A General thread for 2024 Presidential Elections

[Foggy]

I suffer from horrible, distressing prognostications.

Party of the first part:

It is increasingly clear that Trump will be the nominee of the Republican Party. He has managed to turn the indictments from dross into political and actual gold. Polls and donations are way up. I believe that even if he is convicted of one or more crimes, that trend will continue.

No other Republican has a ghost of a prayer of a miniscule chance. Or tell me who.

Party of the second part:

Biden can't find his pants yet. RFK Jr. is in like Flynn. I am gobsmack.

Edit: Oh, wait ...

.

[Slim Cognito]

I think our best chance of keeping the White House is Trump as the GOP nominee, so I’m good with that. If somehow DuhSantis, sneaks in, he’s probably got a pretty good chance of winning. If somebody reasonable miraculously gets in, like Tim Scott, or Asa Hutchinson (neither likely) I think they would win in a landslide quite honestly. Independent and moderate Republicans are begging for a reasonable republican nominee. And the few who see Trump for what he is may stay home or possibly even vote for Biden just to keep Trump out. It’s going to be close no matter what, so those few never Trumper‘s could be the key.

[Sam the Centipede]

It's not impressive that a country of about 330 million people, so about 175 million potential voters, produces such a thin crop of unappealing candidates: Biden, who is uninspiring and (in my opinion) too old for such a pressured job (given that he will be 5 years older than now at the end of the term), Trump, a corrupt racist felon, DeSantis, a nasty asshole, Kennedy, a reality-denying nutter, and nobody else really discussed.

Foggy is, as always, Mr. Perceptive.

[Slim Cognito]

I agree with everything you just said. Buttegieg would be my guy. I'm also a huge fan of Kamala Harris and think she'd be great but she's getting the Hillary treatment because something something female. Instead we have these old people who won't give up and go away, and that includes you Difi.

Too also, I think Tim Scott is worth watching. He's apparently creeping up in the GOP polls but I don't know if trumpers would hold their nose and vote for a black man. That's assuming trump does a permanent faceplant in the meantime.

[Dave from down under]

Jim Wright latest essay doesn’t pull punches..
https://www.stonekettle.com/2023/08/bal ... 0Sqr9k&m=1

[RTH10260]

opinion piece

Trump is undermining the entire US judicial system with another big lie
Trump’s second big lie is almost as dangerous to the future of American democracy as was his first

Robert Reich
Wed 16 Aug 2023 20.10 BST

Not content with trying to destroy America’s trust in the US election system with his big lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him, Donald Trump is now trying to destroy America’s trust in the US judicial system with another big lie.

The second big lie is that judges, prosecutors, witnesses and juries are corruptly prosecuting Trump as a means of keeping him from being re-elected.

Late on Monday, following a two-and-a-half-year investigation by the Fulton county, Georgia, district attorney, Fani Willis, a grand jury there charged the former president and 18 others with criminally seeking to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 victory in Georgia.

This fourth indictment marks another step in the US’s slow but steady process of criminal justice. It is another illustration that no one is above the law.

Willis and her staff deserve the nation’s thanks, as do special counsel Jack Smith and his staff at the justice department, who have brought evidence to other grand juries of Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election nationwide and to steal secret documents.



https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... indictment

[pipistrelle]

Gifted WaPo article.
https://wapo.st/3qAR8Hy

American democracy is cracking. These forces help explain why.
Behind the sense that the political system is broken lies a collision between forces both old and new

[bob]

538: Who's In, Who's Out And Who Might Bail On The First Republican Debate?.

In: Burgum, DeSantis, Haley, Ramaswamy, Scott.

Christie, Pence, and the quadfectee will qualify once they sign the loyalty pledge.

[Suranis]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/18/politics ... index.html

Trump expected to skip debate and do interview with Tucker Carlson

Former President Donald Trump is planning to skip the first Republican presidential debate on Wednesday and is instead expected to sit for an interview with former Fox News Host Tucker Carlson, multiple sources familiar with his plans tell CNN.

Well thats going to be yet another thing no-one watches. Tuckums is traveling the Bill O'Reilly path to irrelevance, and he is jonesing for anything to boost his viewership. As for Trumpy, he is largely irrelevent, only the Media hasn't noticed.

[raison de arizona]

During my interview with Ramaswamy, he reiterated his position that he would allow Putin to keep parts of Ukraine, block Ukraine from joining NATO and even visit Putin in Moscow. The GOP contender added: “Our goal should not be for Putin to lose.”

