/engineer, everybody.
NotMax
@schrodingers_cat
Maybe missed it (not something I seek out). Has Tuckums weighed in?
Suzanne
@gwangung: Most of the coconut tree content I’m seeing today is coming from the KHive and is pro-Kamala in nature. Agree that it can have racial overtones, though I don’t think that was today’s original intent.
As I noted above….. social media’s algorithm makes these weirdly curated little bubbles for us, and it’s difficult to know how anything begins, how fast it moves, and how much content others are seeing. It’s incredibly weird. We have a much smaller shared frame of reference than we used to. It’s all so meta.
It’s why we all need to go outside and touch grass. But fuck, it’s hot!
Eyeroller
@Sister Golden Bear: I’ve defended him based on his fluency disorder (stutter, sometimes other problems) and maybe cold/cold medication) but it’s true he’s OLD. You know what, old people are hit harder by exhaustion, colds, cold medication, stutters, etc. Old people can have an occasional bad day or night (generally not regular if they’re basically OK) and that is not abnormal. But he has a great staff and a wonderful VP so maybe lean into that.
ColoradoGuy
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Yup. You always have your own, trusted sound team. And teach Joe good mike technique … you don’t need to be Frank Sinatra (the master) but you need to know the basics of how to “play” the mike. Think of it as a spotlight, and move in a few inches (no more!) to make a point.
Hmm … if the CNN broadcast had been in stereo, the manipulation would have been obvious to everyone as an imbalanced sound stage.
snoey
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Montana abortion rights groups are sponsoring an initiative and say that they have almost twice as many signatures as needed to get on the ballot.
Currently Montana allows abortion under a general right to privacy, but this will make if far safer.
Only a simple majority to pass, hope it does so and also helps drag Tester over the line.
Miki
@delphinium: With due respect, I said better, not perfect.
There’s no reason to lower that expectation unless, of course, one thinks he can’t.
Geminid
@JWR: To listen to him talk, Chip Roy grew up ropin’ calves down on the Brazos River. But he was born in Bethesda, Maryland and attended high school in suburban Loudon County. Then he got a BA from the University of Virginia. Roy had to work on that accent.
Ishiyama
“”I must not fear.Fear is the mind-killer.Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.”
Trivia Man
@Suzanne: Wisconsin wingnut radio today is “dunking” MVP for a fake shout out to the Kendrick-drake beef.
As if they are qualified to judge content like that.
Sister Golden Bear
@Suzanne:
Absolutely agree. Definitely needs a change in direction, with a new team that understands the current realities, and can work with the Biden we have, not the policy wonk they were trying to make him into.
I still think Biden could do well in a second debate as long as the prep team understands that a debate will be about vibes and feelings, not facts. Biden got much better in the last debate when he got pissed off. Let him do his “come on, man” thing.
Miki
@Old School: … we’re gonna lose. Not because I won’t vote for/fight for/ Joe but he needs to win. We need to win.
RaflW
The “when did this happen before” thing I saw that mattered to me was when Hillary Clinton was ill for a few days near the end of her campaign. There was a strong rash of “can she be replaced?” “Is she secretly dead” (ok, that’s a slight exaggeration) news writing (news fabricating?).
No doubt the Claxon NYT Comey bullshit was more damaging, but what is repeating from 2016 is a press that seems hell bent on destroying the Democratic nominee.
It’s intolerable, and I have no idea how to stop those absolute fucks in charge at the Times, etc.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Geminid:
Good lord, I can practically visualize every step of his process geographically. I saw plenty of faux urban cowboys from the greater metro DC area over the years. Hell, my older cousin might have been one of his teachers depending on which HS he went to.
So basically, he’s taking a page out of the Dubya playbook with his “ranch” and “brush clearing”, etc. Well, at least he’s in TX now and not in VA. JFC.
Jeffro
omfg, are you serious? (of course you’re serious)
Chip Roy, UVA alum. Right up there with Laura Ingraham.
Chip Roy, down-home accent faker. Right up there with John Neely Kennedy (R-LA) (and ALSO a UVA alum)
ArchTeryx
In the meantime, Lawyers, Guns, and Money has completely jumped the shark. They are now not just wanking about a contested convention, but openly advocating for the removal of Joe Biden from the race. And the author of that article dares to lambast the commenters for calling out the crypto-Trumpism for what it is. What a complete and utter shitshow. And if they’ve gone full “Biden Should Drop Out” that bodes ill for all of us
Campos is bad, but I’ve never seen him just plain call advocating for fascism as “good for the Democratic party” before. At this rate, LGM is just going to go full horseshoe, and that’s when I check out.
schrodingers_cat
BS bros (and sisters) are pushing the Harris-Sanders ticket and the coconut tree stuff. Do a general search on Twitter and see for yourself.
