Too soon to start thinking about 2024?

[Kurth]

Asleep over here, perhaps, but why would Biden not be on the ballot in NH?

[The Meal]

Asleep over here, perhaps, but why would Biden not be on the ballot in NH?

That confused me as well. I think it's just an uber-hypothetical. It's more a statement about the challengers than the incumbent.

[Defiant]

If I'm understanding correctly, the Democratic party changed the calendar so that South Carolina is going first (something Biden pushed for, since South Carolina is more representative of Democratic voters than Iowa or New Hampshire). New Hampshire looks like it will still schedule their primary a week before South Carolina. The Democratic party will penalize the state for running it on an unsanctioned date (likely cutting the delegates it gives the state in half and asking that candidates not add their names to the ballots) - something similar happened in 2008, when Florida and Michigan jumped the queue, had their delegates halved and Clinton and Obama didn't campaign in those states.

[malchior]

Several GOPers musing about cutting social security again. Of course they want to exclude the boomers. Why would the boomers sacrifice to fix the problems they made for themselves? I guess I'm still not seeing how they're going to save us.

Three of Donald Trump’s rivals for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination are pushing for cuts to Social Security benefits that would only affect younger Americans, as the party’s leaders grapple with the explosive politics of the retirement program.

In comments on Sunday as well as in interviews earlier this year, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Social Security will need to be revamped — but not for people who are near or in retirement.

Former vice president Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley have taken similar positions since launching their presidential campaigns. From the earliest days of his 2016 run, Trump has vowed not to touch either Social Security or Medicare — a break from GOP orthodoxy that has shifted the party’s views — and has more recently hammered DeSantis for wanting to cut the program.

[malchior]

NY Times has a opinion mixed media piece today digging into the 1st No Labels town hall. The reporter relates that even within "No Labels" they have no coherent message. When asked about climate change Manchin of course naturally talked about making sure we have a robust energy plan in place (a total dodge) while Jon Huntsman talked about carbon pricing schemes which they then argue about. Solid stuff.

None of this is shocking because it isn't intended to be a vehicle for good policy. It is funded by hard-right big money interests. What's sad about this is the person covers it so earnestly. No Labels doesn't merit being taken seriously. It is astroturf of the worst sort. I ended my quotation at the point where the author missed an opportunity to get serious and think about the real question - why does No Labels exist and who benefits from its potential impact on the general election next year?

So you’ve got Jon Huntsman and Joe Manchin at this event that’s about how there’s all these obvious things that we could be doing, bringing the parties together, disagreeing about carbon pricing. It just sort of sat there. They never resolved whether No Labels is for carbon pricing or against carbon pricing. So at that point, the moderator for the event, Kevin Cirilli, starts to ask them, well, how’s it going to work if this actually happens if there’s a Republican and a Democrat in the White House?

Archived Recording (Kevin Cirilli)
And because if there is a Republican and a Democrat, respectively —

Archived Recording (Jon Huntsman)
We can fix problems.

Archived Recording (Kevin Cirilli)
— who are in the White House together, how would that work?

Katherine Miller
And Huntsman responds — well, he like makes a joke.

Archived Recording (Jon Huntsman)
A hell of a lot better than what you have today.

Archived Recording (Kevin Cirilli)
But how — but practically —

[APPLAUSE]

Katherine Miller
And people laughed, and it was like a funny, little moment, but the moderator kind of stuck with it and was like, well, no, but how would it actually work?

Archived Recording (Kevin Cirilli)
Practically speaking, I mean, practically speaking, because if we’re as polarized as we are now, how would it actually work inside of the White House with two opposing parties in power?

Archived Recording (Joe Manchin)
Well, nobody knows. We’ve never tried it.

Katherine Miller
Manchin says —

Archived Recording (Joe Manchin)
Well, they tried in 1864. Yeah, right.

