What Happens to the Republican Party After Trump?
It’s November 4. A nation bracing for the possibility of days or weeks of ballot-counting has realized to their surprise that they already know who won. Texas was called for Joe Biden on Election Night, and no pathway to victory remains for Trump. As a result, although several states have yet to be called, the only question at this point is how big Biden’s margin of victory will be. One thing is clear, though: it is going to be big. The country already knows the Democrats have retaken the Senate and made gains in the House. We are looking at two years of Democrat control of the executive and legislative branches of the federal government — at least.
So what happens now to the Republican party?
You might have guessed that Step One would be the recriminations, but it turns out to be Step Two. Step One is dealing with the claims of fraud. The most immediate issue: Trump has not conceded the election, despite the obvious lopsided results. Fox News and fever-swamp right-wing sites have come out with what they claim is clear evidence of fraud. CNN and the rest of Big Media purports to debunk these claims, and independent observers can see that while there are one or two possibly suspicious episodes, they are not nearly enough to have swung the election. No matter. Trump and his diehards spend weeks claiming that an investigation needs to be opened, and the drama occupies the country up to and even after the inauguration of Joe Biden.
Ultimately, Trump doesn’t refuse to leave office, and while the protests result in some isolated clashes and instances of violence, there is no uprising — although the looniest of Trump’s followers are calling for one.
Step Two: the recrimination phase. This seems like it will never end. Far from mending the schism in the Republican party, Trump’s loss only seems to intensify it. In addition to the loyal Trump fans’ claims of election fraud, Republican dogma insists that Trump was headed for an easy re-election but for the pandemic. Not every Republican agrees, and the vast majority of Republicans who remain in Congress after the bloodbath are in agreement that Trump sunk himself. That said, they are reluctant to say so for a good long while. They’re not exactly intimidated by Trump any longer, given how badly he lost — but they remain cautious about alienating the still-sizable majority of Republicans who. at least initially, still support Trump and believe the narrative that he was both stabbed in the back by the NeverTrumpers and a simple victim of bad luck and/or Chinese evildoing.
The Kurt Schlichters and Dan Bonginos of the world continue to mold themselves as the Only True Trump Fans, and their vitriol towards NeverTrumpers, which previously seemed to have no room to intensify, becomes alarmingly over-the-top. References to NeverTrumpers being literal traitors who ought to be lined up against the wall and shot become shockingly commonplace.
As the 2024 elections approach, however, it has begun to sink in to the less online and less politically hyperactive majority of the Republican party that Trump was a mistake. These are the people who loved Trump purely because he was A Winner — someone who often said things they found obnoxious or stupid, but who always seemed to beat Big Media at its own game . . . until one day it turned out he was capable of losing, and losing badly. The notion that he was totally blameless in his defeat becomes hard to swallow, and the very concept of Trump running again in 2024 is widely panned. Even those who feel like he got dealt some bad breaks are unwilling to back someone who lost as historically as he did in 2020.
With time, one or two politicians previously thought to be stalwart Trumpers begin to say the obvious: nominating Trump was a mistake. He won only because he went up against the historically unlikable Hillary Clinton. Republicans have also rediscovered their fealty to controlling spending and the national deficit and debt. Even the NeverTrumpers, who never liked Biden’s policies and either cast protest votes or reluctant votes for Joe Biden, are starting to get annoyed at the Democrats’ overreach. Absolutely zero effort is expended in terms of making it easier for Congress to enforce its subpoenas or oversight, or revamping Special Counsel regulations, or undertaking any of the myriad other simple reforms that one would have thought critical after a Trump presidency.
Here at patterico.com, the host routinely criticizes the new president, especially regarding the lack of reforms to rein in the executive. In a microcosm of the continuing schism, Trump fans hold the host personally responsible for every lie told by Biden, every radical judge he nominates, and every bad policy he pursues.
All of this seems almost inevitable. I can’t tell you who will emerge as the Next GOP Hero, or precisely the direction the demoralized party will take in 2024. But the broad outlines of the upcoming weeks, months, and years are not difficult to foresee.
Looking forward to it!!!
The republican party does not want you never trumpers back. Talking free trade because your wealthy donor class demands it and wants to sell out the working class to communist china for their profit. Good luck trying to sell that to a now populist republican party. To get donor cash republicans will have to try and ignore the now populist base. Explain to me how john kasich is welcomed back into the republican party or max booth and david drum et.al.
asset (c4fdbe) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:38 amI can’t tell you who will emerge as the Next GOP Hero
I can: Nikki Haley.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:02 amI know you are being sarcastic but judging by the initial comments, it is already started.
PS: “As the 2024 elections approach, however, it has begun to
DRJ (aede82) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:07 amsunk insink in …”…the only question at this point is how big Biden’s margin of victory will be. One thing is clear, though: it is going to be big…
OTOH, this is the time of year to be whistling past the graveyard, what with Halloween approaching.
63 million Americans voted for Trump– warts and all.
Those voters haven’t vanished like ghosts in the night.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:13 amHe [Trump] won only because he went up against the historically unlikable Hillary Clinton.
No, he won by beating out a plethora of shallow, vapid and inferior GOP candidates to secure the party nomination and actually lost the popular vote to the ‘historically unlikable Hillary’ but won the EC tally.
The biggest mistake everyone has made going up against Trump – in both his private and professional life – has been to underestimate him.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:28 amI’d lay off the Ambien if you’re having dreams like that. It can’t be healthy.
Ultimately, we got Trump because our political class treats the mainstream of America as vermin.
In the future, I see the Republican party filled with fewer RINOs, and more folks professing to love our Country, and then acts like they actually love our Country.
But, hey! I could be as delusional as the rest of us.
Wrathchilde (aa4273) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:59 amMy take is that if Biden wins in Nov, which conventional wisdom says is the most likely outcome ( but I think there is a slight possibility that he could lose), if Trump sees a patch to victory from fraud, or the appearance of fraud, he’ll tie the election results up in the courts. I think it’s a real possibility that we wouldn’t know who will be President until 2021. This of course assumes that it is not a Biden blowout. Which is of course very possible.
As for Trump’s loyal constituent zombies who believe anything he says, under President Biden, they will complain about how corrupt Biden is but that will pretty much be it. We might get another Tea Party type event where Republican voters suddenly become fiscally responsible. I also see a lot of investigation of Hunter Biden and his Dad’s dealings in Kazakhstan(or where ever). You will be hearing a lot about how corrupt President Biden is.
ah-non-ee-mouse (e2ed1b) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:51 amTrumps America Love it or get out
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:02 amDCSCA (#5)
You were supposed to take the red pill not the blue pill. Unless you are obscurely warning is that Trump has a foolproof method of cheating.
Appalled (1a17de) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:22 amI will join ranks with JVW in that I will foolishly attempt a prediction, even though my predictions usually turn out wrong: Trump takes Texas*, but the Democrats in Houston cry “foul” – calling for a recount. During the recount many newly “found” ballots are for Trump while many counted votes for Biden are disqualified for various reasons.
Hey, if I am going to be wrong, I want to be WRONG! Maybe I’ll learn my lesson – finally.
*By the time Texas is called – perhaps as late as the next day, it will seal the deal for Trump.
felipe (023cc9) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:23 amWe will find out if Don McGahn put the right judges in the right places, and if Trump has sense enough to hire Jones Day and pay them a hefty retainer for the lawsuits.
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:45 amI would hope that circa 2016, the first thing that the GOP did was understand how FNC and Talk Radio got thoroughly co-opted….and how a base known for picking the known individual next in line….felt so desperate to pick an interloper who most of the time demonstrated little grasp of actual conservatism….in all of its forms. I think all the standard politicians understood that they lost the right-wing propaganda machine that they helped create and they had no answer….so they buckled and assumed their position in the new reality.
What is Trump’s next play? Does he heckle from the sidelines….surely…..but to what end? I agree that a big loss will likely put his future Presidential aspirations to bed….though I question if he really has the interest in “playing President” anymore. His sons are in line but they come across as cheap imitations who seem out of their league….forever entourage….without the familiarity needed to excuse all of the gaffes. So what then? Well, many of the true believers will go back to the usual favorites: unbridled hate and conspiracies. Obama hyperbole…..double-downed by Hillary hyperbole is what brought us Trump. The love of drama….and giving it to the MSM and libs…..can be sold to the masses easier than the details of zero-based budgeting and other technocratics.
The prognosis isn’t great…..but a Nikki Haley is uniquely positioned to wrestle the party back…..back to some sort of seriousness and coherent message. She can move beyond Trump without being hostile….and that will be how the party will need to move forward. A lot of memory erasing….and a candidate that doesn’t indulge the hate and conspiracies….
AJ_Liberty (a4ff25) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:09 amWhen America needed leaders with integrity, Nikki Haley decided it was more politically expedient to lick Donald Trump’s fat orange ass instead.
When she had a choice between America and Trump she chose Trump.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:18 amPatterico, Good post. Your thinking matches up pretty well with the grief cycle. One thing to keep in mind is that these stages don’t have to happen sequentially, not everyone will move through at the same time, and you can move backwards.
I expect a lot of Trump supports to be enraged at any criticism you level at Bidne. A lot of people started with a transactional support of Trump and transitioned to full support. I don’t expect too many of them to understand Never Trumper support of Biden in the same way. I predict that you’ll get a lot of commenters in the future telling you that because you didn’t support Trump you’ve lose the moral standing to criticize anything Biden does or says and that by doing so you’re demonstrating cowardice or dishonest behavior. They will need someone to blame and they’re not going to give up the rage easily. There will be a lot of hate for the media and never Trumpers.
I don’t think we’ll see a lot of open expressions of guilt. Smart people that make their money from infotainment have seen why Trump is loved. There will be plenty of adds to be sold to people who want to watch someone express hate at the part of our country that’s made them feel powerless. The list of people that have made them feel powerless and disrespected will now include republicans that didn’t support Trump.
Time123 (36651d) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:19 aman-non-ee-mouse I think you’re right on that and I’d add this will be enabled by 3 things you didn’t list.
1. Trump’s character. He has to be the center of attention. His time horizons are very short. He doesn’t care if he’s shown to be completely wrong tomorrow so long as today’s news is improved. He defines success by what people say about him in the press. Put that all together and and he has every incentive to fight endlessly.
Time123 (36651d) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:31 am2. There will be plenty of people willing to read or watch a story about these fights. Some because the legal questions are interesting, Other’s because it gives them hope that they might still, and some because it makes them feel better. Every media organization will want the add revenue from that content. Openly partisan outlets will get to run stories about’look how stupid these dead enders are’ / ‘can you believe they’re calling you stupid for supporting this’.
3. If Trump is starting a TV station this will be the jumping off point; He lost because the media was unfair to him and even Fox wouldn’t tell you the Truth. Tune in to Trump TV(tm) to hear Alan D. explain how the constitution clearly says that Biden didn’t win. Watch point/counterpoint online where Probosiec and Cernovich debate if Biden is a pedo who eats babies or a demented old man controlled by baby eating pedo’s.
