The Former Trump Presidency Thread

[Combustible Lemur]

It’s now come out that Moore stayed in an interview a few months back that he first noticed his wife when she was 15 and he was in his 30s. Not sure what more needs to come out to prove this guy was into teenagers.

He made an honest woman out of her. God's work.

What's amazing is that this behavior isn't going to lose him the election, while the rest of the United States is absolutely BLOWING UP over sexual misbehaviour, both large and small.

Al Franken might lose his position for stealing a kiss and posing for a "funny" grope picture, but Moore is going to take his place despite preying on teenagers and sexual assault of minors.

Bill Clinton is under fire again, but Moore is electable? All I can say is this explains why MSD always felt like he was an absolute alien to me. If Hollywood is riddled with sexual predators, wtf is Alabama when they turn a blind eye to their own predators? Worse, they venerate them.

What has become of God's word? Because this is not it.

You're kidding right? It wasn't until the industrial and information ages that 18 was the common age if consent. For most of western history, women's primary place was to produce and raise the most possible male children as not much more than property. Often sold or gifted in marriage as soon as puberty arrived. Juliet was 13.
While I am firmly on the side of secular modernity, it's unsurprising that the staunchly religious, backwards looking people of any nation, wouldn't be phased by grown men shopping for teenage brides. It was the norm until the modern era. Moore may be a particularly predatory case but he talks the talk of a true believer in the old order: God guns, country (state anyway), culture. That's easy to rally behind when the godless heathens trying to take yer jobs, blow up your planes, disrespect yer flags, and repossess yet taxes come knocking. And even then it's the minority. Even in Alabama, enough people aren't that entrenched in the old culture that Jones has a chance.

Sorry about the long post, wasn't really directed at you, but I keep hearing shock on all of the wave of accountability or lack thereof breaking right now. As long as we keep pretending like right now is the baseline morality of our millennia of culture, it's a disservice to our progress, and our past.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[hepcat]

https://twitter.com/EdKrassen/status/93 ... 49536?s=17

[Holman]

It’s now come out that Moore stayed in an interview a few months back that he first noticed his wife when she was 15 and he was in his 30s. Not sure what more needs to come out to prove this guy was into teenagers.

He made an honest woman out of her. God's work.

What's amazing is that this behavior isn't going to lose him the election, while the rest of the United States is absolutely BLOWING UP over sexual misbehaviour, both large and small.

Al Franken might lose his position for stealing a kiss and posing for a "funny" grope picture, but Moore is going to take his place despite preying on teenagers and sexual assault of minors.

Bill Clinton is under fire again, but Moore is electable? All I can say is this explains why MSD always felt like he was an absolute alien to me. If Hollywood is riddled with sexual predators, wtf is Alabama when they turn a blind eye to their own predators? Worse, they venerate them.

What has become of God's word? Because this is not it.

You're kidding right? It wasn't until the industrial and information ages that 18 was the common age if consent. For most of western history, women's primary place was to produce and raise the most possible male children as not much more than property. Often sold or gifted in marriage as soon as puberty arrived. Juliet was 13.
While I am firmly on the side of secular modernity, it's unsurprising that the staunchly religious, backwards looking people of any nation, wouldn't be phased by grown men shopping for teenage brides. It was the norm until the modern era. Moore may be a particularly predatory case but he talks the talk of a true believer in the old order: God guns, country (state anyway), culture. That's easy to rally behind when the godless heathens trying to take yer jobs, blow up your planes, disrespect yer flags, and repossess yet taxes come knocking. And even then it's the minority. Even in Alabama, enough people aren't that entrenched in the old culture that Jones has a chance.

Sorry about the long post, wasn't really directed at you, but I keep hearing shock on all of the wave of accountability or lack thereof breaking right now. As long as we keep pretending like right now is the baseline morality of our millennia of culture, it's a disservice to our progress, and our past.

