U.S. Politics megathread (merged)

[CavySlaveJambo]

9 minutes ago, Mikey1874 said:

The guy that predicted a Harris wins based on the keys (mainly favouring the incumbent) said she has room to lose one. One that didn't apply a few weeks ago was a catastrophic event but that has happened with the hurricane in a democratic run area. 

 

So hopefully they get their arse in gear. And think about Bush and Katrina in New Orleans. 

Which could also go in favour of Harris because she has been speaking about Climate Change and actually doing something to prevent it. 
 

Unlike”Mr Drill Drill Drill” 

[JFK-1]

Maybe the day of cop violence will come after the one day of dictatorship, maybe not. There are increasing signs of a Harris landslide, Trump will try to steal it in other ways. 

[Victorian]

He'll probably squeal about the election being stolen by the Democrats illegally using Zelensky and Ukraine as some kind of armageddon blackmail.  Would be my guess.

[Cameronstheman]

2 minutes ago, JFK-1 said:

Maybe the day of cop violence will come after the one day of dictatorship, maybe not. There are increasing signs of a Harris landslide, Trump will try to steal it in other ways. 

There is  no way that Muppet will  except defeat gracefully  and leave quietly to face loads of subsequent Court Hearings

As the Election gets closer, he will have spread more and more outrageous lies about being cheated. The thing is many intelligent Republicans will agree with his shite, while stirring up violence and hate, knowing fine well the result will be fair

 

He's a gambler who goes all in, very good at it as well. His bet will be  to desperate find  a contaminated Ballot Box, when he loses , just one and  if so, convince many Republican  Tossers and others out there, saying the likes of ''that's what happened in the last Election''  that,  ''the Dems @ Co  were far  to clever to catch back then' 'but not this time '' and that's a big worry for me

 

Hopefully it goes smoothly and all we ever seen of Trump after all this, is him standing in a Court Dock, with  reality kicking in  and justice being  dished out 

[SwindonJambo]

1 hour ago, JFK-1 said:

Maybe the day of cop violence will come after the one day of dictatorship, maybe not. There are increasing signs of a Harris landslide, Trump will try to steal it in other ways. 

Are there really? I do hope that's what happens but it's still worryingly close in the swing states.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/elections/polls-president.html

[I P Knightley]

2 hours ago, Cameronstheman said:

There is  no way that Muppet will  except defeat gracefully  and leave quietly to face loads of subsequent Court Hearings

As the Election gets closer, he will have spread more and more outrageous lies about being cheated. The thing is many intelligent Republicans will agree with his shite, while stirring up violence and hate, knowing fine well the result will be fair

 

He's a gambler who goes all in, very good at it as well. His bet will be  to desperate find  a contaminated Ballot Box, when he loses , just one and  if so, convince many Republican  Tossers and others out there, saying the likes of ''that's what happened in the last Election''  that,  ''the Dems @ Co  were far  to clever to catch back then' 'but not this time '' and that's a big worry for me

 

Hopefully it goes smoothly and all we ever seen of Trump after all this, is him standing in a Court Dock, with  reality kicking in  and justice being  dished out 

He'd be exonerated on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

[Footballfirst]

It might not be quite 1st October in Plains, Georgia, just yet, but it is in the UK, so happy 100th birthday to Jimmy Carter.

[JFK-1]

12 minutes ago, Footballfirst said:

It might not be quite 1st October in Plains, Georgia, just yet, but it is in the UK, so happy 100th birthday to Jimmy Carter.

 
If he doesn’t make it to midnight here now I will blame you for jumping the gun. 😉

[JFK-1]

2 hours ago, SwindonJambo said:

Are there really? I do hope that's what happens but it's still worryingly close in the swing states.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/elections/polls-president.html

 
According to more than one knowledgeable pollster the signs are good for Harris. She leads in many polls while the pollsters agree there’s a 3% error rate either way built into that they suspect the error to be favorable to Harris. 
 

The trend has been in her favor for weeks while Trump has been trending down. They think Trump has bottomed out. No matter what happens now he will be stuck with the MAGA base while she will continue drawing the undecideds.