This was made clear in 2016 and 2017. Conservatives who support free market capitalism, small government, rule of law, and fiscal discipline accepted our rejection from the party and began looking for least bad alternative.
As a result Trump’s way down in PA, MI, and WI. He’s tied in GA and NC, and Texas (For crying out loud) is within the margin of error.
Time123 (daab2f) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:36 amTechnically, we have never known who is President until every “2021”, when the new Congress convenes in January and certifies the electoral votes.
But the Electoral College will vote on December 14, come hell or high water, and no court will dare to impede that vote or any slate of electors dispatched by any state, and that’s my prediction.
As for Tiny Donnie, six weeks is time enough for him to have had his fill of sobbing and tantrums, having his nose wiped, hugs, kisses, and ice cream, and now he should be a good boy and wait to see what Santa brings him.
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:45 am“Nikki Haley decided it was more politically expedient”
Well, so did Romney…General Kelly…..Rex Tillerson….and Mad Dog. The government still had to be run….and I’m thankful that some stepped up and made sure Trump didn’t take it over the cliff. I’m not going to argue that Haley is the perfect representation of my feelings about Trump….especially with regards to not clearly repudiating the Ukraine foolishness….and every other norm-busting move and utterance….but things do need to move forward….and a candidate will need to deal with the reality that is versus the reality that we might prefer. I also conspicuously don’t hear a better choice….probably because someone like David French…a non-politician….is a non-starter. The purity pool is pretty shallow…especially for people who still have to use FNC and Talk Radio to get their message out. So, diming out Nikki might score on the outrage meter….but in the end, who’s better?
AJ_Liberty (a4ff25) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:49 amTrump voters angry at feeling powerless will have to find another way to give the middle finger to American culture.
Time123 (36651d) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:24 amGoing by 270towin and the RCP averages…
Paul Montagu (77c694) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:09 amBiden will get 356 electoral votes, a landslide, and which doesn’t count Texas. Trump will be a one-term loser, decisively rejected by the American people. The loss will be all the glaring because Biden is a below-average candidate and campaigner.
The Senate held 52 seats in 2016, and they’ll lose the majority with 49.
The GOP won 241 seats in 2016, and the Dems will have at least 230 seats because I’m not counting the 24 toss-ups.
The GOP were in 33 governors’ mansions in 2016, and will probably end up with 27 after November 3rd.
The 2020 election will be a repudiation of Trump in particular and the GOP in general, but the real problem is the plurality who nominated him in 2016, who gullibly believed that this buffoon would Make American Great Again. Our deaths per million and cases per million have made America more like sh-thole country.
I foresee an intra-party bloodbath after Trump concedes because the Trump loyalists aren’t going to apologize or repent from their Trump-supporting ways, and I doubt they’ll leave. I don’t foresee a Nikki Haley or some other schlub unifying the party because Trump and his supporters fractured it beyond repair. It’s time for a new conservative party that rejects Trump and returns to traditional conservatism.
@26, Nikki Haley, a non-white woman who took the confederate flag off of the state house when we was governor, is not going to be able to keep the the “What about the White Genocide” portion of Trump’s base motivated.
Time123 (daab2f) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:20 amThis is depressing as it would indicate that no Republican in Congress will learn any kind of lesson or find their backbone as a result of a Biden landslide. As a result, the GOP will not find its footing anytime soon, and Republicans will be as split then as they are now.
Dana (6995e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:46 amTrump being arrested/tried for actual crimes might speed the GOP reformation phase along. As would Trump going into a comfortable exile in Russia or Brazil.
Appalled (1a17de) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:52 amI think this short-sells a lot of good and decent people who voted for Trump not simply just because Hillary was so unlikeable, but because they truly believed he would deliver what he promised and would Make America Great Again. That he was able to tap into their frustration at being left out of the conversation and having their concerns, in large part, ignored, for the previous 8 years, they were willing to overlook any red flags he posed, and give him the benefit of the doubt. With a history to reference four years later, it’s anybody’s guess how many of these supporters are no longer fooled by the schtick.
Dana (6995e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:53 amRight after Bush goes on trial for War Crimes.
Hoi Polloi (15cfac) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:56 amAnother election where there are not any “Lesser of two evils”. Would a lost change the Republican party ? I seriously doubt it because they would brag about court appointments. But what is a win for Conservative legal movement worth if the Conservative movement as a whole is in a state of moral, political and intellectual collapse? You win a battle but lose the war. But Trump alone isn’t responsible. If the Republican Senate had a spine and would have called witnesses, had evidence put forward and not ignored and rubber stamped the Trump impeachment they wouldn’t be as responsible for the 225,000 Americans who died during the pandemic as Trump is.
The problem is the system isn’t broke, the problem is it’s fixed. What we are experiencing is the result of having to vote for the lesser of two evils over a number of years. It is no longer a government of the people, by the people and for the people and they no longer need the consent of the governed. Instead it is two semi private entities who work behind the scenes and have total control of the party, create rules and regulations governing these entities and restrict entry barriers to keep out competition. The mass of passive members have little to say about it….just shut up and vote. This is why the system doesn’t work for a rapidly growing segment of our society. In short the two party system is ruining America.
Knickerbocker Slobberknocker (27d313) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:59 amI should note that I do not use that term to describe myself and never have, but I understand why people would apply it to me. Speaking for myself: I don’t *want* to come back. My real disappointment in the party has not been Trump himself so much as his superfans, who rationalize every bad thing he does. Those people are still there. I am not a joiner in general, but I particular that is not a team I wish to rejoin. I may be alienated for life.
Patterico (115b1f) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:02 am“I expect a lot of Trump supports to be enraged at any criticism you level at Bidne. A lot of people started with a transactional support of Trump and transitioned to full support. I don’t expect too many of them to understand Never Trumper support of Biden in the same way.“
Why be enraged? Hate and anger do their most damage inward (there’s a lesson there somewhere).
If Biden wins it will be fair game to point out to anyone who votes for him (and advises others to do same) that we are reaping what they have sown.
It’s also fair game to thank 2016 Trump voters for adding Amy Coney Barrett to the SCOTUS if that happens. And if it happens today I can’t think of a better birthday present for Hillary Clinton
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:11 am_
Fair. I’m willing to pay the price. Already did. and i’ll do it again and again. And there are millions who see things this way.
Trump was such an awful candidate he was certain to be a gift to the left who accomplished basically nothing. You guys have to repeat judges because that is literally all he accomplished. No wall, no legislation, no reduced spending, endless and horrible corruption, and he nominated a judge. Thanking Trump for such pathetic performance is like defending him for shooting someone on 5th avenue. It’s nuts.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:21 amI was against prosecuting Trump after he leaves office, but I’m coming to what Appalled said.
Paul Montagu (77c694) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:23 amWhat comes next in the GOP is none of my business. I agree with Patterico that Trump gave Team D the senate. They might squander their opportunity the way Trump did. They also have a few million conservatives in the democrative party now, so that complicates things in a lot of places.
I felt bad each Republican I did vote for. I almost just left those blank. I know that the GOP will put itself over my family and my country, so F ’em. I imagine the ultra cynical Nikki Haley and Ted Cruzes will battle the squishy Romney and Kasich for the soul of this rotting party. Nowhere on the agenda will be balancing the budget, immigration reform, solving the russian threat to the world. Trump ruined the ability to get anything done on the most existential threats to our nation. But he got a judge lol.
Biden’s more likely to get something good done than Trump was.
If Trump is in a real prison cell by the midterm I will reconsider support for the GOP. Otherwise, it’s all words.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:25 am7. ah-non-ee-mouse (e2ed1b) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:51 am
By whom, what with the Democrats having majority control of Congress?
And there will be palpably false accusations lobbed against him by foreign or other trolls, which will become the excuse to try to suppress anything more credible that comes from anywhere else.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:29 amPatterico #27: I have always felt outside of the Republican Party, and have long been an independent. It’s because I simply cannot abide the hypocrisy on both sides. And it has become so increasingly personal.
I think that both parties are cracking up. I do not believe that the progressive Left can control the majority of voters, any more than far Right. So there is a place for folks in the middle, who are not mere cheerleaders.
More and more, I think that our political class needs to re-enroll in kindergarten. They need to relearn “I cut, you choose.”
Simon Jester (545ea7) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:30 amI’ve felt this way since 2006. The GOP absorbs all these ideas that are not compatible, and winds up doing nothing but talking the talk. If every ‘spend less, reduce government’ vote goes to people who always expand its powers and lawlessness (and price) what’s the point?
A new party that is a little more intelligent in combining support from groups in Team D and Team R would face tremendous hatred and smears. But I think it’s the only way.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:30 amWhy do you think anyone who left the Republican Party because they had such a moral and political aversion to Trump and his subsequent co-opting of the GOP would want to return to the Republican Party as it currently stands? What would be the draw? Further, when you make the declarative statement that the Party does not want those who you refer to as “never-Trumpers” back, then that demonstrates to me that the Republican Party has no interest in widening the tent, but instead would rather keep it an exclusive club where no wide-ranging thought is welcome. Good luck with drawing new members, getting any legislation through, or making any effective changes that benefit all Americans.
Dana (6995e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:31 amIs it fair game to blame them for Trump’s idiot tweets or his suggestion that we look into injecting bleach to defend against COVID? Or 5000 other stupid things he has done or said?
I don’t like playing that game, but if you’re going to play that game you have to take the bad with the good. But somehow the Trump defenders never seem to see it that way. Sad!
Patterico (115b1f) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:32 amThis whole thing represents how childish and stupid the GOP has become. This playing hard to get, be the bully, so when the nevertrumpers come back they know their place now, it’s Little Man Syndrome. It’s why Trump wears those weird shoes he can barely walk in and gets so upset when asked if he’s ready for tough questions. These guys are insecure because they see the damage they did to the Republican party and the country.
My phone has received at least 50 text messages in the last month. The GOP wants my vote real real bad. They just want to play hard to get.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:35 amThe Democrats controlling the White House, Senate and House, what could go wrong? A hell of a lot! Patterico you can’t really be looking forward to that, right? Earlier in the year you responded to something I wrote saying you hoped the GOP held onto the Senate. Did that really change? If so why? Do you trust Biden (or who ever will be pulling the strings), Pelosi and Schumer with nothing to keep them in check for the next 2 years?
Mattsky (55d339) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:41 amIf there are prosecutable crimes against him — and I think the Mueller report shows there are — I am on record as saying he should be prosecuted. I understand the move on dot org arguments but I think it’s high time we stopped putting presidents and ex-presidents above the law.
Patterico (115b1f) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:42 amNot really, no.
I go back and forth. Initially I just wanted Trump gone. Then I wanted the GOP to take a historic bloodbath, Senate and all, for the good of the party.
Honestly, once I gamed out what is likely to happen next, in this very post, I can see that a bloodbath is unlikely to solve anything. Therefore I am mostly agnostic on the issue but there is a part of me that will be relieved if the GOP manages to hold onto the Senate.
Hell no. But I don’t trust anyone any more. The GOP does OK as a party in opposition though.
Patterico (115b1f) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:46 amWhat might speed the GOP reformation phase along is showing that Trump was cynical in what he said.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:48 amNo Republican has ever been elected president without winning Ohio. That’s in history.
