Fuck Trump and here's why.

[Jaglavak]

I'm hoping for an atomic orca to go with his electric sharks.

[C2H5OH]

Nuclear Killer Whales. I'd love to hear what kind of bafflegab he comes up with over that concept...

With cancer-causing windmills on their heads...

[Sputnik]

Lincoln Project is betting he goes off course and talks about the price of a loaf of gasoline.

[Jaglavak]

I like those odds.

[Sputnik]

Okay, I’ll say it. Biden looked like a cadaver last night. His substance was not too bad, but he looks like he should be hospitalized, not re-elected. Trumpy on the other hand made up 97% of his facts. What a liar. I think we need Devine intervention.

[Flying Saucerian]

You want Andy Devine to step in?

One of my fears is that Biden will drop dead right before the election and Trump will win by default.

My other concern is that we'll get another crop of "Well, I wanted a different candidate and this isn't the candidate I would have chosen so I simply won't vote or I'll vote Third Party and that will teach them a darn good lesson..."

[Solfy]

Originally Posted by Flying Saucerian

One of my fears is that Biden will drop dead right before the election and Trump will win by default.

My other concern is that we'll get another crop of "Well, I wanted a different candidate and this isn't the candidate I would have chosen so I simply won't vote or I'll vote Third Party and that will teach them a darn good lesson..."

Last night was awful. It was Liar Liar vs. Weekend at Bernie's.

I saw a lot of talk about whether it was too late for the Dems to run someone else, and I fear it is. Maybe the best they could do would be to switch up the VP to someone people have more confidence in than Kamala, since it seems decent odds they'd hold office. The number of times I yelled, "Close your mouth, Joe!" SMH. Stumbling over easy answers (the abortion response made me want to weep) was bad enough, but the slack jawed vacant look did him no favors.

Despite Biden looking like the walking dead, I can't say it was a great triumph for Trump. Why even have moderators asking questions if you're not going to even pretend to try to answer them? Not that his base cares. Trump lost no one last night with his non-stop lies because people don't care about the truth. They care about scoring points.

This is all going to come down to turn out. I agree with you - I'm worried about people saying, "I would vote Biden but he's definitely too old, and I'm not voting Trump so I'll just sit this one out." That's how you get Trump.

[Sputnik]

Maybe, as much as I dislike Gavin Newsom (CA’s governor) he, hopefully, will pull a rabbit out of the save America hat and replace Biden at the convention. It’s just going to be too hard for people to get past what they saw last night.

[JackieLikesVariety]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

It’s just going to be too hard for people to get past what they saw last night.

not with that attitude.

OK, I didn't see it, not so much as a clip and I hope to keep it that way.

but I do see EVERYONE going along with normalizing the "word salad" the real dementia patient displayed and that should not be happening.

[wring]

yeah it was bad. very bad. Trump lying w/every word, never actually answering the questions and Biden doing the first, second, third thing over and fucking over, looking like he was about to keel over. and the muted mike played to Trumps favor 'cause he couldn't look as much like an asshole as he usually does, never getting into specifics just saying 'it's really horrible what they did' or it was 'really very bad' what happened. god what a fucking mess.

[Jaglavak]

Man, I sure hope I don't find myself sweating under the bright lights when I'm 81. Thanks, Joe!

[Sputnik]

NY Times Editorial Board calls for Biden to leave the race

It had to happen. Pressure is building for him to step aside all day today.

[Metal Years]

I didn't watch the debate; I already know how I'm gonna vote. What's Bitch-ass Donny gonna say to make me change my mind? But I watched a couple of clips on YouTube. The president wasn't on the top of his game. Now The Democrats are claiming that Joe Biden had a cold and he sounded like it. He should go into the hospital tonight (he's got great health insurance!) on the pretext of having pneumonia. Then the story could be spun that he's a badass for debating for almost two hours and then making public appearances afterwards when he had a major illness and he didn't seek medical attention right away and skip the debate because he didn't want the let The American people down! What do y'all think?

[Jaglavak]

New Jersey to hold hearing next month to decide on liquor license renewals for 2 Trump golf clubs

New Jersey regulators have scheduled a July 19 hearing to decide on the liquor license renewals for two of the shitgibbon’s golf clubs in the wake of his felony conviction in New York. New Jersey law prohibits anyone who was convicted of a crime “involving moral turpitude” from holding a liquor license...