But we are all alive right now. Pre-industrial norms have no more bearing on Evangelical Alabama than they do on Hipster Brooklyn or college-town Michigan.

Moore diddled a 14-year-old in 1979. In 1979 I was a rock-solid Evangelical living in Alabama with a 14-year-old sister. There is no question whatsoever that a 32-year-old trying to date my sister would have seemed creepy and weird as hell even in our church community.

The telling detail is that Moore's M.O. was to meet his dates away from their homes (around the corner, at a movie to which they both traveled separately, etc.). He claims to be a strict non-drinker but made sure to have wine for them. Etc.

[Combustible Lemur]

Sure. I agree that even 30 years ago our laws and norms were both similar and different.
Would a 17 yr. old engaging a 14yr old be o it of the norm, 20, 22. I was from suburban to rural and teens regularly tried to date dudes in their early to late twenties. It was always weird and mockworthy but it wasn't outside of cultural zeitgeist. Would a 50 yr old married to a 36 yr old give anyone pause enough to look into their history?
Yes, Moore is predatory, yet it sounds like ultimately successful.

Regardless, my point is about having enough empathy to rationally evaluate other cultural norms. Not Moore himself but a culture's willingness to rationalize their messy bits in defense of their perceived tribe. We don't have to agree, condone, endorse, or even tolerate it. But not being able to comprehend it leads to bad legislation. And counterproductive political strategy.


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[Kraken]

It’s now come out that Moore stayed in an interview a few months back that he first noticed his wife when she was 15 and he was in his 30s. Not sure what more needs to come out to prove this guy was into teenagers.

He made an honest woman out of her. God's work.

What's amazing is that this behavior isn't going to lose him the election, while the rest of the United States is absolutely BLOWING UP over sexual misbehaviour, both large and small.

Al Franken might lose his position for stealing a kiss and posing for a "funny" grope picture, but Moore is going to take his place despite preying on teenagers and sexual assault of minors.

Bill Clinton is under fire again, but Moore is electable? All I can say is this explains why MSD always felt like he was an absolute alien to me. If Hollywood is riddled with sexual predators, wtf is Alabama when they turn a blind eye to their own predators? Worse, they venerate them.

What has become of God's word? Because this is not it.

You're kidding right? It wasn't until the industrial and information ages that 18 was the common age if consent. For most of western history, women's primary place was to produce and raise the most possible male children as not much more than property. Often sold or gifted in marriage as soon as puberty arrived. Juliet was 13.
While I am firmly on the side of secular modernity, it's unsurprising that the staunchly religious, backwards looking people of any nation, wouldn't be phased by grown men shopping for teenage brides. It was the norm until the modern era. Moore may be a particularly predatory case but he talks the talk of a true believer in the old order: God guns, country (state anyway), culture. That's easy to rally behind when the godless heathens trying to take yer jobs, blow up your planes, disrespect yer flags, and repossess yet taxes come knocking. And even then it's the minority. Even in Alabama, enough people aren't that entrenched in the old culture that Jones has a chance.

Sorry about the long post, wasn't really directed at you, but I keep hearing shock on all of the wave of accountability or lack thereof breaking right now. As long as we keep pretending like right now is the baseline morality of our millennia of culture, it's a disservice to our progress, and our past.

But we are all alive right now. Pre-industrial norms have no more bearing on Evangelical Alabama than they do on Hipster Brooklyn or college-town Michigan.

Moore diddled a 14-year-old in 1979. In 1979 I was a rock-solid Evangelical living in Alabama with a 14-year-old sister. There is no question whatsoever that a 32-year-old trying to date my sister would have seemed creepy and weird as hell even in our church community.

The telling detail is that Moore's M.O. was to meet his dates away from their homes (around the corner, at a movie to which they both traveled separately, etc.). He claims to be a strict non-drinker but made sure to have wine for them. Etc.