No Republican has been elected president without winning Florida for the last 96 years.
Thus these are to two crucial states. If Trump loses one or both, he’s out.
There is a small pathway to victory, but it’s narrowing. And it’s a hard road.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-4xjCqIv1Y&list=RDL-4xjCqIv1Y&start_radio=1
Trump may be able to sneak out an electoral college victory despite losing the popular vote, like he did in 2016. But he’s making the mistake all military colleges warn against. That is, fighting the last war.
Hillary Clinton is not Joe Biden. 2016 is not 2020. Trump is running as an incumbent now. He is not an outsider, but the ultimate insider. He has become what his cult protests against. It’s the ultimate tragic/comedy.
Texas is in play. But it doesn’t really matter. This election will turn on Ohio and Florida. Forget all the rest.
Welcome to the club.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZG5acM9CkM
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:01 amIf ever there was ever a time ripe for a new, third party…
Dana (6995e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:06 amBut we knew that during the primaries and supported cynicism because ‘he fights’ (against us).
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:10 amIn the thread on this topic I placed a great weight on faith in the rule of law. I’ve bene thinking about it. I think the right answer is to prosecute if there is evidence that the prosecutor thinks would meet the burden of proof for a jury. The claims of it being a political attack are inevitable, but that just means the DOJ would need to be clear, transparent, and right in their estimation.
Time123 (441f53) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:19 amThat’s going to be the argument going forward, because it’s my party, too.
Paul Montagu (77c694) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:26 amPatterico, I personally don’t mind being called a NeverTrumper because it’s simply true that I never supported Trump and never will.
What’s inevitable is that Dems and their NeverTrump allies will pave the way for the next Trump-like figure, through bad policies and prosecutorial double standards. They just can’t help themselves.
beer ‘n pretzels (042d67) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:31 amThis attitude is how you get Biden.
The solution to preventing the tragic outcome you predict (and frankly I think it’s a reasonable prediction) is to start killing Russian hackers. Plain and simple.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:36 amSet aside your politics– even Biden’s history– and just examine Biden’s activities as a person.
He’s not doing any public events 8 days out — more ‘lid days’ until he goes to Warm Springs, GA to give a speech where FDR died; he has only been seen in public for brief periods– one or two hours at most– for debates or short, controlled pressers between long ‘down time’ periods or brief, head shot online ‘Max Headroom’ bunker events. He’s had at least two brain surgeries that we know of; and even putting his history of stuttering aside, slurs his words during debates enough to be noticeable [meds perhaps?]; repeats time-worn, long out-of-date phrases; makes odd references to things like ‘record players,’ relationships w/long-dead colleagues and such. Makes up– or mixes up– old stories; makes appeals to unions in speeches, vows to phase out Big Oil… [great rhetoric for 1974]… you can go on and on.
So we have the Joe Biden of 2020, a man applying to start the most difficult job in the world [aside from motherhood] on January 20, 2021… who will turn 78 years old in just 25 days.
You wouldn’t hire him to drive your kids school bus; nor want him to pilot the 767 you’re flying in; nor let him perform brain surgery on you… or even park your car… but it’s okay for him to be the most powerful man on Earth?
Nope.
He’s too old for the gig.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:51 amTrump Addicts of America
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:53 amThere’s foolish and then there’s this kind of foolish. This is jaw-dropping ignorant
Christopher Taylor (c12824) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:53 amTrump has said (to donors) that it will be hard to hold the Senate and (to the general public) that he thinks they’ll win back the House (in order to say that he would have a good chance of passing legislation.)
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:56 amWhat kind of foolish? What ignorant?
Paul Montagu (77c694) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:58 amIn our current media system, where does a 3rd party find its oxygen…..and who would lead it….and how does it replace all of the infrastructure at the grassroots level….and how do you evade the “No True Scotsman” fallacy? I agree with the sentiment….find like-minded individuals who get why the Trump Experiment was a huge setback for conservatism…..but you need a majority…or at least a very healthy plurality if you wish to ever govern. The 3rd party inevitably delays the reintegration that will be required. We need the next great communicator who isn’t focused looking back…and re-litigating the 2016 primary….but someone who can articulate a different vision and leadership style. People on the Right are passionate about conserving policies that work….Trump was only about personality and emoting with most policy positions poorly conceived…..let’s get back to ideas and competence. Again, it’s hard in an environment where Jesse Waters, Judge Jeanine, and Lou Dobbs are sought after opinion makers….but someone has to try
AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:59 am49. These things don’t matter, any more than Trump’s Twitter activity matters.
What a president’s appointees do or what he sign or veto, matters. Sometimes he makes a few decisions.
On the grounds it pollutes!
Now there was a court case where it was argued that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, which it could be in a way, but not for the entire planet, but I wonder if Joe Biden was thinking of that.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:02 am53. I am not sure what Christopher Taylor @51 is referring to either. He didn’t quote or reference anything.
I think Trump is very much more likely to reconcile himself to a loss because of the pandemic.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:08 amAgain, it’s hard in an environment where Jesse Waters, Judge Jeanine, and Lou Dobbs are sought after opinion makers….but someone has to try
And there in lay the sucker bait. What makes you believe their opinion has any more value-or sway– than yours–or mine?!?
“Because you’re on television, dummy. Sixty million people watch you every night of the week, Monday through Friday.” – Arthur Jensen [Ned Beatty]- ‘Network’ 1976
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:09 am@54-
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:16 amOur current electoral system (first past the post) leads to a two-party system and generally prevents the rise of third parties (Duverger’s law). The two major parties jointly restrict the electoral rules in the states to make it difficult, if not impossible, for third parties to get on the ballot. A third party can enter the arena only if it can exploit the mistakes of a pre-existing major party, ultimately at that party’s expense. A proportional electoral system creates electoral conditions that foster the development of many parties.
@55. Yes. They do, Sammy. It’s just a fact of life.
And when it comes to ‘polluters,’ look up the history of Delaware’s DuPont. It’ll make you choke.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:17 amI could see the House with a sizable R net gain, to the point of becoming a small Dem majority of about +9 or +10 222-213 for example. I could see 3 seats flipping here in IL. The trick is, will it be indicative of a hedge or a wave? Many pollsters and pundits incorrectly attributed the come from behind victories of Sens. Rubio, Toomey and Ron Johnson to a sort of hedge were voters were resigned to a Hilary win and were seeking to block her with a R senate.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:30 amAfter Trump, for republicans it will be similar to “The Big Guy” gathering of a dozen people and 7 pumpkins in Bucks county last week.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:31 amGawain’s Ghost (b25cd1) — 10/26/2020 @ 9:01 am
That’s because it is a state that tends to go Republican more than average, and it stayed that way over several political eras.
I checked.
https://www.270towin.com/historical-presidential-elections/timeline
That’s true. Herbert Hoover carried Florida in 1928. (6 Electoral votes) Calvin Coolidge lost Florida in 1924, So that should be 92 years.
For a century – from 1904 to 2004 no candidate won without carrying Missouri, with one exception
And you know what that exception was? Mot a close election. Eisenhower’s second term, in 1956!
Which he won by a slightly bigger margin than in 1952. Eisenhower carried Missouri in 1942 but not in 1956.
The reason, apparently, is that Harry S Truman campaign hard for Adlai Stevenson that year in Missouri.
That goes to show you, if you do something special in a bellwether that doesn’t happen in other states, it doesn’t affect the rest of the states.
Trump needs Florida and Ohio, but he needs more.
The only states he didn’t get in 2016 that he might get this time are Minnesota (10) and New Hampshire (4) But he;s slated to lose Arizona (11)
he;s also slated to lose Michigan (16)
If he loses Pennsylvania (20) also, it’s down to 270 if there are no other changes from 2016.
But Arizona may shift, and he’d need Minnesota plus New Hampshire and retaining Wisconsin to make up for it. He doesn’t have much hope for Wisconsin (10)
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:33 am@35. Why do you think anyone who left the Republican Party because they had such a moral and political aversion to Trump and his subsequent co-opting of the GOP would want to return to the Republican Party as it currently stands? What would be the draw?
A. ‘Morality’ is a transient; for example divorce, would have ruled out a candidate not all that long ago. Times change.
B. ‘Political aversion’ is simply accepting a POV no longer ‘in vogue’ w/changing times. There wasn’t a mass exodus of ‘Rockefeller Republicans’ in 1964 when events began to swop ends. For the most part, they stayed over the decades and worked from withi. And the more extreme fringe elements were ‘Buckley’d’ out or left on their own. A similar scenario is occurring today.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:34 am@61. LOL That was a pretty funny scene– betcha ‘The Big Guy’ believes, as his Irish-Catholic God is his witness, turkeys can fly, too.
Speaking of which…
Nuns for Trump:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/nuns-maga-masks-trump-rally
A group of Trump-loving nuns grabbed attention on social media Saturday after they were spotted wearing MAGA masks with their habits and cheering the president on in Circleville, Ohio.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:39 amWhat happens to the Democratic party after this election? Do they shift further to the left and become the party of The Squad? Does the Corbynization of the party continue? If they win what will the ramification be of packing the court? If Biden wins will Antifa be appeased or will they feel empowered?
Mattsky (55d339) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:41 am“Is it fair game to blame them for Trump’s idiot tweets or his suggestion that we look into injecting bleach to defend against COVID? Or 5000 other stupid things he has done or said?“
__
Absolutely fair. Not once have I suggested otherwise. It’s interesting tho in your choices for his transgressions worth mentioning, tweets and bleach.
__
“I don’t like playing that game, but if you’re going to play that game you have to take the bad with the good. But somehow the Trump defenders never seem to see it that way. Sad!“
__
The Trump haters have always played that same game. It’s ironic how most can’t see it. His behavior, mean tweets and petulance have broken a lot of people who seemed somewhat normal pre-2016.
If Biden wins and we really do get the show trials you’ve been hoping for, I hope you enjoy them as much as every thing else Biden/Harris have in store for the country.
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:42 am_
@36
I’ll play that game.
I’ll take Trump’s idiot tweets or his hamfasted bleach speech spiel or any of Trump’s vices over any of today’s Democrats.
I’ll take both the good and bad.
Bring on this “game” Patterico, because yeah… the Democrats are so much worse.
whembly (c30c83) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:43 amYou are nothing more than modern day Bill the Butcher, but people also incorrectly pegged Archie Bunker as an “et-nik” when in fact he was descended from pre-Revolutionary protestant stock.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:44 am“He’s too old for the gig.“
_
The Democrats that are already showing us the future of the party in Minneapolis, Seattle, Chicago, Portland, NY etc. consider that a feature, not a bug.
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:46 am_
You might get both right and left primary challenges to a President Harris in 2024. There’s certainly the Squad and their fellow travelers, but also a possible reinvigorated southern wing that will not want to piss away their gain plus the remnant suburban Ds that survive the triple pruning of 2020, census reapportionment, and 2022 midtetms.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:49 amWhat are the republicans going to run on in 2024, a budget, smaller gubmint, being nice and bending over?
