US Politics: In Through the Out Door

[Martell Spy]

5 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

again, no. Stop treating this like multidimensional chess. He's doing this because Acosta pissed him off, and he's giving zero fucks today about things. He fired Sessions and put in someone who he likes who is absurdly unqualified for the job - and CANNOT HAVE THE JOB based on the government rules. But he did it because he likes Whitaker and Whitaker wants to work for him. And he got rid of Acosta because Acosta pissed him off today. 

That's it! That's all the complexity that exists. 

My wife absolutely fucking NAILED it last night. I was saying how Trump was going to take credit for this stuff and spin things, but she was worried because people with NPD like Trump absolutely go raging mad when they lose, and take it out on people around them. And sure enough, less than 24 hours later - bam, Sessions dumped, and bam, Acosta has creds removed based on lies. And we get that litany of 'you suck' to the various republicans who lost as well. 

She absolutely called it. He'll keep doing this for a while, I suspect. Expect more angry lashing out at people, more cruelty and rage. 

 

Well, the Sessions thing was telegraphed well ahead of time.

Some people were surprised that we got to vote at all in this election. Perhaps Trump was skeptical of allowing that to happen, but was convinced by people on his side that it would play out in his favor. These moves are alarming, in particular because they are things that may harm him if he plans to run in 2020. Even a stupid man like Trump knows that election is coming, indeed he seems maniacally focused on it. 

It's starting to look like he plans to not allow us to vote in 2020 and all that entails. Perhaps the lesson he took from this election is to not allow Americans the right to vote, as they might vote against him.

[Guy Kilmore]

14 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

again, no. Stop treating this like multidimensional chess. He's doing this because Acosta pissed him off, and he's giving zero fucks today about things. He fired Sessions and put in someone who he likes who is absurdly unqualified for the job - and CANNOT HAVE THE JOB based on the government rules. But he did it because he likes Whitaker and Whitaker wants to work for him. And he got rid of Acosta because Acosta pissed him off today. 

That's it! That's all the complexity that exists. 

My wife absolutely fucking NAILED it last night. I was saying how Trump was going to take credit for this stuff and spin things, but she was worried because people with NPD like Trump absolutely go raging mad when they lose, and take it out on people around them. And sure enough, less than 24 hours later - bam, Sessions dumped, and bam, Acosta has creds removed based on lies. And we get that litany of 'you suck' to the various republicans who lost as well. 

She absolutely called it. He'll keep doing this for a while, I suspect. Expect more angry lashing out at people, more cruelty and rage. 

Tywin and I made a similar comment on this thread, that if you want to predict Trump, you are probably better served to look at what people with NPD respond in those situations.  That is how I was reading his actions today too.

[Mexal]

26 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

again, no. Stop treating this like multidimensional chess. He's doing this because Acosta pissed him off, and he's giving zero fucks today about things. He fired Sessions and put in someone who he likes who is absurdly unqualified for the job - and CANNOT HAVE THE JOB based on the government rules. But he did it because he likes Whitaker and Whitaker wants to work for him. And he got rid of Acosta because Acosta pissed him off today. 

That's it! That's all the complexity that exists. 

My wife absolutely fucking NAILED it last night. I was saying how Trump was going to take credit for this stuff and spin things, but she was worried because people with NPD like Trump absolutely go raging mad when they lose, and take it out on people around them. And sure enough, less than 24 hours later - bam, Sessions dumped, and bam, Acosta has creds removed based on lies. And we get that litany of 'you suck' to the various republicans who lost as well. 

She absolutely called it. He'll keep doing this for a while, I suspect. Expect more angry lashing out at people, more cruelty and rage. 

This isn't multidimenstional chess. It's really simple. Trump fires Jeff Sessions. Media talks only about this. Trump bans  Acosta, media talks about their own. You keep acting like assuming Trump used today's situation that pissed him off to flood the media with stuff is complicated with some genius level shit. It's not. He got mad, made a decision and his team of media savvy people spun it in a way to change topics and flood the media with more crap to talk about. They have done it repeatedly. Maybe as you said he's completely unable to control himself and it's just random luck but I'm not stupid enough to believe that Conway, Sanders, Shine et al aren't smart enough to know exactly what banning Acosta will do and exactly how they will message it to get maximum exposure on that rather than Sessions. 

As for Whittaker, he's allowed to be appointed because Sessions resigned. Yes, it was at Trump's request but the only way that will matter is if A. someone sues the government who has standing (e.g., Rosenstein), B. House Judiciary subpoena's Sessions and gets him to say he was fired (though I don't know the repercussions beyond that). Either way, it'll be awhile before that gets resolved.