Baud
@ArchTeryx:
Yeah, no. LGM is not the voice of the people.
ETA: neither is BJ, for that matter.
ArchTeryx
@Baud: It’s the voice of the legal elite. THAT is what worries me. If they’re spouting this kind of bullshit than the D party bigwigs can’t be far behind. Everyone’s lining up to knife Biden in the back, right on the eve of Trump being given unlimited powers ala the Enabling Act. What the fuck are they thinking?!
Baud
@ArchTeryx:
They’re nobody. We’re nobody. Chill out.
Eyeroller
@ArchTeryx: I don’t see why LGM has that much influence.
Dan B
@Trollhattan: Marshawn Lynch and Newsome. Lynch has always seemed taciturn to me so a podcast with Mr. Chatty could be interesting. Lynch certainly left an impression in Seattle.
ArchTeryx
@Eyeroller: They don’t. I see them more as a canary in the coal mine when it comes to the bankrollers. They can spout whatever Ivory Tower bullshit they want in their own little pond. The big worry to me is that they aren’t the only ones – more and more major D party donors and Powers that Be are joining them. It’s utter insanity and scaring the shit out of me.
Eyeroller
@ArchTeryx: What legal elite? A guy at U Colorado law school? Loomis is not a lawyer. Lemieux is not a lawyer. The name of the blog has little to do with the authors’ professions.
JWR
And another one.
Baud
@Eyeroller:
WaterGirl is a bigger player in the Democratic Party than they are.
Maybe D donors will abandon us, but LGM has nothing to do with it.
Eyeroller
@JWR: Goodie, another old “progressive”.
CaseyL
@ArchTeryx:
Since I don’t watch the news, I have to ask: which major donors and Powers That Be?
ArchTeryx
@Baud: See above. I see them as a symptom, not a cause. None of us are anybody. But the trouble is, the people who are somebody in the D party are now parroting their talking points. The freight train is rolling downhill, and I don’t know if it can be stopped at this point.
That is what scares me. Not the LGM wanking. I’m not even sure any more what’s just media bullshit and what’s actual pressure being put on Biden to drop out.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@Baud:
Harry Truman, Doris Day
Red China, Johnnie Ray
what else do I have to say?
Baud
@ArchTeryx:
We don’t know. But looking for tea leaves is a waste of time, especially of it’s going to upset you.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Nominated!
ArchTeryx
@CaseyL: This gives a good overview. The Great Orange Satan, for a refreshing change, isn’t jumping on the Biden Drop Out bandwagoin, but is trying to separate the media smokescreen from reality. Right now it’s literal Democrats in Disarray and, while I’ve really kept far away from all this crap, it’s even starting to freak ME out. Especially after that disastrous Supreme Court session. That raised the stakes to nothing more than a lot of our lives. Whole lot of people with targets on their back if Trump is (s)elected with those powers.
Eyeroller
@ArchTeryx: He’s told them to fuck off. He had a record-breaking fundraising month including after the debate. I am coming to S.C.’s opinion that the people who want him out are the ones who never wanted him, and they fantasize they can get what they want if he’s gone. Of course they all have different ideas of what that might be. There is a pathology in Democratic elites, that’s for sure, that we don’t see so much in Republican elites (their pathologies are different).
E.
Can I be forgiven for posting some anecdata? I have been canvassing for a local candidate and hitting mostly doors that lean democrat or are very likely democrat. (No party registration in TN so sometimes there’s guesswork involved). Anyway, I do not ever initiate conversations about the wider political world, but every day there are a few people who want to complain about Trump, and I engage with them. BUT TODAY, TODAY . . . they weren’t talking about Trump. People were talking about the Supreme Court and they were pissed about it, too. I don’t mean a few people either, it was astonishing how eager people were to unload on me about the Supreme Court as soon as they learned I was campaigning for a Democrat. I think maybe the Supreme Court thing is going to land, electorally.
