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Rumor has it that if his poll numbers keep falling Trump could drop out of the race. Like this guy says though, I am skeptical. But say he does for "health reasons" or some other excuse, would the GOP run Pence or someone else? I could see one of the Trump kids stepping up to keep the Trump/Pence thing going. Plus with a cult around Trump Im not entirely sure that everyone would follow Pence. But that would probably be balanced out with a stronger showing of evangelicals.
It won't happen. Handing the nomination to his son is tantamount to hereditary dictatorship which would cause many to either cut loose or fight within the party. For as much as political actors within the GOP treat Trump as a cult of personality, political actors inherently have a personal path to power they wish to obtain. Centralized power within a family can only be maintained through force or religion.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Yes it would be like a hereditary dictatorship, but this is the GOP we are talking about. They will toss democracy if they felt it suited them. I cant remember exactly when this was but a poll taken over the past year with potential 2024 candidates ranked had Don Jr in the #1 spot. Their trend towards autocracy is worrisome to say the least.
Sad and absolutely, frickin' hilarious:
https://twitter.com/davenewworld_2/s...65068048158720
As one commenter put it---AntiqueFa.
~D.....:shame:
I greatly doubt his ego and the perquisites of the presidency will be overridden by the desire to quit (though of course Trump is notorious for cutting his losses when he fails). This is a pretty unique situation, but in the end his office is what gives him his (in his mind) absolute authority. He won't drop it just because he feels bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Best case, Trump runs from prison in 2024 like an anti-Debs, splits the GOP ticket like a Roosevelt, and his idiot children subsequently take up the mantle of driving the national party's elections into the ground.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Some needed context on the situation in Kentucky.Quote:
Originally Posted by ReluctantSamurai
We're still ~4 months out so a lot can still change in ways we probably cant fathom right now (it is 2020 after all) but should his polling remain where it is now or worse, the scenario I envision is that he resigns for "medical reasons" so he can save face by saying that he quit before he could lose the election and later spin some yarn about stepping down for the good of the country. If he does quit I dont think he would ever run again (he can then claim he is undefeated), but he would prop up one of his sons or proteges in congress one day (presidential candidate Matt Gaetz *shudder*).Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
They will toss Democracy for everyone else. I am specifically talking about the internal political structure of the GOP. Republicans have no problem with a single party dictatorship as long as they as an individual have a path to party leadership.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Don Jr. is an idiot and is not a good politician, it chafes current conservatives to work under his father, why would they willingly be led by Don the II.
Sure but since when has the internal GOP power structure been good at opposing anyone from within? I have zero confidence they learned anything from 2016 considering almost every single prominent Republican who opposed Trump in 2016 is now a lapdog. I dont think the GOP base would care if Don Jr was a good politician, his dad sure ain't. Good at campaigning sure, but at anything else he fails. All Don Jr needs is his dad to stump for him which Im sure he'd be glad to do in order to continue the Trump name. Or for Ivanka. You are right that one of the kids probably wont ascend after their dad, but I can definitely see them playing a prominent role within the party itself in some form or another. As the story goes, if Trump lost in 2016 he was going to create a news network and feature prominently in it and I could see that path being taken.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Point taken.Quote:
Some needed context on the situation in Kentucky.
Lawyers, Guns and Money? So Kirkland & Ellis meets NRA meets Wall Street....:quiet:
As Monty noted, I have little or no doubt that Trump will continue his bid for a second term. He was the underdog in 2016 and I suspect he believes that he can repeat that performance yet again. He is NOT a scientific campaigner; he goes with his gut.
That said, if he DOES drop out prior to the convention, then the delegates would be committed to vote for him anyway on the first ballot. He would then be offered the nomination. Were he to refuse, it would go to open balloting on the floor.
If he has been nominated and has accepted, but then drops out after the convention has been adjourned, the RNC committee members would meet to decide a new nominee voting, the for the appropriate number of delegates in their jurisdiction by proxy (no re-assembly of the convention would be made). They would be free to choose whomever they saw fit as long as a majority of those proxy votes supported the nomination and that nominee agreed to run.
A winner has finally been called in the KY Dem primary, with McGrath eking out a win. I was rooting for Booker since it seemed like he was the favorite of actual Kentucky Dems plus I just dont think that McGrath is a very good campaigner at all (and I like Booker more personally). But lets be honest here, neither of them were going to win against McConnell, but I do hope that Booker goes on to challenge Rand Paul in 2022 since Paul is just a gigantic all-around moron. At least McGrath and her massive amount of funding will hopefully tie up McConnell's resources. But mark my words, Booker is one to watch for the future, I have really high hopes for him.