In May, bobo boy was found guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records... in order to conceal a payment made to an adult film actress to keep her from speaking out about an alleged affair with Trump before the 2016 election...

New Jersey regulators will hold the hearing...and determine whether the liquor licenses at the golf courses in Colts Neck and Bedminster can be legally renewed...

[Zeener Diode]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

NY Times Editorial Board calls for Biden to leave the race

It had to happen. Pressure is building for him to step aside all day today.

I think it's too late to change horses at this point. Best thing is to stick with Biden and wait for Trump to self-destruct before November.

[Jaglavak]

If they can fog a mirror and has a D next to their name, they've got my vote.

[Sputnik]

I think we’re all prepared to vote a straight blue line, and will do so until MAGA has taken its final breath. The best candidates all come in shades of blue.

[wring]

Originally Posted by Jaglavak

New Jersey to hold hearing next month to decide on liquor license renewals for 2 Trump golf clubs

word is the licenses there are in Jr's name. however, as luck would have it, pretty much any negative thing that can be proved about Sr is also true of Jr.

[Flying Saucerian]

Anyone else remember the episode of POWERPUFF GIRLS where Princess Morbucks becomes mayor of Townsville and passes a law making crime legal and she and the crooks take over the city?

I think a couple of episodes of BATMAN had similar plots.

Dunno why, but I keep thinking about that today...

[wring]

yeah democracy was fun while it lasted.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by wring

yeah democracy was fun while it lasted.

Man, 30-40 more years would have been nice.

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by wring

yeah democracy was fun while it lasted.

Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner. [note. That's not original to me, I read it as a kid, decades ago, but damn if I remember who said it, first]

It looks like the wolves are winning the election...

[Rat Diva]

Originally Posted by Flying Saucerian

Anyone else remember the episode of POWERPUFF GIRLS where Princess Morbucks becomes mayor of Townsville and passes a law making crime legal and she and the crooks take over the city?

I think a couple of episodes of BATMAN had similar plots.

Dunno why, but I keep thinking about that today...

At least the PPG and Batman and Robin got to beat the snot out of the bad guys at the end.

On a completely unrelated note, I wonder if it's too late to take up martial arts.

[Rat Diva]

Although I've already got lots of pointy sticks, and there are patterns for Liberty caps on Ravelry... and most of my knitting group is just as progressive and even more loudmouthed than me...

[Zeener Diode]

Well, with that many knits to pick, it's reasonable to see why.

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Originally Posted by Zeener Diode

Well, with that many knits to pick, it's reasonable to see why.

[/s]Um, actually, it's NITS to pick, as in pesty little bugs.[/s]

(yes, I know you were making a knitting pun; I just saw that as a great time to pick a nit about nit picking)

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by Dr. Winston O'Boogie

[/s]Um, actually, it's NITS to pick, as in pesty little bugs.[/s]

(yes, I know you were making a knitting pun; I just saw that as a great time to pick a nit about nit picking)

Pick-a-little-talk-a-little...



Yeah, my mind goes to strange places when you unleash it. Sue me...

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Good night, ladies!
Good night, ladies!
Good night, Ladies, we're going to leave you now.

Yeah, I was in a production of Music Man. Went to see a production a few weeks ago, and the wife kept elbowing me because I was singing along.

[Sputnik]

I’m betting Biden retires soon. A life well spent serving our country. Thanks Joe.
Also, surprisingly Kamala is polling stronger than trumpy. It really doesn’t matter to me as long as it’s not trumpy fr another 4. I’d vote for Charlie Manson before trumpy.

[Zeener Diode]

It's two weeks until MAGA meets to crown Trump, er, the GOP convention. Is he waiting until then to announce his running mate? Or will he forgo picking his replacement and tell his minions to trust he'll live forever?

[C2H5OH]

It just occurred to me that TFG does not mean merely 'The Former Guy', nor what I've been thinking of it as: 'The Fat Grifter', or 'That Fucking Grifter'. It now means 'That Felonious Grifter'.

[Flying Squid with Goggles]

Originally Posted by Zeener Diode

I think it's too late to change horses at this point. Best thing is to stick with Biden and wait for Trump to self-destruct before November.

I mean, if we've learned anything from the time since 2016, it's that you can just wait out the media for any scandal, and the media will just drop it and move on.