Eyeroller
@ArchTeryx: I read some of your earlier postings about your concerns, and I understand. You are completely correct that the first “undesirables” in Nazi Germany were the disabled (physically and mentally) and we know that Trump mocked a disabled reporter and a lot of the media thought it was funny. But try to stay as calm as you can.
Suzanne
@Sister Golden Bear:
Yeah this.
I think Biden hates much of the mainstream media, which I get, but the response can’t be to just treat them with contempt and try to ignore this issue and hope it goes away. That’s, like, a 20th century response. This is the age of the meme, of the TikTok, and the only way something stops going viral is when something else comes along to replace it.
I think there’s a window — which may be closing — to recover from this. But holy shit, ignoring the concern or calling people bedwetters….. not helpful. Something like 75% of voters have said that Biden’s age is some sort of issue for them, though of course that can be outweighed by other factors. But, like, there’s a problem there.
We spend all this money donating to campaigns specifically to do a good job at this! Arrrrrghhhhh!
ArchTeryx
@Eyeroller: Good! I’m glad of that! Because I’m Biden all the way. My panic isn’t related to what happens if he stays in. My panic is related to what happens if he is forced to drop out. THAT is my worst case scenario. I’ve been in enough rodeos to know what a disaster that would be, but a hell of a lot of Democratic elites seem to not have gotten that memo.
Walker
Anyone who thinks this was not a serious primary thinks black voters do not count. And that is really what this is about.
Baud
@E.:
Good to hear. And thank you for doing that.
zhena gogolia
@E.: Thank you, that is good news.
ArchTeryx
@Eyeroller: They also made a direct attempt at my life (and the lives of millions of people like me) and failed by one single Senate vote. The only time I’ve ever seen McConnell completely flummoxed. Watching the fascists throw a kegger on the House floor celebrating those oncoming deaths is burned into my brain forever.
zhena gogolia
Well, I don’t usually read these campaign e-mails, but I read this one and I have to say it made me feel better, even if that’s ridiculous.
JWR
@Geminid:
You mean he’s a phony baloney cowboy? Who woulda thunk it? But srsly, I don’t remember what he sounds like, but he looks like a stone Nazi.
trnc
It’s a singular role that is only regularly filled every 4 years, so a replacement at the ready makes sense. I would not say that the existence of that role completely mitigates concerns about a president in decline over a period of months.
Renie
I have a 30 year old Bernie fan in the house and it’s infuriating he keeps telling me Biden will have to step down and let Harris be the candidate. He thinks it will happen in two weeks. I told him to not talk to me about Biden anymore. Bad enough the media keeps it going, now I have it in the house!
Eyeroller
@ArchTeryx: I assume you’re talking about all those Republicans laughing and celebrating blocking some part of the ACA. As some people have said, I don’t care whether there’s a heaven but I hope there is a hell.
ArchTeryx
@JWR: You mean, exactly like Dubya? He had the phone baloney cowboy jus’ folks routine down pat, and turned it into two terms.
zhena gogolia
Everybody needs my husband in the house. He keeps saying, “Biden is not going to quit. And he’s going to win.” I thought he might be just trying to make me feel better. So this morning I said, “So if Biden stepped aside and Kamala Harris ran with Pete Buttigieg, would they win?” He said, “No.”
ETA: And he likes both of them.
Geminid
@ArchTeryx: I used to check out LGM, but I am mainly interested in practical, electoral politics and they seemed clueless in that area.
But those LGM guys sure can think! They overthink matters so much they’re like Uberthinkers.
prostratedragon
@Jackie: Yeah, awful, isn’t it?
Ruviana
@Suzanne: I’ve gotta ask, is the 13 yr old the youngest spawn? I swear I thought she was like 3 or 4!
ArchTeryx
@Eyeroller: Celebrating their vote to repeal the ACA, especially the Medicaid expansion. I have Crohn’s Disease, and having my access to medical care taken away is a slow, agonizing death sentence to me. At that time, it was the only thing keeping me alive.
And a whole lot of sick poor people depended on Medicaid expansion as much as me. Before the ACA, they were simply allowed to die. And they still are in ACA refusal states. It’s been a silent massacre for a long, long time. The ACA’s Medicaid expansion was meant to finally bring it to an end, and to the fascists that could not be borne. That’s what they were celebrating. Mass murder.
Elizabelle
@zhena gogolia: Yay Mr. Zhena! Talk some of our jackals off the roof.
He is right, too. Smart man. And lucky. But you knew that.
delphinium
@E.: That’s fantastic! And as commenter Kay stated earlier will be a great thing to focus on during the election (and much more productive than rehashing the debate).