Higher purpose. The Democrat is pro-choice and favors gay rights. He has a history of working for civil rights. Electing him would (almost) tip the Senate into the hands of the godless. Those are far greater evils than Moore's alleged sexual peccadillos.

Maybe the Alabamians will surprise me.

[Holman]

Maybe the Alabamians will surprise me.

They will not. They were saner in 1979.

[Kraken]

Maybe the Alabamians will surprise me.

They will not. They were saner in 1979.

Yes, I will be surprised if they surprise me.

[Pyperkub]

Maybe the Alabamians will surprise me.

They will not. They were saner in 1979.

Yup. They hate liberals more than pedophiles.

[YellowKing]

Case in point, my mom voted for a sexual predator, lying, psychopathic narcissist whose sole mission in life is to undo every shred of progress this country has made in the last 30 years. But she got that Supreme Court seat she wanted! Because abortion! And gays!

[tjg_marantz]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 4220134401
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 4937733126
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 3277868032

[malchior]

And you are killing our nation. When will you do us a favor and just keel over.

Also

https://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status ... 63041?s=17

[LawBeefaroni]

https://twitter.com/ryanobles/status/933067203557167105

There it is.

What is with his wife and kid in the background? I don't think this will end well for them.

[Skinypupy]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 4937733126

This makes absolutely zero sense. What on earth would LiAngelo Ball's issue in China have to do with Lonzo Ball's status in the NBA?

He's truly losing it.

[YellowKing]

It's bad when you're watching Designated Survivor (in which the President and all of Congress is blown up in an explosion leaving the Presidency in the hands of some low-level Cabinet member), and you wish it was true. At this point, I don't even need the fictional President Kiefer Sutherland. I will take the ACTUAL Kiefer Sutherland.

[Remus West]

It's bad when you're watching Designated Survivor (in which the President and all of Congress is blown up in an explosion leaving the Presidency in the hands of some low-level Cabinet member), and you wish it was true. At this point, I don't even need the fictional President Kiefer Sutherland. I will take the ACTUAL Kiefer Sutherland.

Given the cabinet appointees of this president I doubt we'd be much better off. A little maybe but not much.

[PLW]

You're kidding right? It wasn't until the industrial and information ages that 18 was the common age if consent. For most of western history, women's primary place was to produce and raise the most possible male children as not much more than property. Often sold or gifted in marriage as soon as puberty arrived. Juliet was 13.

Juliet was fiction. Normal marriage age in western Europe has never been anywhere close to 15.

Where in the mid-1500s in England, approximately 8 percent of women remained unmarried the inference would be that that figure was either the same or lower in the previous several centuries;[13] marriage in Medieval England appears to be a robust institution where over 90% of women married and roughly 70% of women aged 15 to 50 years were married at any given time while the other 30% were single or widows.[14]

In Yorkshire in the 14th and 15th centuries, the age range for most brides was between 18 and 22 years and the age of the grooms was similar; rural Yorkshire women tended to marry in their late teens to early twenties while their urban counterparts married in their early to middle twenties. In the 15th century, the average Italian bride was 18 and married a groom 10–12 years her senior. An unmarried Tuscan woman 21 years of age would be seen as past marriageable age, the benchmark for which was 19 years, and easily 97 percent of Florentine women were married by the age of 25 years while 21 years was the average age of a contemporary English bride.[15][16]

While the average age at first marriage had climbed to 25 years for women and 27 years for men in England and the Low Countries by the end of the 16th century,[17] and the percentage of unmarried Englishwomen rose from less than 10% to nearly 20% by the mid-17th century and their average age at first marriage rose to 26 years at the same time,[18] there was nonetheless great variation within Britain alone; while Lowland Scotland saw patterns similar to England, with women married in the middle twenties after a period of domestic service, the high birth rate of Highland Scotland and the Hebrides imply a lower age of marriage for the bride, possibly similar to Gaelic Ireland,[19] where Brehon Law stated that women became legally marriageable at 15 years and men at 18 years.[20]