As for your wife, she's right and I think this will get worse too. The minute the House changes over, it's going to get ugly.

[Mexal]

24 minutes ago, Fez said:

Hmm...

If the margin stays at 26,000 I don't think Nelson will come anywhere close to eeking out a win, but if there's more votes left than expected that haven't been counted, this may not be over yet. Nelson shrank his deficit by over 4,000 with the updates a couple hours ago. I don't want to get my hopes up too much though, and its way too much to hope that both Nelson and Sinema will actually win in the end.

The Broward County ballots casted vs counted is a bit wonky. I want to know what's going on there.

[Paxter]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

again, no. Stop treating this like multidimensional chess. He's doing this because Acosta pissed him off, and he's giving zero fucks today about things. He fired Sessions and put in someone who he likes who is absurdly unqualified for the job - and CANNOT HAVE THE JOB based on the government rules. But he did it because he likes Whitaker and Whitaker wants to work for him. And he got rid of Acosta because Acosta pissed him off today. 

That's it! That's all the complexity that exists. 

My wife absolutely fucking NAILED it last night. I was saying how Trump was going to take credit for this stuff and spin things, but she was worried because people with NPD like Trump absolutely go raging mad when they lose, and take it out on people around them. And sure enough, less than 24 hours later - bam, Sessions dumped, and bam, Acosta has creds removed based on lies. And we get that litany of 'you suck' to the various republicans who lost as well. 

She absolutely called it. He'll keep doing this for a while, I suspect. Expect more angry lashing out at people, more cruelty and rage. 

Yeah he does seem pretty livid. Which is weird because my overall read is that the mid-terms were a stale-mate or admirable draw rather than a definite victory for either side. 

[Mexal]

8 minutes ago, Paxter said:

Yeah he does seem pretty livid. Which is weird because my overall read is that the mid-terms were a stale-mate or admirable draw rather than a definite victory for either side. 

It’s the biggest net gain in the house by the Dems since Watergate and it was done while overcoming significantly gerrymandered districts. This wasn’t a stalemate.

[karaddin]

16 hours ago, Relic said:

Morning thoughts...it seems to me that there is something extremely broken in a society where elections are the cause of so much anxiety. I observed to many people on the verge of flipping out yesterday, and that just seems...wrong. How do we back away from the edge of this precipice? 

There are an awful lot of people, in the US and overseas, who fear for their personal safety after the last few years. The system is broken, but its the specific results that also cause a ton of anxiety. For years I've seen Americans on this board talk up the checks and balances in the system, but all the checks and balances in the system don't mean shit when half the population decides they don't matter.

6 hours ago, Morpheus said:

You may have missed it, but a few months ago, Graham actually reversed and said that he would support Trump firing Sessions after the midterms. It is likey that he wants the job himself, it would explain his groveling and debasement and that shameful performance during the Kav hearing.

Graham said point blank (I think it was on the CBSN coverage) that he was not interested in being AG. Now I don't think lying is even remotely possible, but the tone of his "No" sounded an awful lot like "fucking hell no, I'm not taking a job that Trump can fire me from" so I'm inclined to trust that.

2 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Also, in bits of data that make you go hmmm...exit polls had black women voting for DeSantis 18% to 82%. 

They were polled prior to the vote with a 92-3% split. 

Seriously?

The original polling is a lot closer to the exit polls for black women elsewhere and seems a lot more likely than suddenly 18% voting for the GOP there.

1 hour ago, Martell Spy said:

It's starting to look like he plans to not allow us to vote in 2020 and all that entails. Perhaps the lesson he took from this election is to not allow Americans the right to vote, as they might vote against him.

I've been saying for months that the mid terms were the last chance at free and fair elections if they even were, its certainly not a new thing that Trump looks like avoiding a free and fair election in 2020. The big cause of my anxiety about this result is that everyone seems to be committing to acting like they were just another election.

This is also why the GA result is one of the ones that really upsets me - you had the sitting Attorney General blatantly interfering in the election, removing hundreds of thousands of voters from the ballots, bringing spurious accusations against the Dems in the week before the election and not caring how blatant it was, and what's the result? The Dem loses relatively narrowly and everyone acts like it was a legitimate loss and they just couldn't have won it, or it was a problem with the campaign, or they shouldn't have tried etc. Some of these election results are illegitimate. They're done and dusted now, but if there are no consequences for that then you're going to see more and more of it.

