Jump to content

U.S. Politics: It’s beginning to look a lot like Rescission


lokisnow

Recommended Posts

13 minutes ago, Fez said:

Honestly, I was getting more of a Stephen A Smith vibe; he's a big fan of confidence. 

I like Van Jones, but I think he's about one Donald Trump reelection away from cutting off Stephen A Smith's face and wearing it on Face the Nation.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Michael Flynn is getting SCORCHED in court right now by the presiding judge.

So much for the White House talking point that the FBI misled Flynn. And that bit about the Virginia indictments is about Turkey. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Paul Krugman -- 

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/17/opinion/republican-apparatchiks-deep-state.html?

After providing one example after another of how they / rethugs are realizing their objectives past, right now and future, he gives the inevitable conclusion.

Quote

 

Conservatism’s Monstrous Endgame
Apparatchiks are corroding the foundations of democracy.

Conservatism’s Monstrous Endgame
Apparatchiks are corroding the foundations of democracy.

. . . . As David Frum, the author of “Trumpocracy,” warned a year ago: “If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.” That’s happening as we speak.

So Pelosi was right about Reed O’Connor’s ruling being a symptom of a “monstrous endgame,” but the game in question isn’t just about perpetuating the assault on health care, it’s about assaulting democracy in general. And the current state of the endgame is probably just the beginning; the worst, I fear, is yet to come.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

8 minutes ago, Trebla said:

Michael Flynn is getting SCORCHED in court right now by the presiding judge.

So much for the White House talking point that the FBI misled Flynn. And that bit about the Virginia indictments is about Turkey. 

They'll find some way to trash the judge. The WH and Trump aren't beyond ignoring facts to push their own story.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, Mexal said:

They'll find some way to trash the judge. The WH and Trump aren't beyond ignoring facts to push their own story.

Oh I'm sure they will.  According to his wiki, he was appointed to his first two benches by Reagan and Bush Sr. but to this current bench by Bill ClintonPlus, he's black. They'll probably dog-whistle that he's an AFFIRMATIVE ACTION judge.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

From what I've heard, the judge indicated to the defense that he would not guarantee there would be no jail time despite the fact the prosecution recommended it. He repeatedly asked the defense if they were sure they wanted to go ahead with sentencing. They finally balked after the recess. The belief is that Flynn will go back to the special counsel and attempt to sing even more.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, Trebla said:

From what I've heard, the judge indicated to the defense that he would not guarantee there would be no jail time despite the fact the prosecution recommended it. He repeatedly asked the defense if they were sure they wanted to go ahead with sentencing. They finally balked after the recess. The belief is that Flynn will go back to the special counsel and attempt to sing even more.

From what Flynn's lawyer said, the Turkey issue is really the only place he has information left to potentially give. He's been cooperating for a year, likely there is nothing else left there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

Someone else would have done worse. This wasn't a matter of a poor candidate - it was a matter of a state trending out of reach for Democrats. Bredesen won every county in Tennessee in 2006, the last time he stood. In 2018, he not only lost by double digits, but he actually under-performed Obama in rural parts of the state.

Tennessee is no longer winnable for Democrats - the trends are simply too brutal.

Undoubtedly Tennessee has gone more republican When looking at percentages not numbers of voters. But looking at numbers of voters shows a much more stable electorate, if anything the percentages trend indicate a simultaneous republican investment and democrat disinvestment in the state.  There are two outlier races when looking at the big three (gov sen and pres), and both of them are bredesen. The first was his 2002 election and the second was his riding the 2006 wave to 1.25M votes, and that same election brought harold ford jr closer to winning senate than anyone else (Young black and charismatic checking the boxes someone else mentioned).

at the presidential level, gore famously lost his home state by about 80 thousand votes, but Clinton only won because Perot took 200k voters away from bush and dole.

since 2000, there have been steadily about 1-1.5 million republican voters in presidential years, and if you’re not Hillary or Bill Clinton there have been a million democrat voters in presidential years.

but in midterms, excepting bredesens outlier governor wins, democrats have been stuck in the 250K to 600K range for about 30 years

what happened in 2018, is democrats managed to get a million votes, about like they do in presidential elections, that indicates that investment in the state is paying, and could presage a trend back towards. 

As ive  said before republican turnout was absolutely insane for them in 2018, it was a wave year for republicans when you look at raw vote numbers, it just wasn’t as big as the democrat wave, both Blackburn and Bill Lee absolutely shattered every statewide midterm record in their vote totals. The only person who has had more votes than Blackburn from either party is bredesen in the 2006 wave + incumbent reelection, and he’d have lost to Lee’s eye popping numbers in 2018 as well. At normal republican midterm turnout, bredesen wins or is in recount territory.

all this is along winded way of saying that with a Good candidate combined with investment democrats found the voters to improve their midterm performance to presidential year numbers, roughly an increase in voters for midterm senate ranging from 600,000 to 200,000. With similar candidate quality and additional investment in the next cycle, democrats should further improve their numbers and so long as republicans don’t have a wave year like 2018, that’s going to significantly improve the percentage gap. And if republicans are even slightly depressed in their 2020 turnout and democrats surge in their turnout, this becomes a much more likely pickup for democrats.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

If there's bad news about Trump, they'll blame it on the media. If there's a bad economy in 2020, they'll blame it on Pelosi and the House.