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:56 amhttps://scri.siena.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/TX-2-PR-10-26-20-FINAL2.pdf
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:59 amI think it’s more likely that having proven themselves to be some combination of unprincipled, dishonest, and lacking in the power to win elections we ignore people who were strong supporters of Trump. We know that they mock principled positions on issues. We know they don’t care about lying. We know they’re willing to overlook massive levels of corruption. In 2018 we saw evidence that they lacked the power to build a winning coalition. On 11/4 we’ll know if they have to the power to win the presidency. Trump being president is the last reason to pay attention to them. Once that’s gone Richard Spencer, Breitbart, Gateway pundit and the rest of the clowns will be fully irrelevant.
Time123 (ca85c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:01 amI don’t know what will happen, but I know what I would like to happen (it isn’t going to happen). I would like the R party to understand that it isn’t enough to scream about the other side or fear-monger, but that they have to earn our votes. The last time they had a coherent plan for forward movement was in 1994, it was also the last time they truly WON the election argument. And, yes, there was a landslide in 2010, but Rs didn’t win in 2010, the Ds lost.
The Ds, like them or hate them, have been earning their wins (and their losses). They haven’t been counting on the Rs to screw up, they’ve been targeting districts one by one and fielding candidates who fit those specific districts. They haven’t been excoriating everyone who isn’t in lock-step with the most extreme end of the party. They learned from the R mistakes with how Trump got elected and made a strategic lean to the middle and the ongoing message in this election has been in lock-step with the feeling of the majority of the electorate.
The Rs, like them or hate them, have not been doing this. They’ve basically been counting on fox news and talk radio to do their winning for them. I bet half their candidates have no idea what the needs of their constituents are. They’ve been so busy cultivating the screaming extremists that they’ve forgotten that they are also supposed to be serving the other 70% of their voters as well. There hasn’t been a coherent forward moving agenda and this year they just gave up on having an agenda at all. You can’t govern like that.
There are things in the D. agenda that I really don’t like, or that I don’t think are doable, or that I don’t think are necessary. But eff it, at least they are paying attention.
Nic (896fdf) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:02 amI assume so. There were credible candidates both to her right (Biden, Bullock) and left (Sanders, Warren) this year.
Time123 (ca85c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:04 amTexas might be a place where their are shy Biden voters, particularly outside the ring roads of the NBA cities. If it had jungle primaries, all statewide office holders would be John Cornyn clones.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:07 amI oouldn’t check my voter registration online because the Board of Elections somehow had my date of birth wrong – very wrong. It had a date of birth of someone almost 30 years older than I am.
The only thought I had is that they may have somehow mixed up the record with someone with the same name who lived at an address that you could mistake for my address. I never knew his exact age.
I think my credit information – one card – once got mixed up with his. Probably to my benefit because it went back further than mine.
This did not affect my registration – but it may have affected how it was entered into the computer system. They’ve changed to electronic poll books.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:11 amThe only reason Texas is this close- Never Trumpers moving to the Lone Star Sate.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:13 amI think the explanation for the Texas polls is that the pollsters overcorrected for their mistakes in 2016.
These days less than 10% of the people polled answer telephone surveys. It’s probably close to 5%
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:13 amHow’d Romeny do?
Time123 (ca85c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:16 am@68. ‘Bunker’ was from Queens, too. 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:17 amSome of the famous criticisms of Trump are just false. They persist because he is too incompetent, or too dishonest to correctly rebut them.
Trump never made a out and out suggestion that bleach be used to kill the coronavirus. he asked a question. Maybe a question that showed amazing ignorance, but a question. He did not ask that question in private because he can’t rehearse. Everything has to be live. He accepted the answer.
Trump was not told on January 28 that the coronavirus would hit the United States. He was not alerted to how dangerous it was – everybody knew that already. He was being told at the time that it could be kept from spreading in the United States. That was not correct.
Trump did later underplay somewhat the danger of an infection, but that is something separate. He didn’t want domestic United States shutdowns. The CDC had for years overstated the death toll from influenza, so it was possible to argue that the coronavirus was no more dangerous than the flu.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:29 amMany people move to Texas every month from Blue States. Do the math, Einstein.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:30 amAfter re election Trump should offer mittens the ambassadorship to Cuba or Venezuela.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:37 amThe Lincoln Project gets creative
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:37 amTrump’s so freakishly horrible that Texas is in play.
Time123 (441f53) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:37 amThis is the mirror image of Trump being close to winning NY.
May 8, 2019:
https://www.texastribune.org/2019/05/08/texas-keeps-growing-where-are-newest-transplants-coming
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:37 amThat is outstanding work. And indeed I think that’s not even a joke. I think children will speak of Trump for a thousand years in fairy tales and songs.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:53 amA simple investigation of fraud can be done in a couple of days. Audit the vote in Imperial County. If there is fraud, particularly non-citizen voting, it will be happening there. Small population, maybe 50,000 voters. Check the registrations against other records. If Trump’s fever-dreams have any substance, it will be seen there.
But I expect that nobody wants to actually know.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:59 amI expect the fraud is happening, Kevin. I used to sincerely believe the fraud was 95% democrats and a few kooks on team R but I’m sure it’s fraud on both sides.
There’s no way the Team R loyalists these days give one crap about anything.
A completely fixed voting system, with some price to ‘this is how we’ve always done it,’ is one key way to shut down Putin’s attack on trusting democracy and peaceful transitions of power. The other way is explosives.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:03 pmthey remain cautious about alienating the still-sizable majority of Republicans who. at least initially, still support Trump and believe the narrative that he was both stabbed in the back by the NeverTrumpers and a simple victim of bad luck and/or Chinese evildoing.
The best way for this to end — the way it ended with Nixon — is for Trump to be thoroughly discredited. Convicted of theft, embezzlement, bribery or insider trading. Make it clear that the presidency was just a profit opportunity to Trump. I know there are folks here that are certain this is the case.
However, I expect that nothing of this sort will happen, not because Trump is innocent but because his specter is too useful to the Democrats in keeping the GOP split.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:04 pm71. What are the republicans going to run on in 2024, a budget, smaller gubmint, being nice and bending over?
What else: “I’m not Trump.” 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:05 pmMark Dice
@MarkDice
·
YouTube is now adding “Fact Check” notices for searches about Joe Biden saying he would ban fracking, and are manipulating the top search results to boost his lie that he never said it. I think this is a first that YouTube has included a “fact check” for a search.
__ _
Omri Ceren
@omriceren
·
On Google’s YouTube platform, they are automatically posting a “Mostly False” factcheck if a user seems to be searching for Biden saying he’ll ban fracking. There is no such editorializing about videos from Washington Post, CBS News, etc. with debunked claims about Steele Dossier
_ _
kevinlawrencem
@kevinlawrencem
Orwell was right
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:05 pm__ _
There’s no way the Team R loyalists these days give one crap about anything.
I separate Team R for Team Trump. You should too, as there is no real way to uproot the GOP going forward. At best you reinvent it with another name, since there are only two natural political niches in our system.
But yes, there are plenty of Trump partisans who say “Well, we know THEY are cheating, so this is just evening things up a bit, eh?”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:06 pmIt is truly evil to consider Pelosi pulled her punches as much as she could get away with, balancing control of her party against how useful it is that Team R seemingly sanctioned Trump in their impeachment vote.
Team D doesn’t deserve to win. I am just resting on the fact that Team D winning in this pathetic state is a loud message. Same thing Paul said more elegantly.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:07 pmWhat else: “I’m not Trump.”
“I’m not Harris, either!”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:07 pmAs a practical matter it seems impossible. Ballot access scams, special committees clearing signatures on petitions, ever changing rules in 50 states, and the way the media works these days, the intensely biased Team R media, the always biased, yet sometimes imperceptibly, MSM+Education system. Both sides would recognize a new party, centrist in some things, common sense conservative on some things, as a huge threat to the party they’ve been having for 50 years.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:09 pmI think that stock market manipulation, with certain hedge funds managers being in the know, was the main way that Trump’s family has monetized the White House. Trump tweets this, Trump tweets that, and up the market goes, down the market goes … be great to have some advance notice of those tweets.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:10 pm“I think children will speak of Trump for a thousand years in fairy tales and songs.”
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:11 pm__ _
Even “Dec 12, 2000 (Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98, 2000) will go down as the darkest day in American history” thinks this is hilariously overwrought.
_
To you it is, but you are this blog’s most intense Trump fan.
I’m glad you think the events of this year are hilarious. Hundreds of thousands of families lost someone, while Trump said it was a hoax and mused about injecting household cleaner, while his children displayed the most consequential nepotism in history, and twitter had a thousand bots ‘pwn the libs’ which you have helpfully shared with us each day.
But Trump really is something worse than the worst president in history. His cruelty to women that he groped, his wives, his sexualizing his daughter, his freakish opulence, his cheating ever chance at everything, the way gullible white people, often intensely angry Obama was secretly born in Africa, simply dismissed the problems with Trump as overwrought, not really a big deal.
Cherish your pure pure political party that is about to spend two years begging to get me back.
Bush is a likeable great person. Only Trump still hates him. Good luck comparing Trump criticism with Bush Derangement Syndrome.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:19 pmDustin, even if you could start a new party (and it is unbelievably easy in CA), you would find that you were mostly overlapping with several wings of the GOP (or you had found anew fringe). And really, the Trump folks are just one wing of the GOP that has always been there. Military hawks, main-street businessmen, manufacturers and jobbers, construction, etc.
Since Reagan, the more internationalist and economic liberals have been in control, allied at times and to varying degrees with the socially conservative and movement Christians. Trump broke that coalition and tried to form a new one but could not hold it together, due to his incompetence and lack of personal qualities. But litte of his base, and none of those needed to rebuild, came from outside the party.
What will come from this will be some aspect of Reagan’s coalition, with a strong emphasis on rebuilding American industry to replace reliance on China. It will take a good leader to meld the factions — someone who is not a Trump yes-person, but also not openly hostile start-to-finish. Someone who can claim to be smart enough and in touch enough to take what can be saved from Trump’s program (e.g. a focus on the USA) without bringing Trump’s insanity into the equation.
After all, it was not — for most of us — Trump’s positions that caused us to fall out with Trump, but Trump himself who caused us to not care all that much about his positions.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:25 pmSinatra sang, “Fairy tales can come true; it can happen to you; if you’re young at heart…” eh, Joe?!
“Malarkey!” “No miracle is coming.” – Joe Biden
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:27 pmProbably the best send-up of Obama-adulation was the JibJab video from 2009.