 

Every day more prominent Republicans are endorsing Harris while Trump just continues making a complete arse of himself.

 

Nothing is ever certain but the signs are very good.

Edited Tuesday at 00:22 by JFK-1

[Watt-Zeefuik]

https://newrepublic.com/post/186444/conservative-poll-rasmussen-secretly-worked-trump-team

 

So remember way back up in the polling discussions in March when I said that a problem with the RCP polling average is that they, unlike other averages, were still including Rasmussen Reports? (Others had been dropping RR because Rasmussen himself has left RR and the shell of it has largely turned into a GOP PR gig.)

 

Anyway, RR may very well have been violating election law by running an allegedly non-partisan poll but giving the results to Trump well before public release.

 

Which doesn't by itself make their polling crap. But their polling is still crap.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

6 hours ago, Mikey1874 said:

The guy that predicted a Harris wins based on the keys (mainly favouring the incumbent) said she has room to lose one. One that didn't apply a few weeks ago was a catastrophic event but that has happened with the hurricane in a democratic run area. 

 

So hopefully they get their arse in gear. And think about Bush and Katrina in New Orleans. 

 

So I grew up in western NC and I still live in North Carolina, and this is going to be, well, complicated.

 

NC has a Democratic governor but the state legislature has a Republican supermajority because of gerrymandering, and the governor's office is one of the weakest in the nation. Yes, there may be some blowback on this, but Cooper is winding down his term this year anyway.

 

Josh Stein is the Democrat running for governor, and his opponent is Mark "Black Nazi" Robinson, who's now been abandoned by almost his entire staff and most of the GOP. The rest of the Council of State GOP slate, beyond incumbent Secretary of Agriculture Steve Troxler, are little better.

 

WNC, the mountainous part of NC, has its own distinct cultures and demographics which are, to put it bluntly, weird. Asheville, where I grew up, is primarily a tourist town that's also long been a haven for all kinds of new agey types, pot heads, college washouts with trust funds, but also a lot of outdoorsy types attracted the the hiking and whitewater in the area (which is fantastic and I miss a lot). It also happens to attract a lot of retirees from out of state, most of whom end up being classic old white northeastern Republicans.

 

When I was growing up, Democrats and Republicans swapped the congressional seat back and forth. Because of gerrymandering and demographic shifts, despite Asheville's continued growth and continued move towards being a leftist haven, the congressional seat has become solidly and deeply conservative. Former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows held the seat, and when he went to work in the White House, wheelchair-bound boy Nazi Madison Cawthorn took it, before he washed out after his most extreme positions, firearms violations, office chaos, and a gay sex tape (Cawthorn is publicly virulently anti-gay) came out.

 

If we're going to put it into vulgar electoral terms (which is hard to think about as I see pictures of neighborhoods and towns that I personally remember completely wiped away by the flood waters), I think it might be a minor net win for the Democrats, for no other reason than this cleanup and recovery is going to take the better part of a decade, and the most conservative parts of the district are going to be those that have the hardest time getting to the polls. Asheville, by virtue of being the regional hub, will recover most quickly. So you could see Trump's WNC margin cut a decent amount, which would impact his standing in NC, which if it's close, could flip NC. And Trump very likely can't win without NC.

 

Also notably, NC has only gone for a Democratic Presidential nominee twice in my lifetime. Once in 1976 and once in 2008, which we barely got to celebrate as the result was so close it wasn't finalized for weeks, and Obama had long since cemented his win.

 

Obviously this could play out a lot of ways. But I really don't think politicizing Cooper's response here is going to drag down Harris when Cooper isn't even on the ballot, and the GOP gubernatorial candidate is quite possibly the most toxic weight on a party ticket in living memory.

[Ulysses]

37 minutes ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

https://newrepublic.com/post/186444/conservative-poll-rasmussen-secretly-worked-trump-team

 

So remember way back up in the polling discussions in March when I said that a problem with the RCP polling average is that they, unlike other averages, were still including Rasmussen Reports? (Others had been dropping RR because Rasmussen himself has left RR and the shell of it has largely turned into a GOP PR gig.)