Former's certainly true.  As for the latter, there really hasn't been a true economy vs. polarization face off as of yet.  You could say 2012 with Obama getting reelected in spite of the unemployment rate, but things were looking up and he came in when things were shit.  I suspect if the economy tanks under a president, cynicism overrides polarization, and that president is fucked, but who knows.

2 hours ago, Fez said:

No senate seat should be totally ignored, they are simply too important for that, but this goes way down on the list of pick-up targets; probably at number 8 or so. 

Never put an open seat that low.  Let's see we got..Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maine.  I'd put those ahead as pickup targets, but that's it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Trump charity agrees to dissolve amid allegations of a 'shocking pattern of illegality'

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/421874-trump-charity-agrees-to-dissolve-amid-allegations-of-a-shocking

 

Quote

President Trump’s charity, the Donald J. Trump Foundation, has agreed to dissolve amid allegations from the New York Attorney General's Office that it engaged in a "shocking pattern of illegality.'

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, DMC said:

Never put an open seat that low.  Let's see we got..Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maine.  I'd put those ahead as pickup targets, but that's it.

My way too early rankings:

1) Colorado

2) Maine (though only if Collins retires, if she doesn't move this down 3 spots at least)

3) Arizona

4) Iowa (though only if Grassley retires, which I think he does)

5) Kansas (I think Roberts retires, but he's a really weak incumbent anyway, and Kansas suburbs are moving Democratic fast right now; a bunch of GOP state legislators have flipped parties despite it meaning going into the minority)

6) North Carolina (not an open seat, but far less red a state than Tennessee, and Burr is almost certainly going to win or lose or depending on if Trump wins the state).

7) Texas (not an open seat, and Cornyn is a stronger incumbent than Cruz, but this is where we find out if this year was a fluke, or a Beto only thing, or if Texas is truly changes).

8) Tennessee (or Georgia or Montana, all races that can't be considered solid red the way Wyoming can be, but that Democrats aren't winning.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, Fez said:

My way too early rankings:

NC over TN is fair - but it's Tillis running for reelection not Burr.  Kansas would be if it becomes open, but that's kinda my point.  Can't see Cornyn's seat being competitive unless he retires.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, Mexal said:

This will be the angle Fox News will take going forward with Flynn. Focus on small points, mislead on what those parts are, ignore everything else and push a narrative the Judge is not impartial.

I think all questions in the tweet are fair to raise (also, the fact we're discussing Byron York's tweet makes me feel equally old and oddly dirty).  Is FNC gonna mislead on the most extreme accusations?  Of course.  Haters gonna hate.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

26 minutes ago, DMC said:

Never put an open seat that low.  Let's see we got..Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maine.  I'd put those ahead as pickup targets, but that's it.

I'm really hoping Hickenlooper decides to run for the Senate seat against Gardner instead of fighting for space in what will be a packed presidential primary.

Similarly, I think if Bullock runs against Daines for the Montana seat, there is definitely a possible pickup there.

Also, with two more years of organizing and fundraising under her belt, I think Stacey Abrams could really give Perdue a run for his money in Georgia.

I think we have to concede that Jones will be a lost seat in Alabama. However, Pat Roberts will turn 84 during his 2020 campaign, so it might not be surprising if he announces his retirement and I wouldn't rule out an open-seat pickup in Kansas.

Also, there are rumors that Tillis has his eye on the governor's seat in North Carolina in 2020, so I imagine that the right candidate could put that seat in play.

Then on top of that, there's Texas. Cornyn is definitely a stronger candidate than Cruz, but it's a presidential election year and hopefully the Democratic party in Texas will spend the next two years building on the organization and fundraising success that sprung up from O'Rourke's run.

Democrats obviously won't win all of these, but depending on how things go, they can really work on expanding the map and forcing Republicans to play defense in what were formerly safe seats.

With a Jones loss, Democrats will need a net gain of 5 seats to gain outright control of the Senate. I think that is definitely a possibility.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 minutes ago, DMC said:

I think all questions in the tweet are fair to raise (also, the fact we're discussing Byron York's tweet makes me feel equally old and oddly dirty).  Is FNC gonna mislead on the most extreme accusations?  Of course.  Haters gonna hate.

He did sell out the US and asking whether he committed treason seemed a bit much but not completely out there given his significant criminal exposure to the Turkey case as a former 3 star general, future National Security Adviser and adviser during the transition. I think the tweet, as usual, will ignore what Flynn and the Government said, proclaim all false and push a narrative that Sullivan is incapable of being impartial (which for the record, he doesn't have to be since he's the judge and can sentence based on what he believes is fit).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...