While it might be nice to have a younger candidate, trying to replace an incumbent with a new candidate worked out disastrously in 1968 and 1924, to the point where you can't even find alternate history stories where Humphrey or McAdoo won the presidency because people are like "who?"

[Sputnik]

The problem is too many people see Biden as a near death candidate. It’s the toss up voters, those who haven’t made up their mind that are pulling back. Even trumpy knows he has to do nothing but let Biden flounder. That’s why trumpy is so quiet (comparatively).

Kamala is polling very close to trumpy. I really believe she’s going to take over in a few weeks. msnbc has a good article on that today. Also floating Gretchen (Michigan) as her Veep.

[Flying Saucerian]

Another reason to despair: These people seem oblivious to the fact Kamala Harris is Biden's Vice President. If they vote for him, she's still part of the package.

[Sputnik]

MSNBC is devoting a lot of coverage to the dilemma facing the Democrats now. I think this line they published sums up how many people feel about their choices…

“many undecided voters have understood their choice as between a geezer or a lunatic convicted of a felony.”

[Jaglavak]

A geezer with a solid team behind him. I'll take that.

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

“many undecided voters have understood their choice as between a geezer or a lunatic convicted of a felony.”

That last should be modified to "a lunatic geezer convicted of a multiple felonyies". Arguably, the Great Trumpkin" is, mentally, at least, demonstrating greater 'geezerhood' than Biden.

Biden, after all, doesn't launch into incoherent rants about electric boats and sharks, where you can't tell where he's going with any of it until he finally states that he'll take electrocution over being eaten by a shark, and you still don't know, afterwards, what the fuck was going through his mind when he thought that was even relevant to what he was babbling about before he even started on it.

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Originally Posted by Jaglavak

A geezer with a solid team behind him. I'll take that.

This. I trust the advisers Biden put in place to have (in their minds) the best interests of the country in mind. I trust Trump and anyone he uses to only care about themselves, their pocketbooks, and their power.

[wring]

Originally Posted by Dr. Winston O'Boogie

I trust Trump and anyone he uses to only care about themselves, their pocketbooks, and their power.

and maybe their genitals.

[Derleth]

Originally Posted by Sputnik

The problem is too many people see Biden as a near death candidate. It’s the toss up voters, those who haven’t made up their mind that are pulling back. Even trumpy knows he has to do nothing but let Biden flounder. That’s why trumpy is so quiet (comparatively).

Kamala is polling very close to trumpy. I really believe she’s going to take over in a few weeks. msnbc has a good article on that today. Also floating Gretchen (Michigan) as her Veep.

Here's a ranty thread about why replacing Biden won't help:

Originally Posted by David Roberts

So, say Biden stepped aside in favor of Harris tomorrow. How long until the vapid gossips we call political reporters find something wrong with her, some alleged flaw they just have to write 192 stories about? How long until the hopped-up mediocrities we call pundits find some "counter-intuitive" reason that the new Dem ticket is flawed after all? How long until the irredentist left gets over the temporary thrill of its new Harris memes & remembers that she's a cop & turns on her? How long before the ambient racism & misogyny in the US lead center-leftists to conclude that, sure, they'd support a black woman, just not *this* black woman? In other words: how long before everyone reverts to their comfortable, familiar identity & narratives?

About 30 f'ing seconds, is my guess.

Dems uniting, feeling good, telling a clear story, receiving credit for their accomplishments--all of that is *impossible* in the current environment. It won't be allowed. Dems can punch themselves in the face all they want, abandon whoever they want, apologize all they want they simply will not be allowed to turn the page & start fresh, because everyone's incentives remain the same. If they did that, elites, including media elites, would have no choice but to openly & frankly grapple with Trump & what he represents & they *don't want to*.

Everyone feels comfortable shitting on Dems -- it's just a cozy professional space. You get to feel brave & independent (just like all the replacement-level pundits around you) with zero risk.

[snip]

Originally Posted by David Roberts

You can not look at this extraordinary media freakout this last week and not psychologize, not see all kinds of displacement. They can't or won't be serious about Trump & so they are fucking *giddy* at having permission to scold Dems again. Their safe place.

Anyway, my point is just: none of this will change if Harris replaces Biden at the top of the ticket. The idea that the media -- with these soulless careerist court gossips in charge -- will allow it is just fantasy. They *need* Dems in disarray & so they will engineer it.