 

Anyway, RR may very well have been violating election law by running an allegedly non-partisan poll but giving the results to Trump well before public release.

 

Which doesn't by itself make their polling crap. But their polling is still crap.

 

I don't think Rasmussen's bias is news, to be fair. And while on the face of it the story of collusion seems both impressive and credible, I'd prefer to see it explored by a non-partisan (or at least not so overtly anti-GOP) source.

 

It's a great pity that there don't seem to be any objective analysts in the US.  

[Watt-Zeefuik]

50 minutes ago, Ulysses said:

 

I don't think Rasmussen's bias is news, to be fair. And while on the face of it the story of collusion seems both impressive and credible, I'd prefer to see it explored by a non-partisan (or at least not so overtly anti-GOP) source.

 

It's a great pity that there don't seem to be any objective analysts in the US.  

 

The New Republic is only anti-GOP because they have no other option right now. They spend most of their time now pining for the old moderates of the northeast GOP.

 

They can't get on board with Trumpism because it's too vulgar for them but they were rooting hard for Nikki Haley so they could stop having to endorse all those unpleasant Democrats for a while.

[JFK-1]

This is brilliant including an observation that flies are always hanging around Trump, or alternatively Trump thinks they are and I have a theory on that.  If Trump smells like the literal shit he allegedly does well yeah flies might congregate.

 

It's incredible to watch this stuff and contemplate the fact a lot of people would vote for this completely empty head. Actual dystopia in my view.

 

Trump Proposes The Purge, Rambles Incoherently About Migrants at Meandering Rally: A Closer Look

 

 

 

[Mikey1874]

Maybe Trump might want a debate if Vance bombs tonight in the VP debate. 

[Ulysses]

7 hours ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

The New Republic is only anti-GOP because they have no other option right now. They spend most of their time now pining for the old moderates of the northeast GOP.

 

They can't get on board with Trumpism because it's too vulgar for them but they were rooting hard for Nikki Haley so they could stop having to endorse all those unpleasant Democrats for a while.

 

That's certainly an interesting way of looking at TNR. 

 

In the instance you posted, TNR uncritically reposted something produced by American Muckrakers, which in journalism and analysis terms is as much in the swamp as most of the dribbling conspiracy nonsense that populates too much of social media these days.

 

It's a great pity that there don't seem to be any objective analysts in the US.

 

[Gizmo]

3 hours ago, JFK-1 said:

This is brilliant including an observation that flies are always hanging around Trump, or alternatively Trump thinks they are and I have a theory on that.  If Trump smells like the literal shit he allegedly does well yeah flies might congregate.

 

It's incredible to watch this stuff and contemplate the fact a lot of people would vote for this completely empty head. Actual dystopia in my view.

 

Trump Proposes The Purge, Rambles Incoherently About Migrants at Meandering Rally: A Closer Look

 

 

 

1. The flies are clearly attracted to the adult diaper...🤢
2. The Purge...ffs...that said, maybe that should be the future presidential campaign, a state each, highest criminal scum eliminated wins...

 

Edited Tuesday at 12:02 by Gizmo
tweaked the image :D

[Watt-Zeefuik]

1 hour ago, Ulysses said:

 

That's certainly an interesting way of looking at TNR. 

 

In the instance you posted, TNR uncritically reposted something produced by American Muckrakers, which in journalism and analysis terms is as much in the swamp as most of the dribbling conspiracy nonsense that populates too much of social media these days.

 

It's a great pity that there don't seem to be any objective analysts in the US.

 

 

There's no such thing as truly objective analysis anywhere, in the US or otherwise. That's what Donna Haraway calls the "God trick," the implication that anyone can give the "view from nowhere." Media orgs should strive to be as objective as they can but true objectivity isn't a thing.