I know people have had a go at Kalbear for jumping to concerns about the integrity of the voting systems, but ffs why? In the early voting you had documented cases in Texas of voting machines changing peoples votes which had happened the election before without being fixed. This shit is not vague conspiracy mongering, there is actual evidence that these elections were meddled with - again with the most egregious being done by the Attorney General who was running for Governor. How on earth are you going to win if you just let the other side cheat more and more? The worse it gets, the greater the margin you need to win by to overcome it and its already at the tipping point where that just isn't possible. Assuming Trump doesn't just openly suspend elections like much of his base have already said they support.

 

Also I think people should stop equating voting for bigotry with being stupid. Not only is this unfair in that plenty of people with lower intelligence are wonderful and compassionate people whose worth shouldn't be judged by their intelligence, it also has the extremely toxic effect of allowing the bigotry demonstrated by "known" intelligent people to be dismissed. People are voting for bigotry and hatred because they are bigoted and hateful or they are cynically self centred and don't care about the bigotry and hatred if it suits their interests. And an awful lot of white people feel that their interests are represented by the "white race" ahead of anything else. Don't give it a pass, don't dismiss it as stupidity, and don't think there aren't plenty of truly awful educated and intelligent people that are bigoted as fuck.

 

[Paxter]

14 minutes ago, Triskele said:

I think that's so if you just look at House v. Senate gains.  The GOP had a great night in the Senate which blows for the left.  

But in terms of a comparison to the status quo of the last two years the new dynamic represents a potentially enormous shift for Trump.  If he has a lot to hide and has obstructed justice, etc...Now a lot has changed.  

Yeah true. The thing that makes me say 'stale mate' is the nasty way the Senate now looks ahead of 2020, coupled with Trump's increased confirmation capacity over the next two years. But yeah, having control of the House is no small deal, particularly with this POTUS. 

7 minutes ago, Mexal said:

It’s the biggest net gain in the house by the Dems since Watergate and it was done while overcoming significantly gerrymandered districts. This wasn’t a stalemate.

I can see this argument for sure - and I am no expert on the topic. But do you have to weigh the above against the historical performance of first-term Presidents at mid-terms? When viewed through that lens, the Dems taking the House by a reasonable (but not massive margin) feels less impressive and more expected. 

[karaddin]

Sorry for the double post but I'd really love some of what he's smoking

 

[kairparavel]

Twitter tells me we're edging towards a possible Florida governor recount.

[Kalbear]

8 minutes ago, kairparavel said:

Twitter tells me we're edging towards a possible Florida governor recount.

Yeah. Gillum likely conceded too soon.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

29 minutes ago, Triskele said:

I think that's so if you just look at House v. Senate gains.  The GOP had a great night in the Senate which blows for the left.  

But in terms of a comparison to the status quo of the last two years the new dynamic represents a potentially enormous shift for Trump.  If he has a lot to hide and has obstructed justice, etc...Now a lot has changed.  

I think Dems had a huge night--look at all the governor races that turned out blue. The House gains were huge too. AND you can see a direct relation between all the blue efforts to energize young and new voters really paid off. Sure, more work can be done, but having such a big young and new voter turnout is a good indicator of changes on the horizon. Think about what this turnout did in Texas--O'Rourke may have lost, but by most accounts, he shouldn't have been a contender in the first place. Plus he's now an really interesting prospect for 2020.

I've read some opinion today that Dems didn't have a "wave" because they have struggled finding an identity. That was CNN's take anyway. Of course, my conspiracy theory side says this is CNN trying to squash the "progressive" movement, but honestly, that's the identity of the Democratic party. Love him or hate him, Bernie Sanders delivered an identity. Campaigns were built on his "socialism." I wish the Senate was won, but I think things look good. Healthcare won't go backwards now--and no more tax cuts! 

 

On a pessimistic note: Colorado voting down the tax increase on the top 5 percent earners in the state--all money that would go to public schools--makes me worried. We absolutely have to tax the wealthy in this country, but if we can't do even a truly small increase for schools? Ugh...

[Mexal]

13 minutes ago, Paxter said:

I can see this argument for sure - and I am no expert on the topic. But do you have to weigh the above against the historical performance of first-term Presidents at mid-terms? When viewed through that lens, the Dems taking the House by a reasonable (but not massive margin) feels less impressive and more expected. 

Doesn’t matter if it’s expected, it happened and that is a big win. You think the Republicans were calling it a stale mate in 2010 when they took the house? Or the Dems in 2006? It’s a win anyway you look at it and to do it in a highly gerrymandered environment when the unemployment rate is 3.7%, DJIA is almost 26k pts and the economic polls are high is even more impressive. The Senate sucks but they kept a Montana and WV and now have a tough but possible path in 2020. 