Similarly, between 1620 and 1690 the average age of first marriage for Swedish women was roughly 20 years, approximately 70% of Swedish women aged between 15 and 50 years were married at any one time, and the proportion of single women was less than 10%, but by the end of the 18th century it had risen to roughly 27 years and remained high with the celibacy rate as a result of falling infant mortality rates, declining famines, decreasing available land and resources for a growing population, and other factors.[14]

Similarly, Ireland's age of marriage in 1830 was 23.8 for women and 27.47 for men where they had once been 21 and 25, respectively, and only about 10% of adults remained unmarried;[21] in 1840, they had respectively risen to 24.4 and 27.7;[22][23] in the decades after the Great Famine, the age of marriage had risen to 28–29 for women and 33 for men and as much as a third of Irishmen and a fourth of Irishwomen never married due to chronic economic problems that discouraged early marriage.[24]

[Skinypupy]

It's bad when you're watching Designated Survivor (in which the President and all of Congress is blown up in an explosion leaving the Presidency in the hands of some low-level Cabinet member), and you wish it was true. At this point, I don't even need the fictional President Kiefer Sutherland. I will take the ACTUAL Kiefer Sutherland.

Given the cabinet appointees of this president I doubt we'd be much better off. A little maybe but not much.

If this doesn't strike ultimate terror into your heart, I'm not sure what will:

President Betsey DeVos.

[raydude]

It's bad when you're watching Designated Survivor (in which the President and all of Congress is blown up in an explosion leaving the Presidency in the hands of some low-level Cabinet member), and you wish it was true. At this point, I don't even need the fictional President Kiefer Sutherland. I will take the ACTUAL Kiefer Sutherland.

Given the cabinet appointees of this president I doubt we'd be much better off. A little maybe but not much.

If this doesn't strike ultimate terror into your heart, I'm not sure what will:

President Betsey DeVos.

If there's one thing the Trump Presidency has taught me, it's that the charisma of the President matters when trying to lead and get an agenda pushed through Congress. Because of that I have no qualms about either a President Pence or President Devos. One has the charisma of a brick wall with a fake gold plated cross on it and the other is reviled by many.

[Moliere]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 4937733126

This makes absolutely zero sense. What on earth would LiAngelo Ball's issue in China have to do with Lonzo Ball's status in the NBA?

He's truly losing it.

It makes perfect sense if you assume that the father is gravy training all of his sons as their "manager" or some other nonsense as they move into the NBA.

[pr0ner]

Trump retweeted a tweet by Laura Ingraham favorably comparing him with Charles Manson this morning.

He's gone way off his rocker.

https://www.twitter.com/IngrahamAngle/s ... 5085039616

[msteelers]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/sta ... 4220134401

IT WAS ME!

[Octavious]

What a sad sack of shit. You are the president. You don't need people to give you god damn credit for things. What a petty shitty human being he is. I pray for the day when what he says doesn't f'n matter anymore.

[Daehawk]

Doesn't to me now.

A guy who says a lot of car stuff said Trump isn't firing on all cylinders. I said he has a blown head gasket.

[Carpet_pissr]

I pray for the day when what he says doesn't f'n matter anymore.

That is every day for me. How can the words of a pathological liar matter or have meaning?

[Isgrimnur]

They may not have meaning, but they still have impacts.

[El Guapo]

It’s now come out that Moore stayed in an interview a few months back that he first noticed his wife when she was 15 and he was in his 30s. Not sure what more needs to come out to prove this guy was into teenagers.

He made an honest woman out of her. God's work.

What's amazing is that this behavior isn't going to lose him the election, while the rest of the United States is absolutely BLOWING UP over sexual misbehaviour, both large and small.

Al Franken might lose his position for stealing a kiss and posing for a "funny" grope picture, but Moore is going to take his place despite preying on teenagers and sexual assault of minors.