 

TNR was the magazine that popularized Charles Murray's racist guff. It liked Bill Clinton but only when he tacked hard to the right and dismantled the American welfare state. It was as pro-Iraq War as any publication in the country, and absolutely adored Joe Lieberman, particularly when he split from the Democrats and went independent. It loved Obama's soaring "no red, no blue America" but always whined that he didn't do enough to placate the Tea Party, which it saw as some bucolic proletarian peasants' movement, I guess, rather than the white collar revolt that it was.

 

American Muckrakers got the receipts, that's why this got re-posted. They literally had evidence of what's probably a crime. Given how much air time the whole story of Clinton's email server got in 2016 based on effectively nothing at all, I'm not going to lose any sleep over a known right wing troll farm getting further exposed as a right wing troll farm.

Edited Tuesday at 12:25 by Watt-Zeefuik

[Watt-Zeefuik]

Happy 100th birthday to President Jimmy Carter.

 

His presidency got overwhelmed by events, but he may be the best person all around to have ever been President.

 

I'm glad he lived long enough to see his behind the scenes work with the Argo situation, part of the hostage crisis that doomed his reelection, come to light.

[Mikey1874]

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

Happy 100th birthday to President Jimmy Carter.

 

His presidency got overwhelmed by events, but he may be the best person all around to have ever been President.

 

I'm glad he lived long enough to see his behind the scenes work with the Argo situation, part of the hostage crisis that doomed his reelection, come to light.

 

Strangely seen as a failure but was heading for victory in 1980 until the Republicans paid Iran $billions to keep the hostages until after the election.

[Lone Striker]

1 hour ago, Mikey1874 said:

 

Strangely seen as a failure but was heading for victory in 1980 until the Republicans paid Iran $billions to keep the hostages until after the election.

Yep.  Pretty outrageous & cruel.    Something Trump would probably  have done too, similar to his reaction when Biden's bi-partisan Border Bill looked like being passed.

 

It was reported a few months ago that Carter had told friends that the reason he was still alive was his desire to see Kamala elected President.

 

 

 

[Ulysses]

4 hours ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

There's no such thing as truly objective analysis anywhere, in the US or otherwise. That's what Donna Haraway calls the "God trick," the implication that anyone can give the "view from nowhere." Media orgs should strive to be as objective as they can but true objectivity isn't a thing.

 

Too much fondness for the right to have whatever opinion they want, and too little fondness for objectively viewing things as they are and reporting on them.  But also, the bit in bold.  Let's keep it simple - in this instance, neither Muckrakers nor TNR can be accused of striving to be as objective as they can.

 

 

4 hours ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

TNR was the magazine that popularized Charles Murray's racist guff. It liked Bill Clinton but only when he tacked hard to the right and dismantled the American welfare state. It was as pro-Iraq War as any publication in the country, and absolutely adored Joe Lieberman, particularly when he split from the Democrats and went independent. It loved Obama's soaring "no red, no blue America" but always whined that he didn't do enough to placate the Tea Party, which it saw as some bucolic proletarian peasants' movement, I guess, rather than the white collar revolt that it was.

 

American Muckrakers got the receipts, that's why this got re-posted. They literally had evidence of what's probably a crime. Given how much air time the whole story of Clinton's email server got in 2016 based on effectively nothing at all, I'm not going to lose any sleep over a known right wing troll farm getting further exposed as a right wing troll farm.

 

American Muckrakers is in the swamp, just like all the other hyper-partisan "media" shite out there.  It might get stuff right, or it might not, but getting stuff right isn't the objective.  TNR just reposted it because it liked what it saw.  Any oul' unpaid amateur gobshite on JKB could do the same thing.

[Mikey1874]

 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

42 minutes ago, Ulysses said:

 

Too much fondness for the right to have whatever opinion they want, and too little fondness for objectively viewing things as they are and reporting on them.  But also, the bit in bold.  Let's keep it simple - in this instance, neither Muckrakers nor TNR can be accused of striving to be as objective as they can.

 

 

Ultimately objectivity is a chimera and if one gets too focused on reaching it, you come nowhere near it. Journalistic norms historically have relied less on striving for objectivity and have focused on reporting information which can be verified to a basic set of standards. If the information found can be verified, it's reportable.