[Sputnik]

Dave Roberts is one opinion, and not really much of an authority. Meanwhile, Biden just screwed his comeback chance on ABC last night. I like Joe but he’s just too old. He lost 3 more points in the polls since he bombed the debate.

It’s time for him to trade politics for a rocking chair and a retirement he’s earned. Fishing, reading, traveling with Jill. He’s earned it. Pass the torch Joe, with your head held high.

[Derleth]

From an opinion piece in The Guardian: "Why is the pundit class so desperate to push Biden out of the race?"

Originally Posted by Rebecca Solnit

They have become a stampeding herd producing an avalanche of stories suggesting Biden is unfit, will lose and should go away, at a point in the campaign in which replacing him would likely be somewhere between extremely difficult and utterly catastrophic. They do this while ignoring something every scholar and critic of journalism knows well and every journalist should. As Nikole Hannah-Jones put it: “As media we consistently proclaim that we are just reporting the news when in fact we are driving it. What we cover, how we cover it, determines often what Americans think is important and how they perceive these issues yet we keep pretending it’s not so.” They are not reporting that he is a loser; they are making him one.

According to one journalist’s tally, the New York Times has run 192 stories on the subject since the debate, including 50 editorials and 142 news stories. The Washington Post, which has also gone for saturation coverage, published a resignation speech they wrote for him. Not to be outdone, the New Yorker’s editor-in-chief declared that Biden not going away “would be an act not only of self-delusion but of national endangerment” and had a staff writer suggest that Democrats should use the never-before-deployed 25th amendment.

[snip]

Originally Posted by Rebecca Solnit

“Why aren’t we talking about Trump’s fascism?” demands the headline of Jeet Heer’s piece in the Nation, to which the answer might be a piece by the Nation’s own editor-in-chief titled “Biden’s patriotic duty” that proposes his duty is to get lost. Sometimes I wonder if all this coverage is because the media knows how to cover a normal problem like a sub-par candidate; they don’t know how to cover something as abnormal and unprecedented as the end of the republic. So for the most part they don’t.

[snip]

Originally Posted by Rebecca Solnit

Although the Biden administration seems to have run extremely well for three and a half years, with a strong cabinet, few scandals and little turnover, a thriving economy and some major legislative accomplishments, the narrative the punditocracy has created suggest we should ignore this record and decide on the basis of the 90-minute debate and reference to newly surfaced swarms of anonymous sources that Biden is incompetent. Quite a lot of them have been running magical-realism fantasy-football scenarios in which it is fun and easy to swap in your favorite substitute candidate. The reality is that it is hard and quite likely to be a terrible mess. Nevertheless, this pretense is supposed to mean that telling a presidential candidate in mid-campaign to get lost is fine.

The main argument against Biden is not that he can’t govern – that would be hard to make given that he seems to have done so for the past years – but that he can’t win the election. But candidates do not win elections by themselves. Elections are won, to state the obvious, by how the electorate turns out and votes. The electorate votes based on how they understand the situation and evaluate the candidates. That is, of course, in large part shaped by the media, as Hannah-Jones points out, and the media is right now campaigning hard for a Democratic party loss. The other term for that is a Republican victory. Few things have terrified and horrified me the way this does.

[Sputnik]

From cnn

Early in the interview Friday, ABC’s George Stephanopoulos asked President Joe Biden if he had watched his disastrous June 27th debate with Donald Trump that has created an existential crisis.

The president paused and appeared to search his memory. “I don’t think I did. No,” he said quietly.

He doesn’t think he did? Joe is a great man, but if he can’t remember if he watched a replay of his debate, his mind isn’t what it once was.

He’s not going to get past that. The closer we get to the election, the more the GOP
will replay portions of his debate in swing states. The debate was his Waterloo. It will be the enough to swing fence sitters.

His polling is down, even mega doners are backing off from him.

Let him enjoy the time he has left.

[Flying Saucerian]

Just skipped over the whole post and kept going...

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by Derleth

From an opinion piece in The Guardian: "Why is the pundit class so desperate to push Biden out of the race?"

Really interesting Youtube link in that article, for an interview that Biden did with Howard Stern. She says the 'stuttering' part starts at 1:13. The 'stuttering' part actually starts at 6:43. Here's a link cued up to that point. 1:13 is the start of the interview. But I highly recommend watching the entire interview.