From my own anecdata, I formerly worked with 3 life-long Republicans-of which only 1 voted for Trump the first time and none of them the second time. Also, 2 neighbors down the street had signs up for Trump in 2016 but no signs since then. I don’t think there is another large cache of new Trump voters to be had for this election and he has definitely turned off a lot of formerly Republican voters.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Eyeroller:
Yup.
That pathology in the Dem elites also exists in certain sections of the rank and file, call them bedwetters, white liberals, etc., that we’ve exhaustively discussed over the last week and is on full display by that wing as represented by the front pagers at LGM.
The base of the party, different story but again, we’re constantly being dragged back into the same framing and discussion by many of the same people who, if you peel away that layer of the onion, weren’t big Biden supporters from the beginning.
Baud
@Elizabelle:
He likes to be called gogol.
Suzanne
@Ruviana: No, there’s also a newly-five-year-old!
Odie Hugh Manatee
LGM is hard at work knecapping Biden while trying to claim that they’re not. Campos has an article up that breathlessly states that he’s been working on a story
Wow! A story about a story to come! How electrifying and informative you can sound when you compost, I mean compose a bunch of bullshit about some coming bullshit. The whole quote about the story about the story is
So it he’s wrong then it’s good news for the Democrats! This is how you write a story that is absolutely nothing but an upcoming story that is also about absolutely nothing. Two stories about the same thing makes it sound like you’re a genius.
LGM just sucks donkey dicks. All they are about are themselves. It’s a self fluffing site.
Elizabelle
@zhena gogolia: I got it and read it too. And sent my $25.
I think President Joe is going to get a big haul off that email.
Stay and fight, Joe.
And fuck the fucking NY Times. Break Big Pundit.
Jackie
@NotMax: @Jay: @JWR:
Exactly why I ID’d him. The Supid Brigade is forming. It’ll be interesting to see how many House MAGAts join Roy.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
Another one for the clip file!
Elizabelle
@Baud: Smart dude, under any name or ‘nym.
Keep calm and carry on.
This reminds me, we have not heard anything from the Obama camp.
JWR
@Eyeroller:
I seem to remember him as a Bernie Bro? But whatevs, he’s in a solid D district, so no pandering to his Right.
ArchTeryx
@Geminid: I am an exile from academia. I overthink a lot too, and as I like to say, Anxiety (from Inside Out 2) is my spirit animal.
Captain C
@NotMax: Perhaps the FTFNYT and the rest of the Vichy media have figured out that if they just ignore TCFG, people won’t think of how crazy and awful and disastrous he is and would be, and give them the horse race they crave
ETA: Or at least that’s their hope. The polls so far don’t seem to show it much.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: But the media is feeding of the panic of white liberals. Like the ones here and on LGM.
New Yorker wants Joe Biden to resign right now. Not kidding.
I don’t remember them asking for Trump’s resignation.
ArchTeryx
@Odie Hugh Manatee: I gotta say, if the stakes weren’t so high, the whole thing would be an absolutely laughable example of just how big a case of craniorectal insertion syndrome these tenured Ivory Tower academians really have. I worked with them for 20 years. Holy shit I know all about that.
Jackie
@Geminid: Just like LA Sen. John Kennedy with his “aw shucks” affected twang.
S Cerevisiae
Another example of The Simpsons being prescient:
Sideshow Bob vs. Mayor Quimby debate
https://youtu.be/jKfMpzpF6Hk?si=RDuvXJ6pp5oarnq1
Searcher
I don’t know if it would have mattered in this election — people like Joe, and he’s done a good job — but I would like to propose a two round primary when there is an incumbent.
First, run the primary as normal, with the incumbent sitting it out. Then, a week or two after that wraps up, and the “best alternative” is selected, a second primary election is held, one on one, between the challenger and the incumbent. No need for a campaign season — the incumbent is known, and the challenger has spent the last 8 months selling themselves.
No, I don’t know how this works with our insane rolling primaries or our archaic “electoral college of the primaries” delegate system.
In the case of a bad incumbent, we don’t have them winning by default with a plurality because a bunch of challengers split the “not incumbent” vote twelve ways; in the case of a good incumbent, they’ll trounce the challenger head to head with 70, 80, 90% of the vote, and we can rub it in the faces of everyone who whines about the process being rigged.
