Yup, between maxipads on your ears and diapers covering your ass, the GOP faithful have cornered the market in absorbent products.
I agree, and don't understand why things like groceries and gas aren't included in "core inflation." Yes I understand that they can fluctuate more, but why generate a more stable number that doesn't reflect the day-to-day realities of cost of living? Personally, I'd much rather the optics of an open convention, where at least the delegates get to vote for who they want to lead the ticket, to one where the nomination is someone who was selected for the position. Imagine the ads that Trump and the RNC would run about "deep state" candidates. While the deep state part would be nonsense, the lack of winning a popular vote of any kind would not be in keeping with the tenets of a representative democracy - at least in my view.
Since we are already playing in a game where two "selected" parties have access to electoral channels that none of the rest of us or parties have, I wouldn;t be too bothered how they come up with a candidate. It's already a closed shop. in Britain, for example, neither the Tories or Labour have access to anything officially that, say, the Monster Raving Loony Party doesn't have access to
I don’t disagree from a purist or philosophical perspective, but that’s not how it works. Firstly, if Biden exits, then legally Harris is the owner of that money. As we have seen all too often, (s)he with the most money makes the rules, especially if the lawman is on her side. Secondly, Biden is being pushed to exit on the basis that he can’t win, party unity etc. Now in saying he can’t win, then the mandarins and mavens of the Democratic Party must have someone in mind (maybe anyone?) who can win. But they can’t demand Joe ride off into the sunset for the sake of party unity only to open the floor to the shitshow of a civil war of a brokered convention at this late stage. As disorganized as they are now, they might as well not bother if the nominee comes out of a trial by gruelling combat from the convention floor. Plus Biden’s going to ask “party unity, that was the reason they dumped me?” Biden has been campaigning at the top of the ticket really since last November, maybe January. The new nominee will have ceded 8(?) months of campaigning, every week, hour and moment will be vital. So as nice as brokered convention would be, the political reality on the ground is that it’d be pretty much a dead cert loss for the Democrats in November.
It's over. Republicans rally, rally, rally around the worst human being alive. Democrats - you had a bad debate? KILL HIM
What I find hilarious and nothing short of scurrilous is the NY Times. Hand wringing, navel gazing and clutching of pearls. For the good of the country Biden needs to drop out. But not once prior to that Op-Ed and Ed barrage did they ever suggest Lumpy drop out. Not for the the good of the country, not for national unity, not because he’s a straight up fascist, not because he’s a dictator waiting in the wings, not because he’s a genuinely unpleasant individual who has coarsened political discourse and always punches down, not because he’s showing genuine signs of dementia and aging, none of the above and so much more besides has ever scratched the conscience of the NY Times to call for Lumpy to step down. But Biden? OH MY GOD!! Look at the damage he’s doing to the country.
nah - Trump punches "down", up, sideways, into his own face (classified docs), everywhere..... just idiot flailing punchings... His entire life ifs an en-flamed imaginary hitting of the other.....
What’s flying well under the radar is Lumpy’s convention speech. Now no convention speech is going to win or lose you anything; ultimately they’re of minimal importance and relevance. Had the spotlight and microscope not been on Biden, the speech would have been scrutinized a lot more. But it won’t be. Most media outlets, left and right, gave the speech bare passing marks, many saying it was one of Lumpy’s worst and one of the worst in the modern era of televised conventions. One of the descriptions I read was a drunk man reading the back of a Cheerios box to himself without his glasses at 2AM. Just because Lumpy gave a bad convention speech doesn’t mean Biden is suddenly ok. One has nothing to do with the other. But had Biden’s problems not been front and center, there would be concern in GOP circles now. I’ve been saying for a while that Lumpy’s dementia problems are getting a pass. But in giving them a pass, it doesn’t mean they’re not there and are much more pronounced than they were 4-8 years ago. This election may be over for Biden (or maybe not), but what is absolutely the case is that the result is still very much in the unknown column. There’re a few more rounds left yet, a few more revelations, it’s still a horse race, a horse race where the Democrat is essentially TBA and that is bad news for the GOP.
And yet the republicans thought it was the greatest most coherent speech of all time. Well some people are saying this as the Trumpism goes. 92 mins of chaos - but no one is calling for him to step down - right. Which is what I believe you are saying.
You guys are suddenly expecting rationality from any amongst that lot? After the last 4 years of utter mendacity and hypocrisy..... On a slightly humourous note - did the New Statesman get it's own joke here?
I'm fairly sure that Bloomberg donated a significant amount of money from his campaign to the DNC. Now he did self fund quite a bit, but some of that was donations. My guess is that if they do this, that is the route they will go with. Either that or they set up a PAC, but that has some limitations in terms of coordination. The party unity aspect comes after the party has selected their new candidate. C'mon they did this for almost 200 years before conventions were televised, and it worked fine. I think it will be pretty easy to focus people when the alternative is allowing Trump a free run at re-election.
Bloomberg may well have donated to the DNC without any problems but he didn’t have a running mate. Biden does. The money goes to the campaign or representative thereof. Biden resigns, Harris is still a representative of the campaign and the only legal entity allowed access. Biden can’t take unilateral action and donate the money himself (a political awful move anyway) without Harris’ assent. There’re barely concealed fault lines between the progressive and corporate wings of the Democratic Party. Pelosi and AOC pretty much had to arrange a peace summit. There are other strains such as the conservative wings, those Democrats running in traditionally red areas and states who are also going to want input. And then you have the Party elders, the Clintons, the Obamas etc., the Establishment who will want their opinions heeded. In a normal election, all these factions would slowly come together over 2+ years, even more, and unify behind a single candidate. You just cannot compare this campaign or election with any from the pre-televised era. 24 hour news cycle, constant live streaming, social media, immediate updates and so on. None of this existed before when voters often had to wait days and weeks for new information, when newspapers were the only medium for updates. With the urgency of defeating Lumpy and a seriously truncated nominee election, emotions will be running high. There will be serious factional fighting that in all likelihood won’t heal in time to get a coherent party unity campaign on the road and win in a timeframe of 6-8 weeks. A brokered convention is simply not realistic and is extraordinarily poor politics, a dead cert loser.
