The official President Biden thread.

[ICTChris]

16 hours ago, Genuine Hibs Fan said:

 Think this is as right as anything I've seen so far. Like you might put off some people angry about petrol prices going up if you also say you want the LGBT people that pretty much everyone has in their lives to be fired. 

The online aspect of Trumpism seemed to convince the republicans there was something to be gained through the Chris Rufio, LibsOfTikTok weirdos, or the Thiel type crypto monarchists, but they discounted that even in somewhere as deeply weird as the US most people have a real distaste for weirdos 

I remember reading something about abortion in US elections that said the side who talks most about abortion usually sees a negative impact, no matter which side they are coming from. Because, amazingly, people don’t want to turn on the evening news and be shouted at about abortions.

 

[Genuine Hibs Fan]

35 minutes ago, ICTChris said:

I remember reading something about abortion in US elections that said the side who talks most about abortion usually sees a negative impact, no matter which side they are coming from. Because, amazingly, people don’t want to turn on the evening news and be shouted at about abortions.

 

Yeah, seeing a lot of the, funnily enough, people who make money from it saying "no, the culture war worked actually, it was all the *waves hands vaguely* other stuff we did". 

Abortion is a funny one because obviously that has been a big pillar for the Dems this time around. I think all things considered the status quo was ok with the vast majority and the issue was handy second paragraph rhetoric on each side. The republicans blinked first to actually do something about it, made it a live issue so that democrats running on saving abortion actually engaged people rather than made them change the channel. Again, the supreme court and legislative republicans making very clear what their plans to materially impact people's lives are is an oppositional motivator for a far larger number of people than pretending there's cat litter trays for furries in schools

Edited November 10, 2022 by Genuine Hibs Fan

[carpetmonster]

Today’s NY Post front page suggests that Murdoch might be done with Trump

 

[DeeTillEhDeh]

Update - just Pueblo County to declare in Boebert's race - Hilary Clinton beat Trump narrowly there. In 2020 Adam Frisch beat Boebert in Pueblo County with a 10.6% lead.

Of the votes counted in Pueblo County Frisch has a 10% lead.

Update again - other counties were still declaring votes not just Pueblo - it was just that Pueblo had more left to count.

Adam Frisch 156,746 (50.01%)
Lauren Boebert 156,682 (49.99%)

64 votes in it with 95% declared - this will go to a recount and could drag on for days.

[Granny Danger]

1 hour ago, carpetmonster said:

Today’s NY Post front page suggests that Murdoch might be done with Trump

 

I’d love to be in the room when the big orange liar sees this.

[welshbairn]

2 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

Update again - other counties were still declaring votes not just Pueblo - it was just that Pueblo had more left to count.

Adam Frisch 156,746 (50.01%)
Lauren Boeber 156,682 (49.99%)

64 votes in it with 95% declared - this will go to a recount and could drag on for days.

They've got 8 days for overseas and military votes to arrive, assuming they were postmarked by election day. I'd assume most overseas votes would go Democrat and military Republican but who knows?

[welshbairn]

3 hours ago, carpetmonster said:

Today’s NY Post front page suggests that Murdoch might be done with Trump

 

It's quite funny that the Dems backed some of Trump's more unhinged favourites in the primaries, knowing they'd be easier to beat in the Midterms. It would be like Labour voters joining the Tories to vote for Liz Truss.

[Guest]

26 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

It's quite funny that the Dems backed some of Trump's more unhinged favourites in the primaries, knowing they'd be easier to beat in the Midterms. It would be like Labour voters joining the Tories to vote for Liz Truss.

The key word there is "voters". UK voters could do a bit of dishonest democracy in that way, as you point out. However, there was no voter involvement in what was done in USA. It was pure plutocracy. Democrat-aligned financers paid for the advertising of the Republican candidates they wanted to see nominated for that party. 

[welshbairn]

14 minutes ago, FreedomFarter said:

The key word there is "voters". UK voters could do a bit of dishonest democracy in that way, as you point out. However, there was no voter involvement in what was done in USA. It was pure plutocracy. Democrat-aligned financers paid for the advertising of the Republican candidates they wanted to see nominated for that party. 

There are no restrictions on who can vote in the primaries in some US states.

[Guest]

Sure but the effectiveness of advertising upon voters in USA is what I was getting at. That's not direct plutocracy, of course. Yet deliberately undereducating the electorate and priming them from childhood to always do what the market advises, that makes the electorate so pliable to the would-be plutocrats.

Edit: I thought it was the tens of millions of dollars Democrats spent on advertising their preferred Republican candidates (to Republican voters) in the primaries that was the main part of the strategy. I'm sceptical that enough Democrat voters were either aware of or in agreement with the strategy to have made an impact in those primaries.

Edited November 10, 2022 by FreedomFarter

[welshbairn]

5 hours ago, FreedomFarter said:

Sure but the effectiveness of advertising upon voters in USA is what I was getting at. That's not direct plutocracy, of course. Yet deliberately undereducating the electorate and priming them from childhood to always do what the market advises, that makes the electorate so pliable to the would-be plutocrats.