Katherine Miller
You could kind of hear in the room like a little bit of nervous laughter at that line because in 1864, Abraham Lincoln basically formed a coalition party in his re-election bid, but Lincoln was then assassinated, and Andrew Johnson became president and was impeached. So it wasn’t exactly a great success story for this kind of idea.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

The real thing I took away from being in there is, people kind of deserve better than that. Voters kind of deserve a more serious thing. And politics is actually about responding to what voters care about. So you would think that if people were going to put forward a project that they’re going to spend millions of dollars on, they’re going to put a bunch of people in states all over the country to register for this thing, and this is the first event they’re going to do, that you would expect them to have a more serious sort of answer to why people should be trusting them with that, especially when they’re being asked to take a risk by voting for a third party. Coming out of this event, if I were Joe Biden, I would not be worried about what happened at that event. It did not seem like a particularly cohesive set of policy plans or a candidacy that made total sense.

[GreenGoo]

"kind of deserve better"

Geezus H.

[malchior]

NY Times

The polling is too far out to be all that useful and thus the whole piece is pretty...silly...but I think there are major themes here to think about. Why do people think the economy is bad? We're starting to see people rationalize that this system is foisting terrible candidates on us again. Etc.

President Biden is heading into the 2024 presidential contest on firmer footing than a year ago, with his approval rating inching upward and once-doubtful Democrats falling into line behind his re-election bid, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll.

Mr. Biden appears to have escaped the political danger zone he resided in last year, when nearly two-thirds of his party wanted a different nominee. Now, Democrats have broadly accepted him as their standard-bearer, even if half would prefer someone else.

Still, warning signs abound for the president: Despite his improved standing and a friendlier national environment, Mr. Biden remains broadly unpopular among a voting public that is pessimistic about the country’s future, and his approval rating is a mere 39 percent.

Perhaps most worryingly for Democrats, the poll found Mr. Biden in a neck-and-neck race with former President Donald J. Trump, who held a commanding lead among likely Republican primary voters even as he faces two criminal indictments and more potential charges on the horizon. Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump were tied at 43 percent apiece in a hypothetical rematch in 2024, according to the poll.

[Isgrimnur]

[malchior]

That sort of glosses over how the Democratic party machine is pretty undemocratic. Several people have tried to build coalitions and they couldn't get anywhere unless they checked boxes for oligarchic interests. Oligarchs control the media and how they are portrayed to the population. Oligarchs control the vast majority of the most influential donors, big lobbying groups, and other special interests. Ultimately big money has a chokehold on our democracy and is strangling it to death.

[Isgrimnur]

It's a meme. Deep political analysis it ain't.

[Zarathud]

Oligarchs are not monolithic, so that is just an excuse. With crowdfunding and social media, the Democrats have an opportunity for a young coalition builder to bypass all those concerns anyway. The old GOP infrastructure didn’t really want Trump, but they couldn’t stop him. No reason someone with the Democrats couldn’t rise. It’s happened before.

[malchior]

Oligarchs are not monolithic, so that is just an excuse. With crowdfunding and social media, the Democrats have an opportunity for a young coalition builder to bypass all those concerns anyway. The old GOP infrastructure didn’t really want Trump, but they couldn’t stop him. No reason someone with the Democrats couldn’t rise. It’s happened before.

It's true that the oligarchs aren't monolithic but they do tend to push some of the most important policies in one direction though. One where tax and economic policy concentrates more power in their hands. They have different policy pushes in the margins but that only usually differentiates as to which poor or middle class person or sex grouping gets stepped on.

In any case, I don't think Trump is a great example at all. Trump is essentially an oligarch (or a close enough facsimile of one), He delivered on policy preferences for his "coalition" in some real ways but those same choices had the impact of further concentrating power in oligarch hands. HIs choices for Supreme Court for instance lead to reactionary regressive policy outcomes *and* they have delivered oligarchic policy outcomes on taxation, income equality, etc.

It also doesn't impress me too much that a oligarch bypassed some of the regular gatekeeping. It sort of leans into the idea that oligarchs have more power than ordinary citizens.

[Smoove_B]

Some perspective on where we are:

A New York Times/Siena College poll released on Tuesday, however, found Trump and Biden tied in a hypothetical matchup at 43 percent.