It’s now just an historical item. Only funny to those that lived through those years, and often not as intended.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:28 pmI also think that historians will look back and recognize that the whole Putin-Trump thing was a transparent and contemptible “big lie” put together by partisans. Not that this will help the historical view of Trump himself.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:34 pmTrump’s tombstone:
“Still ineffective”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:36 pmIf so, I was taken by it 100%. I completely believe that Putin has been tampering with trust in free elections and that Trump’s campaign supplied Russia with campaign intel to make it more effective. And I think any nation hacking away at what we think of our leaders should be construed as making a military attack, responded to appropriately. To the extent that we know where those threats are trained or where they work, or even where they live, we need to blow them up.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:44 pm100% true. Had Trump delivered on his promises, solved the immigration problem, destroyed ISIS (it’s surging today), balanced the budget or put us on anything like a path there, I’d be his #1 fanboy. I’d be telling everyone I know how great he is. To overlook his bizarre psychological problems. Of course I never accepted his agenda as more than manipulation. Trump’s first two years coulds woulds shoulda but didn’t do anything but announce a caravan coming. I’m sure Trump’s fans think Trump had no chance. Three years of investigations and one year of true crisis. But that is the job Trump asked us to give him. Of course it’s a hard job.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:49 pmI hope you’re joking.
I mean, you have to be joking, right?
Even the most innocent interpretation of their relationship is damning to Trump.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:51 pmBoth sides would recognize a new party, centrist in some things, common sense conservative on some thing
That’s not what I mean. Centrist parties have been tried, but they’re unstable. Their members always feel that pull to one edge or the other, and if there is a center-left or center-right party already there, the centrist party evaporates. See Perot’s Reform Party which attempted that centrist movement, fractures, got hijacked by Pat Buchanan, then disappeared.
Maybe a center-libertarian party might work, but I don’t think our system of first-past-the-post allows 3 party stability. Now, if we had a vote-for-one, elect-the-top-3 system maybe we could have some diversity.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 12:59 pmTo my fiends in CA, it is 28 degrees and snowing here in the NM desert in October. I hear it’s 74 today in Los Angeles.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:00 pm“Here Lies Donald J Trump” would say it all, but unfortunately Nixon got dibs on that meme by dying first.
Whatever it says, I hope I live long enough to pay my respects.
In a manner of speaking.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:01 pmThe big guy is down 10% in Philly Clinton was at 83% Trump is up 9 to 24%
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:06 pmNot good for the baby harvesting gestapo
72 and sunny, with a fairly stiff breeze, here in Mission V.
When I opened the door around noon, a couple bright red orchid petals blew in.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:06 pmFox News and fever-swamp right-wing sites have come out with what they claim is clear evidence of fraud. CNN and the rest of Big Media purports to debunk these claims, and independent observers can see that while there are one or two possibly suspicious episodes, they are not nearly enough to have swung the election.
If this scenario does come to pass then I think it would be absolutely incumbent upon the new Democrat majority and the Biden White House to take these episodes seriously, investigate them fully, prosecute where necessary, and tweak election laws if needed to prevent them from happening again. That is, if the Biden Administration and Dems are truly serious about bringing the country together and not just exacting payback on Trump supporters for the past four years. I’m a cynic about these things, so I would expect Democrats and their friends in academia and the media to gloss over any allegations of wrongdoing and declare them overblown or untrue without bothering to make the most cursory of investigations.
The real interesting question is what happens in a scenario where one state — let’s use Michigan as the example here — becomes the winner-take-all state that decides the election. Imagine Trump wins the initial count on Election Night, but in the counting of the late ballots his margin of victory gets small enough so as to trigger a recount. And then imagine that in the recount there are just enough votes found favoring Joe Biden so that he ends up a few hundred ahead. Now imagine a scenario where the electors meet in a hotly contested December Electoral College meeting and give Biden the Michigan electors, making him the winner of the race. This result is ratified by the new Democrat Congress in January, and Biden is inaugurated President at the end of the month. But then in February there emerges some pretty credible evidence of sloppy vote handling if not outright voter fraud in Detroit and Wayne County which provided Biden with his margin of victory. Based upon past experience, that wouldn’t be entirely unexpected.
What would happen at that point? Clearly Biden would remain President, but any chance of healing in the post-Trump era would be right out the window. This might be the exact outcome that our country deserves in this awful era and this especially awful year.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:08 pm72 and sunny, with a fairly stiff breeze, here in Mission V.
But you folks in Orange County supposedly have bad fires which are affecting the air quality, at least that’s the excuse that my public pool in Torrance used to cancel this afternoon’s lap swimming session.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:09 pmTrump manages to be whiney and petulant at the same time, which I have to confess seems like a rare ability, like singing two notes at the same time (a girl in my high school was actually able to do that). I can’t help wondering which appeals more to his “base”: the whiney part or the petulant part. Or, since both aim at division, perhaps they’re not as incongruous as I imagined.
Roger (83ed7d) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:26 pmIf the election laws of a state are violated, it’s the state’s responsibility to investigate, isn’t it?
Standard disclaimer (not a fancy-pants lawyer, etc) but my impression is that the Feds handle the laws that are the same for everybody (e.g. campaign finance laws) but the states – through the absolute authority granted by Article II – deal with the conduct of the election, which is different everywhere (and optional, since there is no requirement to hold a presidential election at all).
The federal courts have jurisdiction in cases involving constitutional matters and Federal law enforcement presumably have authority to enforce civil rights laws, but otherwise the feds do not enforce 50 different sets of election laws as far as I know.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:26 pmhttps://finance.yahoo.com/news/six-hiatus-jibjab-explores-political-090000757.html
But they did do this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct69gPgNFcA&feature=youtu.be
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JibJab
The wikipedia page contains links to many of JibJab;s vdeos throuh 2014.
I guess nothing continues for very long, except Saturday Night Live.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bII8AH5t6zI
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:30 pmIf the election laws of a state are violated, it’s the state’s responsibility to investigate, isn’t it?
I suppose so, but if it turns out that there is some progressive or otherwise Democrat-affiliated organization operating across multiple states and engaging in voting fraud of some sort, then I think that would call for a federal response. And given that one point of emphasis for Democrats is to standardize voting procedures across the entire country (mandating mail-in votes, same-day registration, outlawing voter ID laws, etc.) Congress would need to understand the potential for abuse before passing any new voting legislation.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:31 pmUC Irvine sent an email urging everyone to stay off campus today due to poor air quality.
I haven’t been there since mid-March, though…
No smoke here as far as I can see, but I’m a half-hour southeast.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:32 pmIt’s now just an historical item.
Like the SX-70; the Betamax… and Joe Biden.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:39 pmNo smoke here as far as I can see, but I’m a half-hour southeast.
My eyes are starting to dry out and itch, so maybe there’s something to the concerns out here after all. I’m going to step outside in a moment and go on a walk to see if I can detect anything.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:40 pmIf the election laws of a state are violated, it’s the state’s responsibility to investigate, isn’t it?
I think the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice may have authority under the Voting Rights Act.
Mattsky (55d339) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:40 pmTo quote the Spartan ephors’ response to Philip II of Macedon in its entirety (h/t Plutarch):
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:42 pm@110. 87 in San Diego; wind gusts- Santa Anas— coastal town warned of possible power outages due to fire concerns.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:43 pm@105.Trump’s tombstone:
“The Lincoln Project.” 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:50 pmPanicked Joe does emergency speech in Chester, PA. claims he doesn’t do Trump-styled rallies because of Covid.
The fact more pumpkins than people show up is closer to the truth.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 1:57 pmGlad Jill was there to walk him through the veritable minefield of pumpkins. Without her guiding presence, he could have fallen and couldn’t get up.
Hoi Polloi (15cfac) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:00 pmHigh winds carry ash from old fires to East L.A., San Gabriel Valley
Rip Murdock (305171) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:12 pmhttps://www.theguardian.com/law/2020/oct/25/mitch-mcconnell-amy-coney-barrett-supreme-court-republicans-democrats-mike-pence-covid
Found here too:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/25/us/politics/amy-barrett-senate-vote.html
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:20 pm114- Something must be in that smoke, JVW.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:21 pmI think these Ace of Spades type Bagdad Bob announcements are going to look real interesting in a couple weeks. I mean maybe you’re right and Biden’s losing big time.
Or maybe this is a leader who doesn’t think a miracle is coming, isn’t leaving anything to chance, and is hitting the places he needs to win, even if the press makes it sound like he should be racking up a huge score in Texas.
You’re right that Biden’s full of crap about why he’s not really campaigning hard. COVID is the most convenient excuse in the world for someone to stay inside most of the time, let the election remain fixed like a laser on Trump. But everyone who goads Biden into getting out and taking the heat of Trump is someone who really wants Biden to lose. Why would be listen?
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:21 pmPolls tighten as people start voting against pro biden media bias and hold their nose and vote for for trump.
asset (130c87) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:22 pmI think he may have been speaking in general. He said “sooner or later” By the next election, wheever the next election is. By another election.
But about being undone, that’s basically only really true about taxes. Things that are more popular stay.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:24 pm114- Something must be in that smoke, JVW.
Think of all those years in the 70s and 80s when people exercised outdoors in the crappy polluted air quality of the Los Angeles Basin. If they could hack it, I think I could have done 45 minutes of laps in the pool today without greatly jeopardizing my well-being.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:25 pmI don’t know. It probably is a symptom of our screwy press weighting things dishonestly.
But if it’s really a shift, all those early votes can’t be changed. Had Trump brought his Debate 3 game to Debate 1 and 2, it would have been a totally different election.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:28 pmHad Trump brought his Debate 3 game to Debate 1 and 2, it would have been a totally different election.
Yep, and had his team had the foresight to realize that voting would begin early, they would have demanded all three debates take place by October 10.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:32 pmYeah they seem super late. I already voted before I saw Trump give a passable performance. In fact, I think I said I thought he won the debate. But I voted for Biden. Not that I regret it or would change it, but Biden said a lot of dumb stuff in Debate 3 that would cost many Texan votes.
Debates should obviously precede voting, and smart candidates should let the other guy talk so voters don’t fill the blank slate.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:37 pmHad Trump brought his Debate 3 game to Debate 1 and 2, it would have been a totally different election.
Had treatments for gender dysphoria been a thing 60 years ago, it would have been a totally different election.
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 2:45 pm“Here Lies Donald J Trump” would say it all, but unfortunately Nixon got dibs on that meme by dying first.
LBJ beat both of them. The “Credibility Gap” was all his.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:01 pmWhen I opened the door around noon, a couple bright red orchid petals blew in.
Also a couple commissars from the Green Police, making sure you had sorted your plastics.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:03 pmmy public pool in Torrance used to cancel this afternoon’s lap swimming session.
The public pools here have been closed since March. But it’s hardly ever hot in the summer here.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:05 pmbut otherwise the feds do not enforce 50 different sets of election laws as far as I know.
Depends on whether they see it as a federal e3lection or a state one. If it involves voting RIGHTS, then its federal. If it involves non-citizens voting in a presidential election, it’s probably federal.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:07 pmBiden has more ‘plans’ than Albert Speer.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:09 pmDebates should obviously precede voting, and smart candidates should let the other guy talk so voters don’t fill the blank slate.
Voting should be as close to the official election day as possible for anyone who is able to get to the polls. Everyone should vote with the same availability of information. Suppose Trump had died of Covid last week.
I’d even say that the expense of putting a polling place at a rest home is worth it if it stops children from voting for their parents. But really, mailing out unsolicited ballots to the last-known-address has got to raise some red flags. Even the most cursory forgery is going to pass inspection.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:11 pmKerry had more plans.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:12 pmHad Trump brought his Debate 3 game to Debate 1 and 2, it would have been a totally different election.