 

What has destroyed political media in the US is the kind of "objectivity" you seem to be aiming for, when every publication takes stock of how any particular thing suits two political parties and then tries to ensure that it's somehow giving equal emphasis to each party. That kind of focus, which the New York Times has been obsessed with to its detriment, means that any party can basically engage in "Overton window" hacking. To get the press to accept something outrageous, you just have to say something even more outrageous, then the original outrageous thing you said becomes the "middle ground." The GOP has been doing this basically since the GWB administration and it's how Trumpism has become normalized.

 

The tether to objectivity shouldn't be trying to keep equal weight on two nebulous partisan bases that are constantly in flux. That's not what journalism is for. Objectivity should be whether information can be verified, then it should be interpreted in the light of the organization that reported it.

 

42 minutes ago, Ulysses said:

 

American Muckrakers is in the swamp, just like all the other hyper-partisan "media" shite out there.  It might get stuff right, or it might not, but getting stuff right isn't the objective.  TNR just reposted it because it liked what it saw.  Any oul' unpaid amateur gobshite on JKB could do the same thing.

 

To call American Muckrakers a media org is a stretch, and I don't mean that as a slur. They're a political action organization dedicated to uncovering information about far right figures. (Aforementioned WNC-based wheelchair Nazi Madison Cawthorn was their first target.) Either Muckrakers pulled those emails out of their arses (or the nearest LLM), or they actually got a leak. TNR's job before reporting it isn't to decide whether or not it's fair to the GOP to report it, it's job is to try to do some authentication on the emails.

 

Now if you want to give it tight to TNR, the names "Stephen Glass" and "Lee Siegel" should be foremost on the list as exemplars of why it's a pretty shit magazine untethered from journalistic standards. TNR just happened to be the site that the story was shared on when I saw it. (It's also been picked up by Drudge, which doesn't say much for quality but at least says it's not only anti-GOP bias that's doing it.)

 

Anyway, we're far off the topic. The basic assertion "Rasmussen Reports polls have pretty much gone to shit since Scott Rasmussen left the company" is a pretty widely supportable one by evidence at this point.

 

 

[Cameronstheman]

19 hours ago, I P Knightley said:

He'd be exonerated on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

Good point !!

[Watt-Zeefuik]

20 hours ago, SwindonJambo said:

Are there really? I do hope that's what happens but it's still worryingly close in the swing states.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/us/elections/polls-president.html

 

I'd say both are very true. There's signs that a Harris landslide could be possible and also plenty of signs that Trump could still win.

 

I'd say the 95% confidence intervals are somewhere around a 10% Harris win and a 1% Trump win in the national popular vote, with the complications of the electoral college playing hell with the middle ground. The fact it's still very much a reasonable possibility that Trump could win is worrying as hell. At this point in any sane world he'd be polling down with Mark Robinson, but he isn't.

 

At this point I'd liken it to Hearts playing Falkirk. Hearts *should* have won that game. The pre-election polls at this point are basically the bookies' odds ahead of the game. But different things happen when the ball hits the grass, just as different things happen in October when the volunteers hit the pavement and the phone lines and the candidates start making their final pitches.

 

The reassurance is that Harris has run a very good campaign so far and Trump is still saying crazy shit. Harris is more popular than he is in favorability ratings. But polls can't predict how well a turnout operation is going to run, how effective closing arguments are going to be, or how last minute revelations or bad weather in certain places will affect voting. And we're unfortunately in a close enough election where that stuff might matter.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

As to why I think a Harris landslide is at least possible (and I'm not ready to predict it yet):

 

Remember that Trump blew up the RNC, installed his own people, and fired like 2/3 of the staff, presumably so he could take the money for himself.

 

Also that Elon Musk is swooning in with tens of millions of dollars to provide the get out the vote operation, but he's outsourcing it all, sometimes to himself, so he gets to take a cut.

 

My *hope* has been that the national GOP's GOTV operation, which was a big factor in Trump's 2016 shocker and his 2020 close call, will end up being shit, just like everything else tries to run or Elon Musk tries to do himself without asking anyone who's done it before.