...

The parties now represent coalitions with such divergent visions of America’s future, particularly whether it welcomes or resists racial and cultural change, that it’s unclear what could allow one side to break out from the close competition between them. And that includes the prospect of Republicans choosing a presidential nominee who could be shuttling between the campaign trail and the courtroom.

“The two political parties are farther apart on average than they have been in our lifetime,” said Lynn Vavreck, a UCLA political scientist and co-author of books on the 2016 and 2020 elections. “That makes it harder for people to think about crossing over to the other side.”

Democrats have won the popular vote in seven of the past eight presidential elections – something no party has done since the formation of the modern party system in 1828. That suggests the Democratic coalition, on a national basis, is somewhat larger than the GOP’s.

...

Vavreck, the UCLA political scientist, and her co-authors John Sides and Chris Tausanovitch, argue in The Bitter End, their book on the 2020 election, that American politics is likely to remain this closely balanced for years. The reason, they believe, is that voters are now choosing between the parties primarily on their views about changes in America’s fundamental identity, rather than their assessment of current conditions, or even differences in economic and foreign policy priorities. And on those identity-focused issues – from abortion to LGBTQ rights – the chasm between the parties has grown so large that very few voters can envision switching sides, even to register a protest over the country’s immediate direction.

And once again with the "Independents"

The best news for Trump in the Bright Line Watch survey was that on each specific issue around which he’s facing a criminal investigation, fewer than half of independents believed he has committed a crime. In a less specific question, a NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll released Sunday found that only about half of independents agreed that he has “done something illegal” in any of the conduct that prosecutors are investigating.

A note during the closing:

Still, McInturff predicts that a Biden-Trump rematch could generate unexpected twists, not because it splits the electorate in new ways, but because so many voters are unenthusiastic about both men. “Actually, the Biden/Trump rerun is more likely to produce surprising results as voters have made clear they do not want to see this rematch,” he said.

It's rather long and there are lots of other points, but it reinforces for me just how screwed up the country is overall. Can't wait to see how many people don't vote in 2024; it's going to be great.

[LordMortis]

And once again with the "Independents"

As independent as Musk and the Federalist anti corruption goons.

[Octavious]

I changed my voting card to unaffiliated because I'm worried the MAGA nation might run a purge. That this guy is still even in the running let alone could win shows how broken this place is. I honestly just want to pack up and go.

[malchior]

The 'has a shot' is what dismays me. I've said it many times but we're a very unserious country that the world depends on to be serious. Our population is on average as bad as our enemies say it is. Many of our fellow citizens are simply historically abysmal people. They live in the lap of luxury compared to almost everyone in human history and they waste their time bullying the most vulnerable and imposing their values on others? History is rightly not going to be kind to our civilization.

[El Guapo]

The 'has a shot' is what dismays me. I've said it many times but we're a very unserious country that the world depends on to be serious. Our population is on average as bad as our enemies say it is. Many of our fellow citizens are simply historically abysmal people. They live in the lap of luxury compared to almost everyone in human history and they waste their time bullying the most vulnerable and imposing their values on others? History is rightly not going to be kind to our civilization.

I remember in the late 90s or whenever it was when Le Pen the elder made it to the runoff stage of the French presidential election. The French elites all lined up against him and he lost overwhelmingly (to Chirac, I think?) by something like an 80-20 margin. I remember seeing news reports of widespread celebration that Le Pen had been thrashed, and I remember thinking sarcastically "congrats, you managed to not elect an open fascist, amazing".

Turns out I was not being nearly charitable enough - apparently it is an accomplishment.

[Blackhawk]

It's got to suck to be the GOP right now. They hitched their chariot to a rampaging donkey because they thought it would get them ahead in the race, and now they are stuck as the donkey careens toward a cliff. And yeah, they can jump off, but the only place to land is on one of several, slightly slower rampaging donkeys who are all headed toward their own cliffs. Meanwhile, their opponent (an aging tortoise) my just end up winning because everyone else is off being a jackass.