Had Trump kept off the Twitter-thing it would have been an entirely different presidency.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:14 pmSuppose Biden loses and claims fraud. What then?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:15 pmOk, smoke is indeed pretty bad here.
JVW (39b661) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:15 pmPanicked Joe scurries across state line from Wilmington to Chester, PA [wot, Scranton too far, boy-o?!] repeats over and over he ‘won’t ban fracking’ then dshes back to the bunker while Trump, on third PA rally of the day, runs tapes on large videoscreens showing Biden literally saying multiple times over the months he’ll ‘ban fracking’ and make ‘Big Oil pay’…
That’s called REALITY TEE-VEE, Plagiarist JoeyBee.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:18 pmWell, some Biden-backing influence peddlers will put together a bunch of half-baked intelligence reports and shop it to the media, claiming Trump was colluding with a foreign power. Should take up the media and Democrats’ time for the next four years or so.
Hoi Polloi (15cfac) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:19 pm@149. JVW– concerned; you have a safe place to ‘evacuate’ to if it’s getting to hard to breathe?
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:20 pmAll of this seems almost inevitable. I can’t tell you who will emerge as the Next GOP Hero, or precisely the direction the demoralized party will take in 2024. But the broad outlines of the upcoming weeks, months, and years are not difficult to foresee.
The GOP splintered at the 1964 convention, Goldwater lost in biblical proportions and everyone said the GOP was doomed. Then Nixon won, even after losing the conservative south, and all was forgotten.
Nixon resigned in disgrace (after wiping the floor with McGovern) and everyone said the GOP was doomed. Carter won by a whisker in 1976, the Reagan beat two opponents in a landslide in 1980 and the GOP held office for 3 terms.
After Obama’s election, we were “all socialists now”, and yet Trump was elected. Trump’s proved (and I mean PROVED) himself a wanker and it looks like BidenHarris will win this time.
THE GOP IS DOOMED!
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:20 pm@149. WeatherChannel is showing reports on the fires now…
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:22 pmOne of two things will happen, depending on what Biden does.
1) If Biden actually governs from the center, shuts down all the court-packing or Inquisitions some would plan. If the New Green Deal becomes something that can tell coal from natural gas and begins a return to nuclear. If taxes stay within reason, particularly capital gains. Then maybe the New Democrats will hold power a while with bipartisan support.
2) If, on the other hand, it becomes the party of Speaker AOC, and they try to pack the courts, ban cars and jack taxes up to 96%, they’ll be out on their ears at the mid-terms.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:26 pm@153. Except Trump won, is in office and more akin to ‘Rockefeller Republicanism’ than a Goldwater Wanker. [No cracks- my late mother was a Goldwater Girl and we never let her forget it!] The party has just swopped ends again. 56 years in the making. Long past time to clear out the Goldwater/Reagan deadwood. Don’t think the entrenched, self-entitled ideological conservatives can handle it–so they’ll either leave, have left already,actively work against The Donald [a la The Lincoln Project, etc.,] — or the cool-headed ones will remain, as RockyRepubs did, and work from the bottom of the deck for a decade or two and savor the SCOTUS Trump is giving them. And consider that he may just win again. 63 million Americans voted for him. His rallies are packed and those voters haven’t just disappeared. Trump got elected exactly because of 47 year Swamp-Gassers like ‘U.F. Joe.’
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:34 pmOnce Trump is gone and the rat’s nest of Trumpalos are cleansed from the party, the GOP can get back to the business of playing the loyal opposition, the Washington Generals to the Democrats Harlem Globetrotters, where they can feebly pretend to fight off the creeping socialism and whine about muh principles just like they’ve always done. i just can’t understand the number of people who somehow blame Trump for ruining the GOP when Trump merely exposed what a ruined party they already were. After being told we had to hold our nose and vote for RINOs like McCain and Romney, why am I not surprised that when these men of principle were told it was their turn to hold their nose and vote for Trump, they fled like cowards instead?
Jerryskids (702a61) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:37 pmPlagiarism alert:
Headlines:
NY TIMES: “Republicans Poised to Confirm Amy Coney Barrett to Supreme Court”
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:40 pmWAPO: “Senate is poised to confirm Barrett to Supreme Court”
So based on word semantics, its OK to get something with my Amazon Prime.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 3:45 pm@149. JVW– concerned; you have a safe place to ‘evacuate’ to if it’s getting to hard to breathe?
Thanks for the concern, DCSCA. It’s not so bad that I would think I need to evacuate; it was just irritating my eyes and throat.
I see that there was also a relatively small brush fire up in Patterico’s neighborhood that has since been put out, so that too might have been a cause of the irritant.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:08 pmNY TIMES: “Republicans Poised to Confirm Amy Coney Barrett to Supreme Court”
WAPO: “Senate is poised to confirm Barrett to Supreme Court”
“Senate” and “poise” are not two words that belong together in any context this days.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:09 pmSince this is about the GOP more than it is about the quality control standards of the Florida Citrus Growers Association, I propose an indicator (or two) about the future influence of Trump:
Trump carries Texas and Nebraska, but Cornyn and Sasse, who raised their heads when they should have been kowtowing to the mandarin, lose their reelections. It would mean that Trumpkins voted against them out of spite. What do you think?
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:13 pmAnd anybody want to start a pool on the number of headlines (and chyrons?) with “YOU’RE FIRED!” on November 4?
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:18 pmhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQN0stFPySU&app=desktop
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:19 pmDa Big Guy is da bomb
Sasse is essentially unopposed because the Dem candidate had a Zell Miller moment, so he got booted of the ticket and replaced by a North Omaha revrun/activist, and unless you are the ghost of either Bob Gibson or Gayle Sayers, not much of a chance. But who knows, maybe he pulls the same trick as James Harrison.
urbanleftbehind (1c6d77) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:29 pmSpeaking of Jaime Harrison, why should Biden campaign when he has Jared Kushner out there stumping for him? https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/10/26/jared-kushner-criticized-saying-black-people-need-want-successful/6043088002/
nk (1d9030) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:33 pm@162 Sasse isn’t going to lose. NE Dems are a mess this year.
Nic (896fdf) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:38 pmDa Big Guy is da bomb
OK, see, I was right! Vindication for JVW! I made this point in my post a few days ago: the line Obama was supposed to have spoken was “Joe, nobody is better than you, but you’re no better than anybody else.” That version makes sense. Dear Leader totally botched it (probably in a Freudian manner) by saying, “Joe, nobody is better than you, but you’re better than nobody.” I knew that couldn’t be the message they were trying to convey.
JVW (ee64e4) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:39 pm@60. Well, just stay hydrated. Winds picking up and gusting a bit here– and incredibly dry– you can feel the moisture being drawn out of your mouth…
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:42 pm^160.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:42 pmFWIW- Senate about to drop nickel on Amy.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:43 pmBrian Stelter
@brianstelter
·
NBC has added an editor’s note to this morning’s “Today” show segment that played a clip of Biden saying “four more years of George, uh…” without noting that he was talking to George Lopez twitter.com/GlennKesslerWP…
__ _
Matt Whitlock
@mattdizwhitlock
·
THIS is what Fact-checking is now? Egregious.
4 Pinocchios because Biden *could have been referring to* four more years of… George Lopez?
Even though he’s mixed up names of previous opponents? And his wife ALSO thought he meant Trump?
https://washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/10/26/no-biden-did-not-confuse-george-w-bush-donald-trump/
__ _
The Partyman
@PartymanRandy
·
Biden saying the wrong name (which he 100% unquestionably did) is not a big deal.
That the media is having a meltdown denying it happened shows just how corrupt they’ve become.
They will go full-Pravda over minutiae.
harkin (7fb4c9) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:50 pm__ _
Oh wow Harkin he sure pwned the libs. Look how “corrupt they’ve become” because they don’t consider this garbage to be information.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:51 pmThey are confirming a member of the supreme court and the main story is Biden said George instead of Donald. Good grief this is how we get Trump. Stupidity.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:55 pm163.Wait a week, maybe+. Not November 4.
Possibly weekly magazines might have something with that motif. But I think people don’t think of that anymore. If one magazine does it, 2 or 3 will copy it.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 4:56 pmIt is nothing short of astounding to me how you can write all of this and turn a completely blind eye to the garbage that the media/DNC are doing and the fact that Joe Biden is a CROOK, CROOK, CROOK!! Take off the stinkin’ blinders!!
Jimpithecus (394376) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:00 pmThe main Supreme Court story is that there will be another assemblage on the South Lawn of the White House, but this time people will be seated somewhat further apart than Sep 25. Clarence Thomas will swear in Amy Coney Barrett.
Trump says, and has said repeatedly that the media will stop talking about Covid-19 after the election. He’s probably really got a reality distortion field around him and is not intentionally lying. But it really is creeping up, sort of like a bull market, which stats almost unnoticed.
El Paso running out of ICU space and may do the kind of treatment rationing (favoring young people) that Ezekiel Emmanuel recommends. Covid is up in 44 states and in maybe 6 is stable. Also more cases in Europe. The antibody therapeutic is still on hold.
Meanwhile there is just about no flu because of all the masks, the social distancing and the closings.. Although all the usual people still say get a flu vaccine. It does protect against Alzheimer’s they say.
Mike Pence is campaigning, despite the fact that his office seems to have become a hot spot. He’s still testing negative. He’s an essential worker, and apparently once an essential worker for one thing, you’re an essential worker for everything.
23 cases nationwide have been linked to Trump campaign events and one [1 – not 0] to Biden events.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:08 pm@146. Speer was an architect. 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:32 pmSince you won’t allow comments on Bob’s post, I will reprint this here:”SEEN ON FACEBOOK: “Some Christians say they can’t vote for Trump because of his past. I say be thankful God doesn’t have that same standard for you.”
Jimpithecus (394376) — 10/26/2020 @ 5:49 pmGus, how you been?
mg (8cbc69) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:14 pmGeorge had a busy today, eh, Joe?! Three rallies in Pennsylvania and attended the wearing in of an associate Supreme Court justice.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:44 pm1. So why should Biden’s past be held against him?
2. Is it a violation of Christian principles to judge Trump as a presidential candidate by his past four years?
3. If we should not judge candidates by their past, then what should we judge them by? Promises alone?
4. For the past 5 years, Trumpers have kept saying “We’re not electing / didn’t elect a pastor” and therefore it’s inappropriate to apply religious or ethical standards of judgment to him. So why now the religious demand to forgive everything in Trump’s past?
5. Christian teaching calls for repentance. Trump never repents, because he believes himself to be (uniquely) faultless.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:45 pmWho said you had to do that? Weren’t you free to vote as you chose, by secret ballot?
And who was responsible for making McCain and Romney the GOP candidates? Wasn’t that up to millions of ordinary voters?
Trumpers like to say that McCain and Romney, and the Bushes before them, were “shoved down our throats” whereas Trump’s nomination and election happened by the free choice of “the American people.” Did something change in the process between 2012 and 2016?