Edit: I thought it was the tens of millions of dollars Democrats spent on advertising their preferred Republican candidates (to Republican voters) in the primaries that was the main part of the strategy. I'm sceptical that enough Democrat voters were either aware of or in agreement with the strategy to have made an impact in those primaries.

Given the amount of money the likes of the Koch family have pumped into campaigns to persuade working class Americans to vote for lower taxes for the wealthy and cutting healthcare access to the poor, I don't see anything wrong with Libs pumping money into Trump's nutter campaigns to screw the Republican chances in the midterms. It's worth it just to see Trump's head explode.

[carpetmonster]

13 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Given the amount of money the likes of the Koch family have pumped into campaigns to persuade working class Americans to vote for lower taxes for the wealthy and cutting healthcare access to the poor, I don't see anything wrong with Libs pumping money into Trump's nutter campaigns to screw the Republican chances in the midterms. It's worth it just to see Trump's head explode.

JB Pritzker's taken flack in Illinois due to running ads seeming to promote barely sentient potato Darren Bailey to the MAGA crowd. It's kinda fair fucks because Ken Griffin spent $50m on GOP competitor Richard Irvin for their primary campaign. Griffin brushed over the fact Irvin's an African-American gentleman, the downstaters ignored him and plumped for Bailey likely on that fact alone. Griffin's now had a hissy fit and moved himself to Florida to bankroll DeSantis. JB Pritzker was announced re-relected as Governor of Illinois 6 minutes after the polls closed. 

[Guest]

In a way, this was the Democrats' strategy in 2016 with the Republican primary going into the presidential election. There was surely some coordinated strategy between liberal media and the Democratic party to promote Trump as much as possible. The thinking being he'd be the most favourable rival for Clinton to later face. That backfired on them.

Then with this smaller scale version of the strategy which we're seeing now, promoting the farthest right Republican in these elections. It means the Democrat candidate need only be less right wing than the nuttiest of Republican wingnuts to appear the reasonable choice to swing voters. So it allows Democrats extra room to drift further rightwards themselves.

[carpetmonster]

5 minutes ago, FreedomFarter said:

In a way, this was the Democrats' strategy in 2016 with the Republican primary going into the presidential election. There was surely some coordinated strategy between liberal media and the Democratic party to promote Trump as much as possible. The thinking being he'd be the most favourable rival for Clinton to later face. That backfired on them.

Then with this smaller scale version of the strategy which we're seeing now, promoting the farthest right Republican in these elections. It means the Democrat candidate need only be less right wing than the nuttiest of Republican wingnuts to appear the reasonable choice to swing voters. So it allows Democrats extra room to drift further rightwards themselves.

I think that's over-conspiratorializing a wee bit mate. The average American reads at a 7th grade level (13YO) so Trump saying 'you're fat' and 'your wife's ugly' gets insta-clicks based on shock value but then also resonates as a 'guy who speaks his mind' to those who aren't overly interested in complex policy positions. It's interesting to see folks now lauding Fetterman's campaign as it's the first one the Dems have ever really run on a 'f**k that guy' platform; they've taken Oz's every mis-step and hammered it. 

I think the second point depends on the electorate. I'd suspect that GOP gains in the NY/NJ region are based around Eric Adams being an absolute fucking binfire. They can't run candidates based on Trump in the areas closer to the city, but they can run moderates who'd fall around the same wing position as a right wing Dem like Adams, but haven't spent the last year making a complete arse of themselves. 

Edited November 10, 2022 by carpetmonster

[Guest]

51 minutes ago, carpetmonster said:

I think that's over-conspiratorializing a wee bit mate. The average American reads at a 7th grade level (13YO) so Trump saying 'you're fat' and 'your wife's ugly' gets insta-clicks based on shock value but then also resonates as a 'guy who speaks his mind' to those who aren't overly interested in complex policy positions.

So you think CNN et al's hyper-promotion of Trump for the Republican primary was solely motivated by profit? You're probably right.

[Granny Danger]

1 hour ago, carpetmonster said:

I think that's over-conspiratorializing a wee bit mate. The average American reads at a 7th grade level (13YO) so Trump saying 'you're fat' and 'your wife's ugly' gets insta-clicks based on shock value but then also resonates as a 'guy who speaks his mind' to those who aren't overly interested in complex policy positions. It's interesting to see folks now lauding Fetterman's campaign as it's the first one the Dems have ever really run on a 'f**k that guy' platform; they've taken Oz's every mis-step and hammered it. 

I think the second point depends on the electorate. I'd suspect that GOP gains in the NY/NJ region are based around Eric Adams being an absolute fucking binfire. They can't run candidates based on Trump in the areas closer to the city, but they can run moderates who'd fall around the same wing position as a right wing Dem like Adams, but haven't spent the last year making a complete arse of themselves. 

Source?

[welshbairn]

11 hours ago, carpetmonster said:

Today’s NY Post front page suggests that Murdoch might be done with Trump

Wall Street Journal too with a brutal editorial.

Quote

What will Democrats do when Donald Trump isn’t around to lose elections? We have to wonder because on Tuesday Democrats succeeded again in making the former President a central campaign issue, and Mr. Trump helped them do it.