 

Too early to call, but there's some signs my wish might be coming true.

 

AP: https://apnews.com/article/trump-political-action-committees-voter-canvassing-musk-0c1c095a6516b7bcbc80bf94fe0fe45a

 

Politico: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/30/republicans-alarm-trump-ground-game-00181577

 

Quote

 

"Some battleground state Republicans say they’re worried they see little evidence of Donald Trump’s ground game — and fear it could cost him the election in an exceedingly close race.

In interviews, more than a dozen Republican strategists and operatives in presidential battlegrounds voiced serious concerns about what they described as a paltry get-out-the-vote effort by the Trump campaign, an untested strategy of leaning on outside groups to help do field work and a top-of-the-ticket strategy that’s disjointed from the one Republicans down the ballot are running."

 

"But several Republican operatives said they aren’t seeing the same kind of presence either from the Trump campaign itself or from those outside groups that they did during his previous presidential runs, in 2016 and 2020. Down-ballot candidates for state legislature in some battleground states aren’t running into Trump canvassers at the doors or seeing the campaign’s literature left behind the way they used to, they added.

One GOP operative in a battleground state, who like others was granted anonymity to speak candidly about the state of the race, cast doubt on whether the Trump Force 47 program is actually putting its recruits to work.

“It’s almost like a timeshare scheme. You have to go in and do the training, and you get the swag and the hat and the yard sign. That’s what you have to do to go get it,” the operative said. “It doesn’t seem like people are really being activated, and the campaign’s not very forthcoming on whether they’ve been activated.”

 

On the other side, I'll say again, Harris's campaign has been back on the field at a level I haven't seen since 2008, which is pleasing to see.

[SwindonJambo]

26 minutes ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

I'd say both are very true. There's signs that a Harris landslide could be possible and also plenty of signs that Trump could still win.

 

I'd say the 95% confidence intervals are somewhere around a 10% Harris win and a 1% Trump win in the national popular vote, with the complications of the electoral college playing hell with the middle ground. The fact it's still very much a reasonable possibility that Trump could win is worrying as hell. At this point in any sane world he'd be polling down with Mark Robinson, but he isn't.

 

At this point I'd liken it to Hearts playing Falkirk. Hearts *should* have won that game. The pre-election polls at this point are basically the bookies' odds ahead of the game. But different things happen when the ball hits the grass, just as different things happen in October when the volunteers hit the pavement and the phone lines and the candidates start making their final pitches.

 

The reassurance is that Harris has run a very good campaign so far and Trump is still saying crazy shit. Harris is more popular than he is in favorability ratings. But polls can't predict how well a turnout operation is going to run, how effective closing arguments are going to be, or how last minute revelations or bad weather in certain places will affect voting. And we're unfortunately in a close enough election where that stuff might matter.

I would fear for the future of the US (and the rest of us!) in the event of a Trump win.

 

Close to home for yourself, if the polls are to be believed, NC is right back into play as a Swing State with Harris occasionally leading them. So yours could be one of the votes that actually matter!

 

I still think the electoral college is ridiculous. That 42/43 states out of 50 are a foregone conclusion is just  ridiculous. Much like our first past the post system here.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

14 minutes ago, SwindonJambo said:

I would fear for the future of the US (and the rest of us!) in the event of a Trump win.

 

Close to home for yourself, if the polls are to be believed, NC is right back into play as a Swing State with Harris occasionally leading them. So yours could be one of the votes that actually matter!

 

I still think the electoral college is ridiculous. That 42/43 states out of 50 are a foregone conclusion is just  ridiculous. Much like our first past the post system here.

 

I would get rid of it or reform it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately not up to just me.

 

Durham County where I live will almost certainly deliver Harris her highest percentage win. (Mecklenburg might outdo us for biggest numerical margin just because it's so much bigger.) I'm hopefully going to get to do some door-knocking around here. The goal is to get Durham's turnout up to 80%, which could be critical.

[Ulysses]

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

Ultimately objectivity is a chimera

 

 

That may be true where you live, but not where I do.