The state Republican parties that would not allow any primary challenge to Trump this year did a lot more to say we have to hold our nose and vote for an unsavory candidate.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:55 pmThe Richard Spencer wing of the republican party has unique ideas about whose preference is legitimate.
Time123 (80b471) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:08 pmIt would mean that Trumpkins voted against them out of spite. What do you think?
Well, it’s not like they did it rationally, now is it?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:09 pmRadegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:45 pm
I hate judgemental people!
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:10 pmAfter being told we had to hold our nose and vote for RINOs like McCain and Romney,
Jerryskids dictionary:
RINO = actual long-term Republican
Real Republican = actual long time Democrat donor and Clinton friend
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:15 pmThe state Republican parties that would not allow any primary challenge to Trump this year did a lot more to say we have to hold our nose and vote for an unsavory candidate.
Happily, I was able to vote for an uncommitted slate.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:16 pmThe state Republican parties that would not allow any primary challenge to Trump this year did a lot more to say we have to hold our nose and vote for an unsavory candidate.
State Republican parties weren’t allowing primary challenges to Bush in 2004 either. It’s just that there wasn’t anyone throwing a hissy fit over it.
beer ‘n pretzels (042d67) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:39 pmKevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:15 pm
Biden has an ad with Cindy McCain speaking for John about how they were friends. I remember John saying basically the same about Teddy. Using McCain as your not-a-rino example isn’t the best choice.
frosty (f27e97) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:47 pmAfter Trump, the Republican Party will be as relevant to me as they were before him, which is to say, not much.
Gryph (f63000) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:51 pmBiden has an ad with Cindy McCain speaking for John about how they were friends.
Any ads about the living?
Nope.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 7:59 pmThis is a good point except Bush was good and Trump is garbage. Skipping the chance to do what was necessary, over and over, will come at a price to team r.
Thanks for the justice though.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:07 pmElections are all about judging the merits of candidates. Trumpers have a habit of changing the standards of judgment, depending on whether it applies to Trump or someone else.
Trump himself is highly judgmental toward other people, in a very public way. So it’s amazing how Trumpers get righteously offended when anyone judges Trump. In fact, they’re highly judgmental toward people who judge Trump.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:22 pmKevin — I typed before thinking, and just now caught the joke.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:24 pmActually, I sensed there was a joke there, but was distracted by the weirdness of the notion that it’s wrong to judge Trump on “his past” whereas everyone else’s past is fair game.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:27 pmWas it like Tuvan or Inuit throat-singing? You can get a lesson in the Tuvan style here.
Overtone singing is also done in Sardinia. I saw a French travel documentary that visited some western European village that carries on a tradition of overtone singing, but I don’t recall which country it was.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:56 pmSource?
Which Republicans gave any hint of wanting to run against Bush in 2004?
Dave (1bb933) — 10/26/2020 @ 8:58 pmWell, Billy Jack ran in New Hampshire, along with 8 others. None as well known.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:12 pmFunny how the former kept getting their heads kicked in, while the more populist Tea Party members overwhelmingly took back the House a mere four years after the Democrats obliterated the Bush-run GOP in 2006, followed by taking back the Senate in 2014. During the most recent mid-terms, despite Trump’s supposedly horrible broad-based appeal, the party held on to the Senate and lost House seats that were right in line with the normal shift from the incumbent party during a mid-term.
The most prominent feature of “actual long-term Republicans” over the last 25 years has been getting their asses handed to them by the Democrats, which is why the base dropped them and the neocons after Romney crapped the bed in 2012, and went with a guy who’s basically a 1980s Democrat instead–they figured if the “actual long-term Republicans” weren’t going to go in the more populist, nationalist direction that they wanted, they’d go with the 1980s nationalist Democrat who would at least not show his belly to beg for lovepats from the opposing party, and might even win the election.
It’s not a surprise that the Bush-era Republicans feel completely alienated from the party at this point. They were happy to ride the Tea Party wave, but never bothered to consider the political or national implications of why it happened. The party’s base moved on without them, and now they have nowhere to go. Maybe the Libertarians might be more his speed–they’re “socially liberal and fiscally conservative,” and are about as politically relevant as the neocons are now.
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:13 pmKevin — I typed before thinking, and just now caught the joke.
I cannot tell you how many times I hear that nonsense from people who don’t get their own joke, so I fully understand.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:14 pmIf the “House Freedom Caucus” all lost their next election it would be a good start on the house-cleaning. Their repeated idiocy of sabotaging every last thing the GOP House tried to do under Speaker Ryan cost the GOP their majority in 2018. But they’d rather be right than be effective, much like the rest of Trump’s mindless minions.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:17 pmI meant to put “right” in the proper quotes.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:17 pmLOL–Bush left office with historically low approval ratings, completely blew two wars, one of which was a war of choice, left the Middle East off even worse than he found it (a feat that Obama shockingly managed to exceed with the “Arab Spring”), commandingly led the party to a historic mid-term blowout, and bailed out banks that defrauded the American people for billions, while sinking the country into a recession that it’s never completely recovered from.
Spare us this baloney about Bush being a good President. Decent person, but his time in office was utter crap and set the foundation for the party’s current schism and foundation of national angst.
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:20 pmGood thing we had Trump to fix everything right. Mind like a steel trap, that one.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:23 pmOther than judges — something that any Republican could have done — Trump has done nothing that won’t be undone by the 1st of February.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:24 pmThe cope levels in your post are off the charts.
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:25 pmAlso not counting frack-ups.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:25 pmMind like a steel trap, that one.
“George.”
‘Nuff said.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:25 pmGo ahead, Kevin–tell us how Bush left the party in a position of strength with his rock-ribbed Republican values in 2008.
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:26 pmThe cope levels in your post are off the charts.
I’m sure that meant something to you when you typed it.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:31 pmSo you’re saying those Middle East peace deals are going to get nuked so the Dems and the neocons can play Age of Empires with the American military again?
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:32 pmConsider it an in-kind contribution.
Factory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:33 pmIn 2016, a GOP year, the Republicans were on the upswing everywhere. They had the Senate, they had the House, they had 2/3rds of the statehouses and all they needed to do — ALL they needed to do — was get a president in the White House. Cruz or Rubio would have been fine, maybe someone else. They had a wealth of talent until Trump hijacked it with his mindless minions — getting 30% of the vote which was enough to win delegates. Then he FUKKED EVERY LAST THING UP.
Look up “opportunity cost” — Trumps picture will be there.
He was the only candidate that Hillary might beat, and she almost did — she gets a few more votes in PA and MI and she’s got her 270. People talk like he won some kind of landslide. Dumb luck and some mistakes by Clinton.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:38 pmBut here I am feeding the troll.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:39 pmWell said Patterico. This post mostly sums up my thoughts and predictions about the aftermath of the 2020 elections. The most diehard of Trump sycophants won’t change their tune by 2022 and 2024, but the number of those who will feel that Trump getting the GOP nod was a mistake will gradually increase over time, IMO. From what the polling numbers indicate, it seems to be evolving to the results of the 2008 election, where Obama won the EC 365-173. The main difference is that unlike 2020, 2008 didn’t have an incumbent running for reelection. It’ll be interesting what happens with Texas, given how tight the polls are. I still think Trump will eke out a slim win there, probably with margins not too dissimilar to Ted Cruz’s margin over Beto O’Rourke. Biden winning TX is definitely not out of the picture, but I think the real decimation will be the loss of GOP members of the House in suburban Texas seats. That plus the fact that Democrats have a real chance to win control over the Texas state House. In any case, November 3 isn’t going to look pretty at all for the GOP.
HCI (92ea66) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:15 pmI wish it were so but I still don’t see Biden winning Texas.
lurker (d8c5bc) — 10/26/2020 @ 11:36 pmThe Big Guy/ never trumpers /2020
mg (8cbc69) — 10/27/2020 @ 2:48 amPaul Ryan- worst pos ever in the house
mg (8cbc69) — 10/27/2020 @ 2:49 amOle Paulie boy has a nice fence around his property to keep you away Kevin M.
mg (8cbc69) — 10/27/2020 @ 2:50 amhttps://pjmedia.com/election/stacey-lennox/2020/10/26/watch-new-ad-drops-a-bomb-on-joe-bidens-covid-19-talking-points-n1088597
mg (8cbc69) — 10/27/2020 @ 3:20 amlol
Did anybody link this over the weekend?
I think it raises some serious questions we will need to confront here at Patterico’s Pontifications in the very near future…
Dave (1bb933) — 10/27/2020 @ 3:56 amTrump:
Allahpundit:
*mic drop*
Dave (1bb933) — 10/27/2020 @ 4:04 amTL;DR: you have been given a mind and a sense of judgement, the cultivation of which is your own responsibility. It is right and just, to develop and use them. Do so wisely.
I very much like your comment, Radegunda; let me add to it:
The writer is correct. God is infinitely merciful and just.
Good question. It shouldn’t. But one cannot/should not ignore history, or we might not profit from the lessons it contains.
No. Christions must weigh his past results (which are no guarantee of future performance) against his current plans for the future. Does a candidate’s plan violate God’s laws? If they do, a Christian should reject that candidate. This does not mean a Christian must choose their opponent if that candidate’s plan also violates God’s law.
No one should base their freely made decision on one criterion “alone” – this lacks both nuance and wisdom. A good start is to use your well-formed conscience to consider what the candidate promises to do through the lens of your own salvation. You will be held accountable for your vote insofar as it pertains to faith and morals.
Two things: “judge not lest ye be judged” is not a prohibition against using our judgement; it is a reminder that there will be consequences for us when we , ourselves, will be judged by God; for, “the measure that you use, will be used against you.”
This true for us all! If we do not repent, a dire fate awaits us. Trump should be worried about his own soul. Let us worry about our own as well, let’s e careful; it is easy to fall into the trap of using Scripture to correct another before, first, correcting ourselves. Remove the beam from your own eye before pointing out the splinter in your neighbor’s.
felipe (023cc9) — 10/27/2020 @ 4:40 amnever trumpers are with the net neutrality group
mg (8cbc69) — 10/27/2020 @ 4:50 amlol
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/26/2020 @ 6:45 pm
I don’t think so, although it is possible he doesn’t have a sense of right and wrong. He values the good opinion of other people. Maybe that”s more what they say than what he thinks they think. If he can;t get the good opinion of other people, he denigrates them, so that they shouldn’t affect the good opinion of still other people.
He almost never says he made a mistake, or did something wrong, because he doesn’t want to be embarrassed. He will sometimes ascribe different motives to himself, i.e. a question wasn’t based on a misunderstanding, but was sarcastic, which doesn’t even make sense.
Lately, he came up with, or adopted, an improvement on sarcastic for at least one thing: I was kidding.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/27/2020 @ 4:58 amNo.
He feels entitled to the good opinion of other people.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:01 amThere are violent anti-mask and lockdown rules protests in Italy.
CBS News says they have been taken over by the far right, the far left sad organized crime groups.
That can only mean one thing:
They are all being paid by Russia, which probably has some connections into them for some time. The bounties aren’t only in Afghanistan.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:02 am227 Dave: He feels entitled to the good opinion of other people.