Trumpy Republican candidates failed at the ballot box in states that were clearly winnable. This can’t be what Mr. Trump was envisioning ahead of his “very big announcement” next week. Yet maybe the defeats are what the party needs to hear before 2024.

Looking at the Senate map, the message could not be clearer. In New Hampshire, the Trump-endorsed Republican Don Bolduc lost to Sen. Maggie Hassan, 53% to 45%, as of the latest data. At the same time voters re-elected Republican Gov. Chris Sununu by 16 points.

“Don Bolduc was a very nice guy, but he lost tonight when he disavowed, after his big primary win, his longstanding stance on Election Fraud,” Mr. Trump said. “Had he stayed strong and true, he would have won, easily.” We doubt New Hampshire voters simply wanted Mr. Bolduc to stay kooky.

In Arizona the Trump-endorsed Republican Blake Masters trails Sen. Mark Kelly, 51% to 47%. This is a state successful Gov. Doug Ducey won by 14 points in 2018. Mr. Ducey could have won the Senate seat, but Mr. Trump pledged to go to war with him because Mr. Ducey refused to entertain 2020 fraud theories.

In Pennsylvania, the Trump-endorsed Republican Mehmet Oz lost to John Fetterman, 51% to 47%. This is a tough state for the GOP. But Mr. Fetterman was a weak candidate: He’s a lefty with a record of wanting Medicare for All and a ban on fracking, and he’s recovering from a stroke. David McCormick would have been a better Republican nominee, but he wouldn’t say the 2020 election was stolen, so Mr. Trump endorsed Mr. Oz.

In Georgia, the Trump-endorsed Republican Herschel Walker trails Sen. Raphael Warnock, 49.4% to 48.5%. This is going to a December runoff, which Mr. Walker could win. But Gov. Brian Kemp won re-election by eight points. Mr. Walker’s flaws as a candidate were obvious, but Mr. Trump helped clear the primary field and other candidates opted out.

In Ohio the Trump-endorsed Republican J.D. Vance won a solid victory over Rep. Tim Ryan, 53% to 47%, while Republican Gov. Mike DeWine won by 26 points. Mr. Vance was a poor fundraiser. As of Oct. 19 he’d pulled in $12 million to Mr. Ryan’s $47 million. What saved him was $32 million from the Senate Leadership Fund (SLF), a Super Pac aligned with Mitch McConnell. Mr. Vance trailed in the polls until mid-October.

Doug Mastriano, Pennsylvania’s Trump-endorsed gubernatorial choice, lost by 14 points. Tim Michels in Wisconsin and Tudor Dixon in Michigan fumbled winnable gubernatorial races. Also in Michigan, Mr. Trump helped John Gibbs beat GOP Rep. Peter Meijer in the primary in the Grand Rapids seat because Mr. Meijer voted to impeach him. Mr. Gibbs lost by 13 points. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler also voted to impeach Mr. Trump, who helped Joe Kent beat her in a primary. Mr. Kent is trailing in that Washington state district.

Mr. Trump could have stayed quiet in the final weeks of the campaign except to spend money to help his candidates. But he did little of the latter and instead staged rallies that played into Democratic hands. His rally in Latrobe last week might have hurt Mr. Oz with suburban voters who cost Mr. Trump the state in 2020.

Since his unlikely victory in 2016 against the widely disliked Hillary Clinton, Mr. Trump has a perfect record of electoral defeat. The GOP was pounded in the 2018 midterms owing to his low approval rating. Mr. Trump himself lost in 2020. He then sabotaged Georgia’s 2021 runoffs by blaming party leaders for not somehow overturning his defeat. That gave Democrats control of the Senate, letting President Biden pump up inflation with a $1.9 trillion Covid bill, appoint a liberal Supreme Court Justice, and pass a $700 billion climate spending hash.

Now Mr. Trump has botched the 2022 elections, and it could hand Democrats the Senate for two more years. Mr. Trump had policy successes as President, including tax cuts and deregulation, but he has led Republicans into one political fiasco after another.

“We’re going to win so much,” Mr. Trump once said, “that you’re going to get sick and tired of winning.” Maybe by now Republicans are sick and tired of losing.

 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trump-is-the-gops-biggest-loser-midterm-elections-senate-house-congress-republicans-11668034869

Edited November 10, 2022 by welshbairn

[carpetmonster]

23 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

Source?

https://centerforplainlanguage.org/what-is-readability/

[Inanimate Carbon Rod]

On 03/11/2022 at 13:34, Detournement said:

Biden (or more likely his speechwriters) are playing a very dangerous game with the constant claim that if his party loses then Democracy loses.

The Democrats don't really have anything else though so why not gamble with the future of your country?

 

A few days after this post Trump was in the press for hinting that he’d like to see dissident reporters imprisoned. Just for context. 

[Detournement]

2 hours ago, Inanimate Carbon Rod said:

A few days after this post Trump was in the press for hinting that he’d like to see dissident reporters imprisoned. Just for context. 

I'd jail Laura K.

I don't see the problem.