Its exactly 4 months until the general election. Things are only going to get crazier as a rumor comes that GOP leadership is giving Trump until Labor Day to "turn things around" and if not, he's on his own. I think this rumor is utter :daisy:, the GOP is too intertwined with Trumpworld to cut it loose. They had their chance to cut themselves loose of Trump with impeachment and they failed miserably. No reason to think they wont go down with the ship even as his polling keeps dropping. Also didnt they say something similar in 2016 after the Access Hollywood tape?
A slight chance perhaps with a first day pardon for dear old Donald after he's pardoned everyone else on the last day.Quote:
Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh
~:smoking:
So because this timeline is the dumbest timeline, Kanye West is claiming hes running for president. I'm pretty sure he's just saying this to stir up controversy/get in the news cycle but who knows, he's similar to Trump in the sense that he has delusions of grandeur.
Obviously this means that Biden needs to pick Taylor Swift as VP.
https://giphy.com/gifs/taylor-swift-...oVKDYkme6xfmdGhttps://media.giphy.com/media/l4EoVK...fmdG/giphy.gif
He's got an album coming out, so it's probably just for publicity. :shrug:Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Oh I am 95% sure that this is the case too. Especially since for the states in which the filing deadline hasnt passed yet, he would need literally thousands of signatures to get on the ballot to run as an independent. In Florida he would need over 130,000 signatures. But even if he just pushes for a write-in campaign I think its not going to hurt Biden or Trump as it feels like the only people who would vote for him are the ones who werent planning on voting for either main party anyways.Quote:
Originally Posted by Csargo
Also didnt he do this in 2016 too?
Yeah, I don't think it he actual said it in 2016 but sort of hinted at running iirc.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hooahguy
Well I'll believe Kanye when he actually files so :shrug:
They delayed counting the absentee ballots in the New York Democratic primary, originally July 1, now set to begin 2 weeks after election day (June 23) fhsdgegagahrgek
November is going to be pure sex in this country.
Granted that New York is neither a battleground state nor has extensive experience handling mail ballots, but I wonder how the midwestern and southern states that matter will operationalize.
On an interesting note from available non-mail returns, a substantial proportion of the ballot decisions on the presidential primary left the party delegate section blank (on the New York ballot you vote for the candidate and for the delegates who would vote for them at the DNC). I can't comment on the significance of that since for all I know it happens that way every presidential primary, but it does suggest to me a measure of contempt for the system of voting both for party candidates (directly) and for party electors pledged to vote for those candidates at the party convention.
White House Trade and Manufacturing Policy director and assistant to the president Navarro with the white supremacy foghorn
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1279142640055812096 [VIDEO]
Quote:
Navarro: They spawned the virus, they hid the virus, they send hundreds of thousands of Chinese nationals over here to seed and spread the virus
The GOP elites may very well be pressuring Trump, but it is a bluff and one that even Trump should be able to see.
I have a feeling that we might not know who won the election for a week at least after especially in states where it might be very close like Florida or Pennsylvania.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
I believe Santoris should ask for special funding to set up the re-count and pay for it NOW -- it is foregone that it will be required.
I am predicting Trump takes Florida by fewer than 10k.
Damnit.
Why? Biden is showing a great lead. The two latest polls that show a more even matchup are both rated C- by 538. https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com...neral/florida/Quote:
Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh
A- polls show Biden with a clear lead.
I'll be far more interested in what the polls in Florida have to say in early August when the death toll from the current COVID wildfire there gets logged:inquisitive:
So far, the toll is falling heaviest among Dem districts. Though there are a lot of "purple" swaths in Florida.Quote:
Originally Posted by ReluctantSamurai
Very interesting cohort survey that suggests the toll of CV19 on a county is correlated with reductions of support for Donald Trump, also implicating the increasingly-evident shift among older Americans.Quote:
Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh
When the vast majority of new cases are coming out of red states, or even red counties, and concentrated in swing states like Florida, Arizona, and *gulp* Texas, then Trump has a lot to worry about this summer.
It is rather macabre that Trump's most ardent supporters may be enhancing their chances to die just prior to the election as an expression of their support for Trump (not masking, refusing to social distance, etc.). It could even affect the margins in states such as Florida and North Carolina where the margins are thin.
Not sure if this is something Sartrean or more like Poe would have written...
This is unrelated to thread topic, but we still got 4 months to go so it's meh right now. I've been thinking of what I would promise when running for local government given the current climate of US politics and the fact I have been hopping around from purple district to purple district, following work.