Whichever one of you secretly controls the presidential primary system, please consider implementing my proposal. Tank you for your time.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
They’re actually advocating for Kamala?
Eyeroller
@JWR: He’s in the Progressive Caucus. Like Lloyd Doggett. I do not know for sure but I seem to recall he was a Bernie supporter.
LanceThruster
The party machinery operates in a way to try to ensure candidates acceptable to the donor base. Whose “turn” it is can also come into play. 2016 actually had a rather “robust” challenger despite other hopefuls recognizing that was not a good time to go head to head with the presumptive nominee as that could damage future ambitions within the party. What was thought as pretty much a token challenger turned out to be serious competition for the nomination (a tactic used against him was that he was too old to risk with the top slot, his heart episode confirming that in their minds) .
The grass roots enthusiasm was a ongoing concern to the Establishment leadership who had other plans, rather than something to be capitalized on by using the swelling ranks of youth nd previously disaffected voting blocks to ensure victories across the board far into the future. They found a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory trusting that the smartest people in the room had run the metrics and had mapped the proper course to victory. The convention was their opportunity to point out that all that was needed was for anyone with a dissenting view to get in line as being the only game in town might as well entitle them to those votes, though they didn’t feel compelled to make any concessions to earn them as Hillary pointed out in a townhall with Rachel Maddow that her primary victory was so conclusive that she did not need to do anything particular to win over progressives as per Maddow’s question.
Fast forward one term and Julian Castro took a lot of flak for challenging the former vice-president’s memory, Rahm Emmanuel being quick the condemn the exchange as mean and disrespectful, and probably complained later that kitchens are just too hot these days. The remaining field was pretty much cleared before Super Tuesday with key endorsements by challengers upon exit and James Clyburn just before the vote pushing the one time 4th place candidate who was close to the end of his campaign cash to the front of the pack. It was pretty much smooth sailing from there, and after teaming up with a primary candidate who made an issue of the eventual nominee’s civil rights record in a primary debate but wound up not earning a single primary debate herself, the party regained the office of the presidency on the basis of experience being more relevant than age.
Biden was reported as only planning on serving just one term and that he was confident a worthy successor would be ready when the time came. At some point that was dismissed and he was ready to shoot the moon for a 2nd term. The modified primary process during the pandemic worked to his advantage. Biden was known for his gaffes and his dropping out in ’88 for reasons dismissed anyway went down the memory hole. The remarkably energetic protest to the slaughter in Gaza was not enough to make any noteworthy policy changes (standing with Israel “no matter what” is pretty much signaling they have a free hand in their retaliation), and the ICJ findings were dismissed to the point of various assurances of serious consequences to the court if pursued further from both sides of the aisle. Again, they felt the protesters had nowhere else to go and the margins might get squeezed a bit but not enough would hold out to matter. They pretty much ignored those anti-genocide voices until the Michigan “uncommited” primary vote tally came in. Assurances were made that the president was doing everything he could to bring about a ceasefire (UN vetoes notwithstanding).
Unflattering videos from various Biden events were dismissed as being doctored, or out of context, or whatever would fly. This same approach was employed post-debate. Don’t believe your eyes and ears. We see him regularly and up close and he’s fine. There are a few dissenters, but they have an agenda so can also be dismissed. The president is sharp as a tack, democracy hangs in the balance, and only an idiot is unable to see he wears the finest garments in land.
So dance with the one who brung ya, swing with the one who swung ya, and you’ll have a ball at the dance.
:—:
Panic on the streets of Washington
Panic on the streets of Manhattan
I wonder to myself
Can my life ever be sane again?
Do we keep him, do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him
Do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him
Do we keep him, do we dump him, do we keep him
Do we keep him, do we dump him
Do we dump him, do we keep him 🎵🎶
Eyeroller
@LanceThruster: You can sing all you like but if Biden says he’s not dropping out, that’s it. Sorry.
Suzanne
@JWR: Grijalva is a longtime old progressive guy. I wouldn’t call him a “Berniebro”….. he’s been in Congress for a long time, representing a district with a lot of people of Mexican descent. He taught at the University of Arizona for a while.
Geminid
@Elizabelle: Barack Obama put up a very supportive social media post the next day.
Jay
@Geminid:
Uberthinkers is a gig job, it doesn’t pay well, there is no job stability, and technically, it’s not really a “job”, just a gig you might get paid for.
Elizabelle
@LanceThruster: LimpDick says what?