 

 

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

What has destroyed political media in the US is the kind of "objectivity" you seem to be aiming for, when every publication takes stock of how any particular thing suits two political parties and then tries to ensure that it's somehow giving equal emphasis to each party.

 

That isn't objectivity, nor has it anything to do with it.  And in any case, what has destroyed political media and the political discourse in the US is the priority given to who says something, rather than whether or not what they say is either correct or true.

 

 

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

The tether to objectivity shouldn't be trying to keep equal weight on two nebulous partisan bases that are constantly in flux. That's not what journalism is for. Objectivity should be whether information can be verified, then it should be interpreted in the light of the organization that reported it.

 

The fact that you even have to say that demonstrates how far from reality and objectivity your national political discourse has become.

 

 

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

To call American Muckrakers a media org is a stretch, and I don't mean that as a slur. They're a political action organization dedicated to uncovering information about far right figures. (Aforementioned WNC-based wheelchair Nazi Madison Cawthorn was their first target.) Either Muckrakers pulled those emails out of their arses (or the nearest LLM), or they actually got a leak. TNR's job before reporting it isn't to decide whether or not it's fair to the GOP to report it, it's job is to try to do some authentication on the emails.

 

Indeed - but for that particular story, reposting and cheerleading seems to have taken priority.  I wonder why?

 

 

1 hour ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

Anyway, we're far off the topic. The basic assertion "Rasmussen Reports polls have pretty much gone to shit since Scott Rasmussen left the company" is a pretty widely supportable one by evidence at this point.

 

 

Keep it on topic and it'll be fine.    

[Ulysses]

50 minutes ago, SwindonJambo said:

I still think the electoral college is ridiculous. That 42/43 states out of 50 are a foregone conclusion is just  ridiculous. Much like our first past the post system here.

 

It's a federal nation, so there is a logic to the college.  The real issue, IMO, is the number and distribution of Senate seats.  That's where proportionality is lost.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

23 minutes ago, Ulysses said:

 

It's a federal nation, so there is a logic to the college.  The real issue, IMO, is the number and distribution of Senate seats.  That's where proportionality is lost.

 

Which is the thing that's the hardest to change. Article V, which describes how you can amend the Constitution, basically says, "you can change anything but the proportional assignment of Senate seats." So to change the Senate, you'd have to first amend Article V to not say that, then you'd have to amend it to change the Senate assignments. Oh, and to do that, you'll need the approval of a lot of small states that benefit from the disproportionate assignment.

 

I'd say we could do to the Senate what the UK did to the Lords and make it effectively an advisory and approval body. That's still probably impossible to pass but it might work.

 

And FWIW, the folks who came up with the electoral college were kind of pissed off that states started doing winner-take-all assignments. So it's not even doing what it was supposed to do.

[JFK-1]

Vance CRASHES & BURNS over simple question at VP debate

 

 

 

[Ally]

2 hours ago, JFK-1 said:

Vance CRASHES & BURNS over simple question at VP debate

 

 

 

Why do YouTube people use CAPITAL LETTERS on certain words? Is it because their audience struggles to understand WHAT IS IMPORTANT?

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

As opposed to the partisan nonsense on this thread, a subscription to The Economist and the Checks and Balance weekly podcast is far more enlightening. 

[Mikey1874]

Just now, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

As opposed to the partisan nonsense on this thread, a subscription to The Economist and the Checks and Balance weekly podcast is far more enlightening. 

 

You must then mean they are more pro Trump.

 

Why not just say how good Trump is. 

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

24 minutes ago, Mikey1874 said:

 

You must then mean they are more pro Trump.

 

Why not just say how good Trump is. 

They actually aren't.

 

Equally, they provide decent insight and analysis on where both parties succeed and fail.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

1 hour ago, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

As opposed to the partisan nonsense on this thread, a subscription to The Economist and the Checks and Balance weekly podcast is far more enlightening. 

 

Do you mean to suggest that an expensive publication with a large newsroom of professional journalists is a better source of information than a side forum on a football discussion board in another country?

 

How dare you, sir. How DARE YOU.