They're in a place where even the sanest Republicans have to choose between fully embracing the madness or choosing to lose (and we know which one it seems to be.)

I'm sure they'd love to have Trump out of the running entirely, but they have no plan B. It's Trump (who promises to be far Trumpier the second time around), or one of several Trumpalikes that have no chance of winning. If this were a TV show, I'd almost expect them to push for a good VP pick, let Trump win, and then get him out of office (impeachment, incompetence, umbrella, slight ramp, etc.), leaving their VP pick in charge.

[Daveman]

I doubt there's the political will to do so, but aren't there some procedural things they could pull at the GOP convention to rule out Trump?

[Blackhawk]

I doubt there's the political will to do so, but aren't there some procedural things they could pull at the GOP convention to rule out Trump?

See the part about a lack of a plan B. They don't want Trump, but they can't get anyone they do want elected. They back Trump and embrace his madness (including the downfall of American democracy?), or they choose to forfeit the 2024 elections.

At least with the prior option they believe that they'll have the power to rewrite the system ahead of 2026/2028 to ensure that they can run the country in perpetuity.

[El Guapo]

I doubt there's the political will to do so, but aren't there some procedural things they could pull at the GOP convention to rule out Trump?

See the part about a lack of a plan B. They don't want Trump, but they can't get anyone they do want elected. They back Trump and embrace his madness (including the downfall of American democracy?), or they choose to forfeit the 2024 elections.

At least with the prior option they believe that they'll have the power to rewrite the system ahead of 2026/2028 to ensure that they can run the country in perpetuity.

The easiest thing to do relatively speaking would've been to convict Trump in the Senate in January 2021. The next easiest thing would be to take a neutral stance on his indictments - e.g., "Donald Trump is entitled to his day in court, and we'll see if the allegations are ultimately proven beyond a reasonable doubt." That leading GOP folk were not able / willing to do either means that they'll almost certainly never muster the political will to stop Trump, which means its up to people outside of the GOP to do so.

By contrast, pulling some shit at the convention would require a *lot* of political will, especially since trying to pull some shit at the convention to disqualify a candidate who had (presumably) won the primary would produce a ton of pissed off people who in that context would have very valid complaints. So...never going to happen.

[malchior]

I agree that the convention is probably the last and worst place for that sort of change to happen. The convention matters in a scenario where Trump vanishes from the scene or drops dead in the midst of primary season. That's about it.

[El Guapo]

I agree that the convention is probably the last and worst place for that sort of change to happen. The convention matters in a scenario where Trump vanishes from the scene or drops dead in the midst of primary season. That's about it.

I suppose there's a wild card scenario where Trump gets convicted in one of these cases between the end of the primary and the start of the convention. That would presumably provide *some* grounds for ditching Trump, but even then that would require enormous political will that GOP leaders have shown no evidence of to date.

[Smoove_B]

Yeah, I mean the GOP is largely acting like they're totally going to bail on him:

Former President Donald Trump will serve as one of the keynote speakers at the California GOP’s fall convention in Anaheim, the state’s wing of the Republican party announced Tuesday.

Trump will address convention attendees during a lunch event on Sept. 29 at the Anaheim Marriott Hotel.

Jessica Millan Patterson, chairwoman of CAGOP, said the organization was thrilled to welcome Trump back on the convention stage for the first time since 2016.

“As California Republicans prepare to play a major role in deciding who our Party’s 2024 presidential nominee will be, I look forward to President Trump speaking with our delegates about his plans to move our country forward,” said Millan Patterson. “We look forward to a great event and lunch keynote address from President Trump.”

Cult. They're 100% a cult now.

I really want to see if there's any movement with the groups that are seeking to have him removed from various state ballots. I'm not sure of the legalities, but I would like to live in a world where people have to write-in TFG's name on election day if they want him to serve. Or better yet, cause a scene when he's not on the ballot.