How did you make it out of the pie filter? Up to check it out …
3Sice
@Eyeroller:
His actual statement is reasonable, the press mob don’t care about nuance, and yes there is some score settling going on for denying the chosen one his throne.
Elizabelle
@Geminid: Excellent.
BlueDWarrior
@Eyeroller: This whole controversy is just dumb. It’s not that there is no reason to be concerned. But it’s all coming from the top and middle-top down.
Most of the people at the bottom (baseline Democratic voters) have noted that it is a concern but so far have yet to be convinced is a disqualifying one.
Mayhap the operation is to churn up so much storm and strife that the general public start assuming he really is going soft in the head for good and they stop donating, volunteering, etc.
Elizabelle
@LanceThruster: Answering you seriously: have you not noticed how good Biden has been for Americans, not just the moneyed?
That counts tremendously for me.
Disgusted with The New Yorker, to which I also subscribe. Thinking I can do without them for a while too.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Did not click the link. I was grossed out.
“Instead of making a choice between remaining on the ticket or stepping off of it, Biden should resign from the Presidency altogether as soon as possible,” @JeannieSGersen writes. http://nyer.cm/d470KM
I have never heard of her before.
BTW I just remembered that NYC was on the wrong side during the Revolutionary War and home of the Copperheads during the Civil War.
Eyeroller
@BlueDWarrior: Elite media led by FTFNYT want Biden gone, with CNN chiming in due to its new leadership. Other media may not be as slanted but they follow the lead of the “paper of record.” This is EMAILZ dialed up to 11. If we’re lucky it will peak and fade so they won’t get their October Surprise.
Jackie
Good news for MS Democrats!
Paul W.
First of all, fuck all of these pundits and 77 year old nobodies from Austin (my home state) for getting out ahead of the President. He knows if he can do this or not, and they aren’t the ones who ran and won two presidential primaries.
In talking with my family, all stalwart Biden and Democrats, I am 100% behind Biden if he chooses to continue because nothing else besides an all out effort (no matter our candidate) will win this.
However, if he is staying I do want to see a reinvigoration and I would say even to cut back on Presidential duties if it means more campaign and rest time for big planned events. We need him to close this door and not look back, and that also means I don’t really want him thinking about going all wonky next debate but just being pissed and hitting his talking points next debate.
If he can’t do that, I think he should step aside. My support is likely not enough, but it also isn’t my choice so I leave it up to him and his confidants to make that decision.
There is a lot that a Kamala Presidential run would do to change the game, and a lot of underlying and obvious risks as well (woman, blah person, etc) but I think it would electrify Democrats as a historic moment. I predict it would double the previous single highest fund raising day in history, but I don’t trust Kamala’s campaign instincts as much so hopefully she is willing to listen and learn from her last race and we get this done if Biden and her agree that is what needs to happen.
(edit) also adding: I’m not panicked, I am worried. But then I’m a Democrat.
moonbat
I swear a good percentage of the commenters on here would rather be right in predicting DOOM! than win with Biden/Harris.
Get over yourselves. Biden, better than any of us, knows what’s at stake and he knows what his own condition is. If he didn’t think he could win and do the job, I honestly don’t think he would run. He has done more than right by this country in the years he’s been president and I trust him to make the call in a situation where he knows more than I do.
Cannot wait to see the freak out on here when Netanyahu does his best to torpedo the president next week. Are you all going to be sifting through his every word looking for secret insidery knowledge that proves Biden is unfit to lead? Doing his and Putin’s work for them?
For a bunch of media savvy political junkies, a distressingly high number of you sure enjoy getting played by the NYT and a few newly minted trolls.
trnc
I agree that Dean going down in flames for that one thing was ridiculous, but this is different. The media have been running “Biden is old” stories for a while. They were stupid most of the time, but now here is something that retroactively provides legitimacy to every one of those stories, and it happened at the place and time of Biden’s choosing.
I saw Biden on tv at some event today, and he looked and sounded pretty good. That’s great, but I admit to some trepidation about the next case of long term jet lag after campaign travel.
3Sice
The thing about The Texans is any career ambitions got jammed by the Democrats inability to put anyone over statewide since dinosaurs roamed the earth. I’d be sour about it.