Samark - setting aside the process / mechanics and any resentment about the treatment of Biden ..... Do you think Harris becoming the nom would be the right thing in terms of Dems' chances in November? (not trying to start a debate, just curious)
I'm more intrigued by the (possibly conspiracy) stories that Obama is really pushing for someone else. Outwardly seems to support Biden but isn't committed to him behind the scenes. Already did it in 2016 when he helped convince Biden not to run in favor of Hilary.
There’s the old saying about looking for Mr. Right. Do you want Mr. Right or Mr. Right Now? Harris, assuming she’s the nominee, will be Johnny on the spot, right place, right time. She’s very much in the driver’s seat if Biden exits, and I would give her chances of being the nominee at somewhere in the region of 75%+ (but what do I know?). So that’s the hand the Democrats have been dealt and a lot of the considerations will be along the lines of Joe can’t win and we believe Harris has a better chance. Basically a derided and not very popular VP is a better bet than a sitting president. The GOP and Lumpy have been pointing their compass at Biden for the last 4 years. Their whole strategy has been built around Sleepy Joe, Weaponized DOJ and the Biden Crime Family. All that goes out the window. They’ll try to stick her with weaponizing the DOJ attacks, that she’s part of the Biden Administration and so on, but I’m not sure they’ll take. In some cases they’ll rebound. No more talk of altered mental states as that would be then more germane to Lumpy than Harris. The GOP will have to redraw their whole campaign while all the time being a damn site more careful about attacking her personally lest they further alienate the female and black vote. I suppose there’s a case to be made that the GOP have already written off the female vote, but the GOP are going to need to be harvesting not shedding voters. I’m not Harris’ greatest fan, but there’s little doubt that she’s an awkward opponent for Lumpy. The debate might actually mean something this time around. A huge factor in any success that Harris will have will be how well she’s received by the down ticket candidates. There are more than a few Democrats who are running away from Biden, others who are neutral, others again who are sitting and waiting and the final lot who are running towards Biden. Will she bring enough of the first 3 groups with her? And what about the donors? Some have already turned off the spigot and others have slowed the stream. Will Harris be seen as the antidote to both Biden and Lumpy? So many of these donors seem to go on feelings rather than data and can Harris generate the feel-good and the competency factors? More than any convention bounce, she will have what us football fans refer to as the new manager bounce. She wins that simply by not being Biden. All of this is a very long way round of saying that I don’t know ultimately (who does?) but replacing Biden with Harris is not a death sentence, it’s not a magnificently stupid own goal and it should make things very awkward for Lumpy and the GOP. For what it’s worth, I see FoxNews have been ramping up the Kamala attacks. It’s a huge risk removing an incumbent, but it’s not as bad as removing Lumpy and replacing him with Vance or to go back to ‘16, exiting Clinton and putting Kaine at the top of the ticket. But the fact remains that but for one off-night, Biden would be running this thing. But that one off night invited all types of scrutiny and every misstep has now been magnified. Against a competent, genuinely popular candidate, Harris would probably stand little chance. But against Lumpy? She has to be in with a genuine chance, assuming she campaigns nearly flawlessly.
Samark: I might respond later on, but about this bit I would give her chances of being the nominee at somewhere in the region of 75% not sure what you mean, I interpreted your other posts about her "owning the donations" as saying that if Biden leaves she is the nominee by default now as the DNC has little option eg a convention isn't an option. I'm a tad confused.
Don’t forget there are going to be more than a few Democrats, influential ones, who will feel Biden AND Harris out or that Harris is no or not enough of an improvement on Biden. Pressure will be brought to bear, appealing to her to step down, good of party and country, etc. Don’t forget Biden was forced to sit out 2016 in favor of Hillary and he was the sitting VP. Which goes to show that the mandarins and mavens of the Democratic Party don’t have an unimpeachable crystal ball. Assuming Biden steps down, the nomination is Harris’ to lose, but it’s not a lock until she’s announced.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/20/poli...sus-harris-should-biden-step-aside/index.html Democratic consensus solidifies around Harris, should Biden step aside No one quite knows what the process of picking a new nominee would be if Joe Biden did step aside – but many Democrats say that any process is likelier than ever to quickly end with Vice President Kamala Harris as the nominee. The informal conversations about how a fight to replace Biden at the top of the ticket would play out have been raging for weeks behind the scenes. But uncertainty about the process has been so unclear it’s given multiple Democrats – even those with serious concerns about Biden – pause about coming out against the president’s candidacy, given that what comes next could be even messier. “F**k it, I’m coconut pilled. I just want this to stop,” said one well-known Democratic operative, referring to the online meme that has taken off from an old video of the vice president telling a story of her mother saying, “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?” It’s not that everyone has suddenly coalesced – but exhaustion is gelling into consensus. Internal polls that show Harris would at least be more helpful to boosting Democratic enthusiasm and aiding down ballot races are getting passed around. Arguments that she would be fastest to put together a campaign are landing harder. Daydreams of her making a more active and vigorous case against Donald Trump are taking root.
For Harris to have access to the money, does she have to be the nominee? Or could someone else run for President with Harris as VP?