I don’t think he’s that stupid. He wants it – that’s what I mean by values it. He wants it, and it doesn’t matter whether it is based on false pretenses or not.
It doesn’t even matter whether it is sincere, so long as they convey that impression to others. He’s not sincere when he praises other people. He is quick to forgive slights, so long as he now gets praise.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:07 amWhile we were sleeping/lamenting:
https://www.inquirer.com/news/west-philadelphia-police-shooting-locust-20201026.html
Now you cant just blame the west part of the state and the spectre of a fracking ban.
urbanleftbehind (f3c58b) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:09 am223. I saw a Biden ad on “Big roter” last night whose theme was we shouldn’t be locked down, and we ned a plan to get out of that (which presumbably Donald Trump doesn’t have)
His would be policy (which the ad does not say) is I think to impose, for a short time. rules so severe that they eliminate the virus.
That’s not following the official science. Donald Trump and Mark Meadows, when they says we will have to live with the virus, are following the science. Live with it, and prevent bad results by vaccines and therapeutics.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:15 amFactory Working Orphan (f2abc6) — 10/26/2020 @ 10:20 pm
You’re leaving out so much. Bush II was a veritable war criminal that should have been dragged to The Hague. He was so corrupt that he started two wars for oil and war profiteering wasting the lives of a lot of Americans in the process. He was so stupid he was called a chimp and so evil he was called Hitler. He alienated our allies and destroyed our reputation around the world. He set the Middle East on fire. He lied routinely and he also had an evil VP. He moved US forces out of Western Europe weakening NATO and letting down our allies.
But, to his credit, he isn’t currently thought to be the worst POTUS ever. At least not according to True Conservatives, who are now voting D.
frosty (f27e97) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:31 amIt’s come to this:
2020 reads like a TV script. So we asked screenwriters how it should end.
The characters? We’re gonna need a bigger boat…
The plot twists?
The ending?
I think we’ve got a pretty good idea who the kid shaking the snow globe is. And he’s got tiny, tiny hands.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/27/2020 @ 5:50 amBush II was a veritable war criminal that should have been dragged to The Hague: Yes, for torturing detainees. Whether that justifies a trip to The Hague, arguable.
He was so corrupt that he started two wars for oil and war profiteering wasting the lives of a lot of Americans in the process: No. Lives were wasted but your opinion of his motivations are straight out of the 2003 progressive playbook and it’s gotten no less nonsensical seventeen years later.
He was so stupid he was called a chimp and so evil he was called Hitler: His stupidity is arguable, but being equated to Hitler is stupid and straight out of the mouths of the progressive wing.
He alienated our allies and destroyed our reputation around the world: “Alienated” and “destroyed” are hyperbole, but he did damage relationships.
He set the Middle East on fire: Yes.
He lied routinely and he also had an evil VP: Compared to whom? We have an evil and routinely lying president right now. Compared to Clinton before him and Obama after, Bush was fairly truthful and not corrupt.
He moved US forces out of Western Europe weakening NATO and letting down our allies: Arguable.
Bush made his share of mistakes, and one monumental, history-changing mistake, and that was invading Iraq and removing Saddam, and that stain will be on his legacy forever.
Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 6:16 amTrump himself is a stain. While less than 7,000 Americans have died in Afghanistan-Iraq in the last seventeen years, which is tragic, Trump has killed tens of thousands of Americans in the last five months because of his mismanagement and ineptness in handling this virus. With his rallies and his indifference toward masks and social distancing, he is literally a public health menace.
I think Texas is in play, but the race really could go either way. It will be a tight race though.
I saw a report on CNN last night that almost as many people, over 1.2 million, in Harris county (Houston) have already cast their ballots by mail or early voting as the total number who voted in 2016. And it’s a week before the election!
Similar reports are coming from Bexar (San Antonio), Travis (Austin), Dallas and El Paso counties, as well as Hidalgo (McAllen, though the county seat is in Edinburg). People are standing in long lines for hours to vote early across the state. If this is happening in other states, the Republicans have a real problem on their hands.
The thing about Texas is that it was solidly Democratic for decades. For example, the congressional district where I live has never elected a Republican representative since it was created in 1913. In fact, in one-fourth of the elections over that time, the GOP didn’t even field a candidate, because they knew they would lose.
Texas did not become a “Republican” state, turned from blue to red if you will, until Reagan and later Bush. It has always tended Democratic. And now it’s turning blue again.
Trump is losing the suburbs, badly. He might eke out a victory in the rural counties, but there simply aren’t as many voters in rural counties as there are in suburban counties. That’s his problem. He panders to his base but does not expand it. That’s his problem.
In 2008, and 2016, there was not an incumbent on the ballot. In 2020, there is. And he’s the most despicable candidate ever. That’s why people are standing in long lines to vote early. This guy has got to go. Him and his entire family of corrupt businesses.
The Republican party that nominated him, excused and defended him, needs to be exorcised. Trumpism has to be repudiated, entirely.
That’s what I anticipate or hope the American people will do.
It’s the down ballot Republicans that are at risk here, not just representatives and senators in Congress, but governorships and state legislatures as well.
The GOP could lose it all. And deservedly so. We have spiraling deficits, mountains of debt, a pandemic out of control. And nothing to show for it but 225,000 dead Americans and an economic collapse.
Biden is not my choice for a candidate to vote for, but then neither is Jorgensen. I certainly will not vote for Trump. This man is a lunatic on steroids.
I will be voting Libertarian where I can and Democratic where I must, but the most important thing is to remove Trump from office. He is a disease on the Republican party, a cancer. He must be excised, totally removed. And all of his cult supporters exorcised.
The Republican party is in dire straights right now.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:01 amPaul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 6:16 am
You missed my sarcasm and made my point. The current playbook for Trump is the same one used against Bush almost word for word. One of the reasons I can’t take NeverTrumpers seriously is they’re completely oblivious to this. When this is pointed out the response is always some version of how this time all of the hyperbole and distortions are the truth.
I’ve seen comments here that the Trump family is the most corrupt ever. If taken literally that is a laughable comment.
frosty (f27e97) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:13 am234. Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 6:16 am
The mistake maybe was allowing sanctuaries for terrorists, i.e. not going on to invade Syria, the sort of mistake the British Empire didn’t make in the 19th century.
Syria did not have nuclear weapons, and it wouldn’t have been a difficult war. Maybe Assad and Iran could have been deterred. The biggest mistake was, as is almost always the case with blunders, an intelligence failure – simply not understanding where the opposition in Iraq was coming from – it was not bitter enders.
How so?
It has a small effect.
His biggest mistake was accepting too small victories over the FDA.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:18 amSaletan explained it pretty well. Far as I’m concerned, Trump is primarily responsible for the American deaths after Memorial Day. Sure, blame Xi and his Chinese Communist Party for bringing it here, but how our leaders mishandled the pandemic is on them, at all levels.
Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:31 amAs for the rallies and such, it’s not just about the spread of the virus from those events, it’s about the message Trump is sending to the rest of the country. He learned nothing.
I caught your last paragraph, but I’ve seen all too often Trump supporters denigrating previous Republican presidents to make their guy look better.
Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:40 amIMO, Trump will go down as one of the most–if the most–corrupt and dishonest president in American history.
Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 7:40 am
Trump will go down as one of the most–if the most–corrupt and dishonest president in American history.
This is hard to square with actual American history and it’s not defending anything to point that out.
frosty (f27e97) — 10/27/2020 @ 8:14 amI will reprint this here:”SEEN ON FACEBOOK: “Some Christians say they can’t vote for Trump because of his past. I say be thankful God doesn’t have that same standard for you.”
Which past? The past month? The past eight months? The past four years?
nk (1d9030) — 10/27/2020 @ 8:14 amHe has said publicly that he never seeks forgiveness because he hasn’t done anything to require it. But he is quick to accuse other people of terrible sins and crimes.
He often claims that he has done something perfectly, in the best way possible, and better than anyone else has ever done, or could do. (“I alone can fix it.”) And he is quick to call other people “losers” or total failures.
Admitting a mistake is actually less embarrassing than leaving the impression that I think my boneheaded action was exactly right. If Trump had admitted that he made an error regarding a hurricane forecast, it would have drawn far less ridicule than the Sharpie loop on the official forecast map. He made the Sharpie loop in hopes of sustaining the illusion that he is always right.
He doesn’t admit mistakes because he has a grossly inflated sense of self, and a moral code in which nothing that he perceives as being to his own advantage could possibly be wrong. He shows us these aspects of his character on a regular basis.
Radegunda (20775b) — 10/27/2020 @ 8:20 amWe’ll see who’s right five years from now. I’m confident in my assessment.
Paul Montagu (cbbfc4) — 10/27/2020 @ 9:08 amIf you want sre (improbable) election scenarios:
https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/what-if
No, they can’t. (replace the electors) While the wording f the constituton may be a little bit unclear, I think it means Congress can set a variety of dates for choosing the Electors (it uses the word time there, not day, as it does for when the electors shall cast their votes) and Congress has, since I think 1845, set the time as the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November for all states. A state can’t choose electors after November 3. No votes cast after that date can be added. That must be why all ballots must be presumably cast by the end of Election Day in every state. You may find out later who won, and voters may even verify their ballots in some states, but the vote was cast before November 4.
https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/full-text
Article II, Section 1, Clause 3:
There is apossible loophole:
https://www.loc.gov/law/help/statutes-at-large/28th-congress/session-2/c28s2ch1.pdf
If the election is inconclusive, then tey can pass a law saying how the electors shall be appointed. Most states probably already have some provision for certifying a winner.
Before 1845, there was a 34 day window preceding the first Wednesday in December.
Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/28/2020 @ 7:08 amPersonally, I think Trump will quit by late November if he loses. Dump it all on Pence. I’d like to know what country he’s moving his money to.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/29/2020 @ 1:37 pmAnd the people insisting this isn’t true will also insist they weren’t really Trump fans. They were just straight shooters LOL.
Trump’s going to be quite a spectacle in a week.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/29/2020 @ 1:43 pmTrump will go down as one of the most–if the most–corrupt and dishonest president in American history…
ROFLMAOPIP dreams Paul Montagu… Tricia Nixon Cox… and Julie Nixon Eisenhower.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/29/2020 @ 1:58 pmhahahahaha
Eisenhower lol
Oh man you guys are hilarious.
Dustin (4237e0) — 10/29/2020 @ 2:09 pmTrump will go down as one of the most–if the most–corrupt and dishonest president in American history.
Harding and Grant got bad reviews, too, although I think the Grant thing was Southern-apologist propaganda.
And what can you say about any President who actively supported slavery? How is that not corruption of the first order?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/29/2020 @ 6:57 pm@248. Yeah, it’s hilariously funny Julie Nixon married David Eisenhower.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 10/29/2020 @ 7:01 pmGrant was never implicated in anything corrupt himself, but he foolishly trusted a lot of corrupt people.
That’s why he lost every cent he had to a scam after leaving the presidency, and had to write and sell his memoirs in his final days to lift his family out of destitution.
Dave (1bb933) — 10/29/2020 @ 7:02 pm