Geminid
@JWR: There are Sanders supporters and Rep. Grijava may have been one, but I would not call him a “Bernie Bro.” Grijalva formed his political views long before Senator Sanders ran in 2016. Speaking only for myself, the people I call Bernie Bros are a subset of Sanders supporters, and not nearly the largest subset.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@ArchTeryx:
I’m glad that I quoted Campos because I think he realized that smelling your own farts and telling others that the next ones are going to be great probably isn’t the best idea he’s had.
Campos pulled the story about the story over at LGM…lol! Someone should do a story about it!
Betty Cracker
@Paul W.: Anyone who’s not worried is a goddamn fool.
Geminid
@schrodingers_cat: Yes, the Civil War Copperheads who worked hard to undermine the Republic and discourage those who thought it worth defending.
There are still Copperheads around. They drop by this blog every now and then.
Captain C
@ArchTeryx:
Loomis or Campos?
Mike E
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: 🎼We didn’t start the fire…🎶
Captain C
@ArchTeryx: Ah, Campos. I generally avoid his writings because he’s too into doom. Unless it’s on a topic that I find interesting in the first place.
Gwangung
@Betty Cracker: Absolutely fair. But I get annoyed at the binary thinking and unnuanced takes.
Slightly_peeved
@cmorenc:
But on the other hand the polling reaction is in line with previous bad 1st debates from incumbents and both other people on the ballot have been publicly accused of gross sex stuff. Re-elected Presidents have been in worse positions.
zhena gogolia
@Elizabelle: I’m the lucky one!
TBone
@Jackie: the Heritage Foundation has stated that it will sue in several states if anyone other than Biden is permitted to be on the ballot. 🙄
https://www.wonkette.com/p/heritage-foundation-nut-tuggers-will
Eyeroller
@Slightly_peeved: Yep. I keep being reminded of the freakout over Obama’s first debate against Romney, much later in the election cycle. I remembered it was bad but not that there was screaming for Obama to step aside for somebody else. But that happened. The FTFNYT did not have its thumb quite so heavily on the scale back then, however.
Ruviana
@Suzanne: That’s the one! I thought I was in some kind of time warp!
topclimber
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan): He won his second term against Dewey. His first was to fulfill 3.75 three years of FDR’s term after his death in April 2045.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
@topclimber: 3.946 years
Gretchen
@LanceThruster: someone remind me how the pie filter works…
Gretchen
@schrodingers_cat: I did not know that history! Thank you! Kind of like the NYT were Hitler- curious until he invaded Poland.
Suzanne
@Geminid: Yeah, Grijalva has been in Congress for over 20 years at this point, and he had a local political career for a couple of decades before that. He’s definitely an old-school progressive guy.
His district is weirdly shaped, and includes some of the southwestern Phoenix metro area. One time I was phone banking for the Dems in that area, which has a large Latino population, and I reached a man who spoke not-too-much English (and my Spanish is, like, conversational at best). I kind of tripped through introducing myself and why I was calling and he got super-excited and started speaking really fast about how he was incredibly excited to vote for the first time as a new citizen and how he was talking to his whole family and all his friends. I had to have Mr. Suzanne (fluent in Spanish) come over and complete the conversation to give him directions to the polling place, but it was seriously one of the greatest voter contacts I ever had while doing that work. He was just absolutely esctatic.
apocalipstick
@Sister Golden Bear: And the best policy wonk in the world could not ‘debate’ Trump. The proper response is to point and laugh, which Biden does well.
Slightly_peeved
@ArchTeryx:
“Elite legal opinions?” Did Paul Campos convince someone he knows to start posting?
I’m sure he’s a perfectly good legal professor, but he ain’t at Harvard and he hasn’t litigated much.
Papa Boyle
I will entertain conversations about Biden stepping aside *if* he steps aside. Until then (if that then ever happens) he’s running. And I’m voting for him.
Also, I’m putting a hold on my NYT subscription. For a couple decades or more.
Slightly_peeved
@Eyeroller:
A lot of the post-debate arguments I’ve seen boil down to “sure, first debates and replacing incumbents have gone badly before, but this time is different!” I imagine if I found conversations around the Obama-Romney debate or Kennedy’s challenge of Carter people would be saying the exact same thing.
Kay
@E.:
I do too. People are already there. This is really bedrock to Americans – we can’t have a king. They know that.
I sort of don’t know how to extend it though -how to keep it in front. They’ll forget about it without some sort of continuing story. One thing that is coming up is Trump trying to skate on the NY charges.
frosty
@Jeffro: Especially if the sound guys have prepped our mics right!!