Bill Clinton is under fire again, but Moore is electable? All I can say is this explains why MSD always felt like he was an absolute alien to me. If Hollywood is riddled with sexual predators, wtf is Alabama when they turn a blind eye to their own predators? Worse, they venerate them.

What has become of God's word? Because this is not it.

You're kidding right? It wasn't until the industrial and information ages that 18 was the common age if consent. For most of western history, women's primary place was to produce and raise the most possible male children as not much more than property. Often sold or gifted in marriage as soon as puberty arrived. Juliet was 13.
While I am firmly on the side of secular modernity, it's unsurprising that the staunchly religious, backwards looking people of any nation, wouldn't be phased by grown men shopping for teenage brides. It was the norm until the modern era. Moore may be a particularly predatory case but he talks the talk of a true believer in the old order: God guns, country (state anyway), culture. That's easy to rally behind when the godless heathens trying to take yer jobs, blow up your planes, disrespect yer flags, and repossess yet taxes come knocking. And even then it's the minority. Even in Alabama, enough people aren't that entrenched in the old culture that Jones has a chance.

Sorry about the long post, wasn't really directed at you, but I keep hearing shock on all of the wave of accountability or lack thereof breaking right now. As long as we keep pretending like right now is the baseline morality of our millennia of culture, it's a disservice to our progress, and our past.

But we are all alive right now. Pre-industrial norms have no more bearing on Evangelical Alabama than they do on Hipster Brooklyn or college-town Michigan.

Moore diddled a 14-year-old in 1979. In 1979 I was a rock-solid Evangelical living in Alabama with a 14-year-old sister. There is no question whatsoever that a 32-year-old trying to date my sister would have seemed creepy and weird as hell even in our church community.

The telling detail is that Moore's M.O. was to meet his dates away from their homes (around the corner, at a movie to which they both traveled separately, etc.). He claims to be a strict non-drinker but made sure to have wine for them. Etc.

Higher purpose. The Democrat is pro-choice and favors gay rights. He has a history of working for civil rights. Electing him would (almost) tip the Senate into the hands of the godless. Those are far greater evils than Moore's alleged sexual peccadillos.

Maybe the Alabamians will surprise me.

Honestly, I have a fair amount of sympathy for Alabama Republicans who are considering still voting for Moore. First, obviously Alabama is overwhelmingly pro-life. If you believe (as most Alabamians (Alabamans? do), that abortion is essentially the intentional murder of a human life, then a vote for Jones is a vote for someone who will generally vote to approve policies strengthening widespread state-sanctioned murder. Even if you 100% believe the allegations against Roy Moore, what's more important - his personal predations, or the lives of hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of developing human lives?

Second, if the situation were reversed and this was a Democrat running for Senate in Massachusetts, I would probably be similarly torn. Electing a Republican senator (in my view) would make it more likely that tens of millions of people lose health insurance (with all the human suffering that that would entail), that a horrible tax plan with awful long-term impacts pass, and that a million other horrible policy outcomes happen. It's at least defensible to view the policy outcomes as more important than even really terrible personal crimes.

[Captain Caveman]

It says so much that Trump keeps going to the "ungrateful black athlete" well. Like their success is not so much earned but given to them by benevolent white men in power that could be taken away at any moment ("get that son of a bitch of the field"), relegating them back to the lower social and economic status of many other minorities in this country. I've heard some say "ungrateful" is the new uppity. Damn straight.

For Trump, his one political instinct is to activate racial grievance culture wars. Shame on this country for letting this strategy work as well as it has.

Edit: Ah, found it. Here's the article about ungrateful as the new uppity.

[malchior]

It's at least defensible to view the policy outcomes as more important than even really terrible personal crimes.