[Slim Cognito]

The fact that he's an asshole aside, does he think Putin only wants "parts of Ukraine?" I was under the impression he thinks the whole damn country belongs to him and I don't see him knuckling under to somebody no one had heard of prior to last winter. How would he react when Putin says, No thanks, and keeps on bombing children?

[Suranis]

Oh no. Putin would say yes, let the guy get headlines as a peacemaker, then occupy the rest after he has moved supplies and Machines into the new area, before NATO could respond.

[shannon]

Ramaswamy Says He’d Run the Government Like Elon Musk Runs Twitter: ‘A Good Example Of What I Want To Do’

"Ramaswamy appeared on Friday’s edition of The Ingraham Angle on Fox News, where he was asked about a comment in which Musk called him “a very promising candidate.”

“Well, you just got a lot of kudos online recently from Elon Musk, who seems to be – perhaps moving away maybe – from DeSantis and toward you,” Laura Ingraham told him.

“Look, I think Elon is an excellent example of what he did at Twitter, is a good example of what I want to do to the administrative state,” Ramaswamy replied. “Take out 75% of the dead weight cost, improve the actual experience of what it’s supposed to do. And at the same time, I love the way he released the Twitter files. I’ll release the state action files. Any time a bureaucrat has pressured a private company, let’s publish it for the world to see. And he put an X through Twitter? I’ll put an X on the administrative state. So, that’s where I’m at on common tactics with Elon.”

[AndyinPA]

"Business" people should be allowed nowhere near the reins of government.

[Kendra]

Asa Hutchinson was on Deadline WH today. Nicolle Wallace really drilled down on his answer about signing the promise to vote for the nominated pledge, His line was well tfg won't make the nomination, so he's good with having signed it since he won't be forced to vote for tfg. Nicolle was having some of it and pushed back and then David Jolley jumped in as well.

[AndyinPA]

He was pathetic. No wonder people hate politicians.

[keith]

Asa Hutchinson was on Deadline WH today. Nicolle Wallace really drilled down on his answer about signing the promise to vote for the nominated pledge, His line was well tfg won't make the nomination, so he's good with having signed it since he won't be forced to vote for tfg. Nicolle was having some of it and pushed back and then David Jolley jumped in as well.

The point is being missed here.

The pledge does NOT require anybody to vote for anybody. It requires them to campaign for the ultimate candidate, or perhaps not campaign against them. Including running as a third party candidate, of course.

Usually I mostly like Wallace when I see her stuff. But this question was the wrong question, and Hutchinson gave the right answer - its really none of her business who he is going to vote for.

[bob]

And even then, "support" is incredibly vague.

Any failed candidate could say, with a flat affect, "I support the party's nominee."

Ultimately, there's no legal resources if a failed nominee doesn't cheer hard enough for the winning candidate.

But there can (and likely will) be political ramifications for those who don't support the nominee, even without the pledge.

[New Turtle]

What he didn't want to say was he signed it so they would let him in the debate.

[bob]

Rooting for injuries.

[johnpcapitalist]

Larry Elder
@larryelder
I intend to sue the RNC to halt Wednesday's presidential debate.

It looks like someone is desperate to retain relevance after losing badly in the 2021 attempt to recall California governor Gavin Newsom.

[neonzx]

Larry Elder
@larryelder
I intend to sue the RNC to halt Wednesday's presidential debate.

It looks like someone is desperate to retain relevance after losing badly in the 2021 attempt to recall California governor Gavin Newsom.

I had completely forgotten about Larry. But here he is. I do not understand what ground he is on to "sue" to stop the FoxNews RNC debate.

[bob]

I had completely forgotten about Larry. But here he is. I do not understand what ground he is on to "sue" to stop the FoxNews RNC debate.

Essentially (and being very charitable), breach of (implied) contract.

Elder's gripe is the RNC change the eligibility rules, so if Elder can't debate, nobody should be able to.

The is fracticly wrong, but Elder didn't file this to win.

[Grumpy Git]

So who's watching the GOP debate tonight? Despite the 2am starting time here I will be tuning in, I'm curious to see if Ron DeSantis is as vacuous and lacking in humanity as he appears to be in the news clips.

The Lincoln Project has a great bingo card!

bingo.jpg (401.24 KiB) Viewed 962 times

[Kendra]

Oh, I'm gonna watch. This should be good.