[El Guapo]

The party's crossed the Rubicon with Trump already. The Big Lie and January 6th was really the last line to cross - if you're not willing to oust him over that, then you're not willing to oust him over anything. Like how do you expect to beat him in a primary as a loser when you're also not willing to say that he lost?

[Isgrimnur]

[Carpet_pissr]

Great album! Sadly, I think it's the only one they ever made.

[Isgrimnur]

[Smoove_B]

He's clearly just cashing checks at this point. He can't possibly be a serious Democratic contender:

Longshot Democratic presidential candidate and conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Sunday that he would support a national ban on abortion after the first three months of pregnancy if elected.

“I believe a decision to abort a child should be up to the women during the first three months of life,” Kennedy told NBC News in an interview at the Iowa State Fair here. Pressed on if that meant signing a federal ban at 15 or 21 weeks, he said yes.

“Once a child is viable, outside the womb, I think then the state has an interest in protecting the child,” he said, adding “I’m for medical freedom. Individuals are able to make their own choices.”

He also added:

I think we’re living in a weird period of history right now.”

On that we agree, nut job.

[Alefroth]

Maybe he's trying to get as many conservatives on board as he can, then he'll make a run as 3rd party.

[malchior]

The party's crossed the Rubicon with Trump already. The Big Lie and January 6th was really the last line to cross - if you're not willing to oust him over that, then you're not willing to oust him over anything. Like how do you expect to beat him in a primary as a loser when you're also not willing to say that he lost?

Correct. Many support him outright. And the rest? They are 'Good Americans" now. Bad voters. Bad people. Whatever (sorry to cross pollute here!). Lots of these folks should and do know better but in the end it doesn't matter. We have to hope we just get through this period.

[Carpet_pissr]

Sooo...hopium?

[Jaymann]

The party's crossed the Rubicon with Trump already. The Big Lie and January 6th was really the last line to cross - if you're not willing to oust him over that, then you're not willing to oust him over anything. Like how do you expect to beat him in a primary as a loser when you're also not willing to say that he lost?

Can you imagine if someone went into a coma in 2015 and just now woke up?:

Patient: Wait a minute doc, let me get this straight.

Doctor: It's all true.

Patient: Please, just put me back under.

[Smoove_B]

Saw this and thought of YellowKing:

Vivek Ramaswamy is one of the highest-profile candidates seeking the GOP presidential nomination, but he has not voted in a Republican primary recently enough to be affiliated with the party in his home state's voting records.

Additionally:

He's said he voted for a Libertarian in the 2004 presidential election, but did not vote in 2008, 2012 or 2016, according to Reuters, and has contributed to both Republican and Democratic candidates. He brushed past a question about his sparse voting history during Wednesday's GOP presidential debate.

Ramaswamy said he went on to become a "hardcore" Trump supporter and voted for him in 2020.

Seems like a totally legit candidate.

[Carpet_pissr]

I smell a Putin plant.

[Smoove_B]

Not for Gloria Johnson, it's not:

State Rep. Gloria Johnson is turning the attention from a joint act of political defiance as part of the Tennessee Three into a campaign for U.S. Senate.

Johnson, D-Knoxville, is trying to unseat Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn. Johnson launched a campaign website this morning and made the announcement near Knoxville's Central High School, where she taught for years and lived through a 2008 school shooting. She plans to appear in Nashville and Memphis later today.

Johnson made gun reform her central platform after Tennessee House colleagues tried to oust her and fellow Democratic state Reps. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson after they took to the House floor to loudly call for gun reform after the deadly shooting of three children and three adults at Nashville's Covenant School in March. Johnson, Jones and Pearson garnered national attention and met with leaders, including Vice President Kamala Harris.

[LordMortis]

Heard in the background on TV Minn is trying to keep TFG off the Ballot as are Co and Mich and several other states. I found this

https://www.courthousenews.com/minnesot ... 24-ballot/

If put to the vote, I'd vote to keep him off the ballot, even if that meant having to deal with DeSatan.

[malchior]

Uh wut.

[Holman]

There's reporting today that RFK Jr. is about to announce an Independent campaign for president.

[Smoove_B]

"Independent"