IMHO this is at least one of the major causes that our society is fraying apart. We have sorts of competing parties who have compromised all moral authority and decency to get their policy outcomes. A race to the bottom of the barrel. We have a pedophile being defended right now. We are near the absolute bottom now. It has lead to the complete degradation of our society. We literally have one of the worst person's alive right in the United States running our country because people cared more about the SCOTUS or keeping black people down than having a decent good person leading us. In what universe is that defensible?

[Isgrimnur]

The "needs" of the many outweigh the crimes of the few.

[malchior]

The "needs" of the many outweigh the crimes of the few.

Oh I get it but we're so, so, so far past the line where we should look around and say wtf are we doing here.

[Isgrimnur]

You have more faith in humanity than I do.

[El Guapo]

It's at least defensible to view the policy outcomes as more important than even really terrible personal crimes.

IMHO this is at least one of the major causes that our society is fraying apart. We have sorts of competing parties who have compromised all moral authority and decency to get their policy outcomes. A race to the bottom of the barrel. We have a pedophile being defended right now. We are near the absolute bottom now. It has lead to the complete degradation of our society. We literally have one of the worst person's alive right in the United States running our country because people cared more about the SCOTUS or keeping black people down than having a decent good person leading us. In what universe is that defensible?

I don't disagree exactly, but at the same time, let's say your vote would be decisive in a Senate election (very close race!), and these are essentially your choices:

(1) Senator Roy Moore, only he will belong to the same party as you and vote the same way you would;
(2) Senator Scrupulous Republican - will provide the decisive vote to repeal the ACA, causing tens of millions to lose insurance (and some thousands to ultimately die as a long-term fallout of not having health insurance), but who hasn't committed so much as a traffic violation.

Which do you choose?

[El Guapo]

This type of situation also seems like a decent reason to use a parliamentary system where you vote for a party and not for an individual (then the party allocates the seats that they win).

[malchior]

It's at least defensible to view the policy outcomes as more important than even really terrible personal crimes.

IMHO this is at least one of the major causes that our society is fraying apart. We have sorts of competing parties who have compromised all moral authority and decency to get their policy outcomes. A race to the bottom of the barrel. We have a pedophile being defended right now. We are near the absolute bottom now. It has lead to the complete degradation of our society. We literally have one of the worst person's alive right in the United States running our country because people cared more about the SCOTUS or keeping black people down than having a decent good person leading us. In what universe is that defensible?

I don't disagree exactly, but at the same time, let's say your vote would be decisive in a Senate election (very close race!), and these are essentially your choices:

(1) Senator Roy Moore, only he will belong to the same party as you and vote the same way you would;
(2) Senator Scrupulous Republican - will provide the decisive vote to repeal the ACA, causing tens of millions to lose insurance (and some thousands to ultimately die as a long-term fallout of not having health insurance), but who hasn't committed so much as a traffic violation.

Which do you choose?

It isn't binary - there could have been pressure for Moore to withdraw. Party leaders could step up and organize a write-in campaign for Strange. There are--were probably now since they dicked around--plenty of options. Instead they chose to surrender all moral and ethical authority. What the hell does it matter if you have to pick a monster to get what you want. I personally refuse to be complicit with that. Unfortunately too many people go along and then wonder why we are up to our hips in shit.

[El Guapo]

It's at least defensible to view the policy outcomes as more important than even really terrible personal crimes.

IMHO this is at least one of the major causes that our society is fraying apart. We have sorts of competing parties who have compromised all moral authority and decency to get their policy outcomes. A race to the bottom of the barrel. We have a pedophile being defended right now. We are near the absolute bottom now. It has lead to the complete degradation of our society. We literally have one of the worst person's alive right in the United States running our country because people cared more about the SCOTUS or keeping black people down than having a decent good person leading us. In what universe is that defensible?

I don't disagree exactly, but at the same time, let's say your vote would be decisive in a Senate election (very close race!), and these are essentially your choices:

(1) Senator Roy Moore, only he will belong to the same party as you and vote the same way you would;
(2) Senator Scrupulous Republican - will provide the decisive vote to repeal the ACA, causing tens of millions to lose insurance (and some thousands to ultimately die as a long-term fallout of not having health insurance), but who hasn't committed so much as a traffic violation.