The US is really in need of new ideas and while I myself identify as a Progressive or maybe a very left Neoliberal, it's been difficult to really expand my mind's horizon of what is possible besides mainly data driven, targeted neoliberal reforms. Big ideas are just as likely to get sabotaged 5-8 years down the line as they are to fail before they even get to the presidents desk. My way of thinking is perhaps Democrats and the left in general need to be more clever and pursue policies in the background that mainly improve the efficiency and outputs of government so we can change the social meme of government being naturally ineffective and wasteful. But how would I do that on a city level?
There are some ideas I have kicking around like transitioning to an LVT and repealing NIMBY laws to allow medium density, mixed residential/commercial zoning...but I am afraid whether we are at the point that any and all reform is now painted as a 'leftist' policy. For example, Republican commenters in the local papers make it clear that the expectation in the wrongful application of police force is not to rectify with any policies but to demand that people's expectations of what is proper compliance needs to shift to what the most hawkish law enforcement imagine it to be. This move of the GOP to go from a right-wing liberal party to a nationalist reactionary party has really set us up for the culture wars Fox News has been raving about for decades.
That's the Democratic party brand, it's what they already do.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Sorry, did I say brand? :mean:
The Holy Grail of leftist ideology is really to create a sort of perpetual motion machine by empowering the "common person" to self-radicalize and self-organize, which grassroots we know by now was the engine of social democracy and civil rights around the world in the 20th century (as compared to top-down action alone). Neoliberals and technocrats in a meta-sense are perhaps too focused on what they might accomplish with dictation, but that is clearly a vulnerable strategy even when at its best (and when it's not at its best it reproduces many of the social flaws carried over by the agents, or just results in outright bad or damaging policy).
Culture war is a long-term move that began at least with the Birchers and patriarchal reactionary evangelicals in the 50s, make no mistake.Quote:
This move of the GOP to go from a right-wing liberal party to a nationalist reactionary party has really set us up for the culture wars Fox News has been raving about for decades.
Anyway, socialists are gaining an increasing presence in city governments across the country today, so adjusting for local conditions I'm not sure how scared you ought to be of Republican op-eds. Even in Seattle, Amazon won the battle against the head tax in 2018 but in the subsequent election it lost the war and now an even higher tax is being imposed. If you really want a taste of power do the research on your target jurisdiction, the target office, and on what makes an effective political campaign.
Hmm, they do a tremendous job of not promoting that aspect. On the national level it is hard to really shake the assertion that Democrats love to bring attention to Big Bills once they are in power and spend everything they have on these Big Bills. Both Obama and Clinton would have done better to spend their political capital on less controversial, efficiency driven improvements rather than harping on universal health care for the past 30 years. Even now there is no clear path to universal health care, assuming Biden gets everything he is promising. So what exactly have Dems done, cause as far as I can tell the Veterans are still struggling to get healthcare, the Post Office is broke, funding for research and development in some fields is not being expanded, and the IRS is still trying to move beyond computers older than me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
There are already plenty of radicalized socialists spending all their time talking theory over the internet, radicalizing other people. They never leave their room though, so there is a missing component beyond being part of a grassroots organization. Anyone can stand in a march with friends for a day. Some can march in the streets for a few weeks. Few actually carry out their lives as political agents, despite the strength of their opinions.Quote:
The Holy Grail of leftist ideology is really to create a sort of perpetual motion machine by empowering the "common person" to self-radicalize and self-organize, which grassroots we know by now was the engine of social democracy and civil rights around the world in the 20th century (as compared to top-down action alone). Neoliberals and technocrats in a meta-sense are perhaps too focused on what they might accomplish with dictation, but that is clearly a vulnerable strategy even when at its best (and when it's not at its best it reproduces many of the social flaws carried over by the agents, or just results in outright bad or damaging policy).
I don't think the situation we find ourselves in was part of anyone's Grand Plan. Evangelicals of the 1950s would have balked if you said they would be defending someone with the record of Donald Trump.Quote:
Culture war is a long-term move that began at least with the Birchers and patriarchal reactionary evangelicals in the 50s, make no mistake.
Even slight degrees of public attention can change things, especially on the local level, even more especially for purple districts.Quote:
Anyway, socialists are gaining an increasing presence in city governments across the country today, so adjusting for local conditions I'm not sure how scared you ought to be of Republican op-eds. Even in Seattle, Amazon won the battle against the head tax in 2018 but in the subsequent election it lost the war and now an even higher tax is being imposed. If you really want a taste of power do the research on your target jurisdiction, the target office, and on what makes an effective political campaign.
My understanding is that socialists continue to lose on national and state levels in primaries or in the general elections when compared to moderates and neoliberals. It's great if progress is made within cities, but those by definition are the easy pickings for a socialist candidate, once in the suburbs and rural areas they seem to fall apart although I can't explain why.