 

(I can't stand the Economist's austerity cheerleading but beyond that, yes, they have outstanding reporters.)

[Maple Leaf]

I watched about 50% of the debate.  Neither guy hit a home run, and neither guy did a face-plant from the bits that I saw.

 

Vance sounded sane, which is more than can be said for his running mate in the President's debate.  I thought Walz could have hit him harder over Trump's failures as President.

 

I doubt if many voters' intentions changed.

[Ulysses]

5 hours ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

Do you MEAN to suggest that an EXPENSIVE publication with a LARGE newsroom of professional JOURNALISTS is a better source of INFORMATION than a SIDE FORUM on a FOOTBALL discussion board in ANOTHER country?

 

How dare you, sir. How DARE YOU.

 

(I can't STAND the Economist's AUSTERITY CHEERLEADING but beyond that, yes, they have OUTSTANDING reporters.)

 

Fixed YOUR post for YOU.  Call it the MEIDAS (sic) touch.

[Footballfirst]

Special Counsel Jack Smith's January 6th submission which was sent to the judge last week has now been published in redacted form (mainly redacting names).

 

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149.252.0.pdf 

[Watt-Zeefuik]

7 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

I watched about 50% of the debate.  Neither guy hit a home run, and neither guy did a face-plant from the bits that I saw.

 

Vance sounded sane, which is more than can be said for his running mate in the President's debate.  I thought Walz could have hit him harder over Trump's failures as President.

 

I doubt if many voters' intentions changed.

Yeah, I didn't watch, but it sounds like Vance did marginally better than Walz.

 

In 1988 Lloyd Bentson delivered perhaps the most memorable verbal slam ever delivered in a televised debate when, after Dan Quayle compared himself to JFK, said "Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy." Quayle looked pathetic, stupid, and overwhelmed. (Which, in fairness, he absolutely was.)

 

 

 

 

Bentson's ticket went on to lose the national vote by 8 points, managing only 111 electoral college votes.

[Watt-Zeefuik]

 

 

[Maple Leaf]

42 minutes ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

Yeah, I didn't watch, but it sounds like Vance did marginally better than Walz.

 

In 1988 Lloyd Bentson delivered perhaps the most memorable verbal slam ever delivered in a televised debate when, after Dan Quayle compared himself to JFK, said "Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy." Quayle looked pathetic, stupid, and overwhelmed. (Which, in fairness, he absolutely was.)

 

 

 

 

Bentson's ticket went on to lose the national vote by 8 points, managing only 111 electoral college votes.

Prior to the debate, Vance's image was that he was weird and unlikeable.  I think his objective in the debate was to change the public's perception of him, and he probably succeeded.

[JFK-1]

13 hours ago, Ally said:

Why do YouTube people use CAPITAL LETTERS on certain words? Is it because their audience struggles to understand WHAT IS IMPORTANT?

I presume because it’s more eye catching to someone scrolling down a list.

[Mikey1874]

2 hours ago, Footballfirst said:

Special Counsel Jack Smith's January 6th submission which was sent to the judge last week has now been published in redacted form (mainly redacting names).

 

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149.252.0.pdf 

 

 

[ｕｎｋｎｏｗｎｕｓｅｒ]

2 hours ago, Footballfirst said:

Special Counsel Jack Smith's January 6th submission which was sent to the judge last week has now been published in redacted form (mainly redacting names).

 

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149/gov.uscourts.dcd.258149.252.0.pdf 

 

"Make them riot. Do it."

[Ulysses]

2 hours ago, Watt-Zeefuik said:

 

 

 

 

Also:

 

[Ulysses]

[CavySlaveJambo]

On 01/10/2024 at 13:39, Watt-Zeefuik said:

Happy 100th birthday to President Jimmy Carter.

 

His presidency got overwhelmed by events, but he may be the best person all around to have ever been President.

 

I knew President Carter was big into humanitarian work (Carter Center, Habitat for Humanity). 
 

I did not realise he was also working on Climate Change. 
 

This is one of the politicians who until he was unable to did so much for people, 

 

I just hope he can get his wish to vote for Kamala Harris.