Which do you choose?

It isn't binary - there could have been pressure for Moore to withdraw. Party leaders could step up and organize a write-in campaign for Strange. There are--were probably now since they dicked around--plenty of options. Instead they chose to surrender all moral and ethical authority. What the hell does it matter if you have to pick a monster to get what you want. I personally refuse to be complicit with that. Unfortunately too many people go along and then wonder why we are up to our hips in shit.

Right, but you the voter are essentially limited to those binary outcomes. Well, there is a third "split-the-difference" choice for voters, insofar as they can choose to not vote or cast a write-in vote or something, but at this point either Jones or Moore is going to be the next Senator-elect from Alabama, so each voter has to either choose one (with the policy outcomes that result) or refuse to choose (which itself impacts which of the two is the next Senator-elect).

So, which does Voter Malchior choose in the above election? With the addition of (3) Decline to vote / meaningless write-in vote

[malchior]

You are ignoring my point to push an absolute practical. We are here because we keep accepting that only two choices exist. Do they only meaningfully exist? Maybe but the second we vote for that person we are legitimizing them. Sure it sounds like idealism but a complete lack of idealism about holding high standards or any standard at all has cast us into the pit of hell. We have to do better and saying that the ends justifies the means only steers into this madness. I'd argue that not voting or writing in is the only moral thing to do instead of voting for Moore. Even if the write in said none of the above.

Also I disagree that a write-in is meaningless. Murkowski won a write in campaign for the Senate in *this decade*.

[El Guapo]

You are ignoring my point to push an absolute practical. We are here because we keep accepting that only two choices exist. Do they only meaningfully exist? Maybe but the second we vote for that person we are legitimizing them. Maybe this sounds like idealism but a complete lack of idealism has cast us into the pit of hell. We have to do better and saying that the ends justifies the means only steers into this madness. I'd argue that not voting or writing in is the only moral thing to do instead of voting for Moore. Even if the write in said none of the above.

Also I disagree that a write-in is meaningless. Murkowski won a write in campaign for the Senate in *this decade*.

In the long-term there are more choices, to be sure. One entirely valid response for an anguished Alabama Republican is to vote for Jones or not vote, even acknowledging that Senator Doug Jones would probably produce mostly policy outcomes that the Alabama Republican will mostly strongly disagree with, on the grounds that the long-term health and sanity of the Republican party is more important than policy outcomes over the next couple years. All I'm saying is that those policy outcomes that will be decided over the next couple years are going to be hugely important - even life-or-death - for a lot of people, so I don't think it's crazy or completely indefensible for an Alabama Republican to vote for Moore. With the caveat that Alabama Republicans by and large believe a lot of horrible policies should be law and they're wrong about almost all of it, so they should vote for Doug Jones anyway, but just taking their policy views as given for the moment.

Also, a write-in is meaningless in the Alabama Senate election right now. If Republican leaders coalesced around an alternative write-in candidate to Moore, it could *become* less meaningless, but unless and until that happens there's no viable write-in alternative at this moment. And while I am less sympathetic to Republican leaders, it's far from clear that there is a viable alternative candidate who could actually have a reasonable chance of winning (as opposed to merely hugely boosting Jones's chance of victory).

Anyway, sounds like you would choose #3 in my hypothetical - which is a sound and defensible choice!

[malchior]

Yes #3. I think it comes down to I just don't think it is or has been healthy to continue to frame these false Sophie's choice moments as a life and death struggle policy wise while we strangle the nation instead. Plus it is fair to criticize them since they nominated him when he was just a plain piece of racist shit.

[El Guapo]

Trump supporters are mistakenly attacking LeVar Burton.

[malchior]

They are both black. Close enough.