ETA: There's more about his stutter, about 30 minutes into it. Again, highly worth watching, and only a couple of months before his disastrous debate performance. The dude is NOT losing it, mentally, unlike The Felonious Grifter...

[Derleth]

I know, I know: Biden Is Old because Project 2025 might actually hurt Republicans. Biden Is Old because Project 2025 actually has enough traction among Normal American Voters that even Trump is distancing himself from it and other Republicans are following suit because it's so goddamned toxic. I know, I know, Biden Is Old because that horrible debate isn't hurting him in the swing states like Republicans thought it would but Project 2025 looks like a goddamned cornucopia of hurt for the GOP.

Just remember: Biden Is Old. It's all they have left, so it has to work, right?

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by Derleth

Just remember: Biden Is Old. It's all they have left, so it has to work, right?

So's Trump, and that message might come back to bite him if he continues to decline...

[C2H5OH]

Originally Posted by C2H5OH

... Really interesting Youtube link in that article, for an interview that Biden did with Howard Stern.

OK, just finished watching the entire interview. It was WELL worth the hour and a quarter it took. Here's an in-line link, for anyone who cares to watch it:



Normally, I just waste my time here or at the Durp, with occasional Youtube vids, plus whatever my email links to, that I don't just ignore, but that one was well worth the hour and a quarter I spent on it.

[Derleth]

Originally Posted by C2H5OH

So's Trump, and that message might come back to bite him if he continues to decline...

Yeah, Trump's age will only be a major talking point if the DNC makes it one, really hits it hard with ads and manages to bait Trump into responding, and the DNC has Project 2025 aka Trump Is A Fascist to hit him with, which resonates a lot more with voters. Trump being an incoherent mess who goes off on bizarre tangents is, apparently, Not News to the media, so it never becomes the news.

[Derleth]

The New York Times just paraphrases the 14 Words in a puff piece about Christian Fascists

Originally Posted by Ruth Graham

Why a New Conservative Brain Trust Is Resettling Across America

[snip]

“A lot of us share a sense that Christendom is unraveling,” said Skyler Kressin, 38, who is friendly with the Claremont leaders and shares many of their concerns. He left Southern California to move to Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, in 2020. “We need to be engaged, we need to be building.”

As Mr. Trump barrels through his third presidential campaign, his supporters buoyed by last week’s debate, many of the young activists and thinkers who have risen under his influence see themselves as part of a project that goes far beyond electoral politics. Rather, it is a movement to reclaim the values of Western civilization as they see it. Their ambitions paint a picture of the country they want should Mr. Trump return to the White House — one driven by their version of Christian values, with larger families and fewer immigrants.

"We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children" right there, reworked into something palatable to NYT readers. "Milk before meat" is what the Mormons call it, get people in the door with a reasonable-sounding version before you work up to the full insanity.

Just a bit more research reveals the true colors:

Originally Posted by The Guardian

The SACR is a secretive far-right men-only organization with an emphasis on Christian nationalism and a desire to open branches across the US.

The Guardian has previously reported on SACR’s close links to the Claremont Institute, an influential rightwing thinktank with fellows who have participated in attempts to overturn the 2020 election and promoted the idea that an authoritarian “Red Caesar” might redeem a US republic they see as decadent.

[snip]

Originally Posted by The Guardian

As previously reported in the Guardian, Skyler Kressin, a tax consultant based in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, appears to play a central administrative role in SACR. Idaho and Texas company records show that Kressin incorporated lodges in Boise, Coeur d’Alene and Dallas; serves as a director of the Coeur d’Alene and Dallas lodges; and was named as the principal officer of the parent organization on its 2020-21 tax return.

On 30 October 2020, Kressin wrote an email to Yenor with the question “that good?”, along with a screenshot of an Amazon listing for Super-Afrikaners, a book by the investigative journalists Ivor Wilkins and Hans Strydom.

First published in 1978, Super-Afrikaners exposed the workings of South Africa’s Broederbond, a secretive, exclusive, men-only network that promoted the interests of white Afrikaners in that country and which is credited with a significant role in bringing the National party – the architects of apartheid – to power.

Within half an hour, Yenor replied: “That’s the one”.

But why would the NYT do research when it could whitewash White Nationalism and Christian Fascism?