[kairparavel]

1 minute ago, Kalbear said:

Yeah. Gillum likely conceded too soon.

So here's a question about that: concession before all the ballots are counted. 

If we want to maintain the idea that every vote counts why on earth do we allow candidates to concede before everything is counted? Plus, with everything we've seen in the past decade plus, why would you ever not wait til the very end?(And this I genuinely don't know (and yeah I should but I don't) - does conceding too soon mean anything or is just symbolic?)

[Paxter]

2 minutes ago, Mexal said:

Doesn’t matter if it’s expected, it happened and that is a big win. You think the Republicans were calling it a stale mate in 2010 when they took the house? Or the Dems in 2006? It’s a win anyway you look at it and to do it in a highly gerrymandered environment when the unemployment rate is 3.7%, DJIA is almost 26k pts and the economic polls are high is even more impressive. The Senate sucks but they kept a Montana and WV and now have a tough but possible path in 2020. 

Yes, fair enough. You can also add the seven gubernatorial wins to the 'this is not a stale mate' bucket (including in key blue wall states).

I guess I'm just being cautious because quite a few things happened that the GOP would be pleased with. Maybe the House win trumps all that. 

[Guest]

26 minutes ago, karaddin said:

Sorry for the double post but I'd really love some of what he's smoking

 

Fuck Schumer and Pelosi and their mealy-mouthed, bi-partisan bullshit. How fucking stupid are they?

[karaddin]

Just now, The Great Unwashed said:

Fuck Schumer and Pelosi and their mealy-mouthed, no-partisan bullshit. How fucking stupid are they?

No, but really this time the Republicans are going to care about Trump breaking the rules. They truly value the American Democracy don't they? What's that? The US is a Republic not a Democracy. Well that sounds positive!

[Altherion]

18 minutes ago, Paxter said:

I can see this argument for sure - and I am no expert on the topic. But do you have to weigh the above against the historical performance of first-term Presidents at mid-terms? When viewed through that lens, the Dems taking the House by a reasonable (but not massive margin) feels less impressive and more expected.

There's a chart of the historical midterm results at the bottom of this article. If you average all of the midterm elections starting from 1934, you would expect the President's party to lose an average of 27 seats in the House and 3.8 seats in the Senate. If you only take the past 10 midterm elections, you those numbers become 24.7 for the House and 4.3 for the Senate. Either way, the Democrats did slightly better than average in the House and quite a bit worse than average in the Senate. The numbers are nothing to write home about in and of themselves, but of course the big deal that control of the House lets them do all sorts of fun stuff. For example:

Quote

Nadler has been more forthcoming about another area his committee would investigate if Democrats took control. In October, he said he would launch an investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct and perjury lobbed at Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

"It is not something we are eager to do," Nadler told The New York Times. "But the Senate having failed to do its proper constitutionally mandated job of advise and consent, we are going to have to do something to provide a check and balance, to protect the rule of law and to protect the legitimacy of one of our most important institutions."

Kavanaugh has denied any wrongdoing, and only one Supreme Court justice has ever been impeached.

Going after Kavanaugh worked out brilliantly for Democrats in the Senate so why not try the same thing in the House?

[Kalbear]

3 minutes ago, Triskele said:

Not that I think these people are above reproach, but I seriously doubt that they seriously think the GOP in Congress will turn on Trump.

This could be the equivalent of Susan Collins saying she's sure Kavanaugh is fine on abortion where it's probably not what she really thinks but just the thing that's said in that situation.  

There is no chance Pelosi doesn't realize where we're at and that we're unlikely to get much help from Republicans.  

I know, but I also think a whole lot of dems out there are tired of even pretending to be the adult in the room and want to have someone say "fuck no, we are going with our agenda, and either trump can get on board and be a Democrat or he can get out of the way." And meanwhile punish the shit out of his cabinet. 

[karaddin]

8 minutes ago, Triskele said:

There is no chance Pelosi doesn't realize where we're at and that we're unlikely to get much help from Republicans.  

From what darkness springs this confidence monkey? I feel like they've demonstrated enough times now that they keep expecting Republicans to snap out of it and act in the interests of the country. They're never going to.

3 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I know, but I also think a whole lot of dems out there are tired of even pretending to be the adult in the room and want to have someone say "fuck no, we are going with our agenda, and either trump can get on board and be a Democrat or he can get out of the way." And meanwhile punish the shit out of his cabinet. 

Yup this. That's what I think is necessary to elevate enthusiasm beyond where it is. Show that you're actually standing for a different America and will fight to make it happen.