US Politics: Town Hell

[Jaxom 1974]

1 hour ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I think it's clear that the war for the soul for the GOP will be fought between the Romney/Sasse faction and the Cotton/Hawley faction. Assuming Trump doesn't just win and Trumpism becomes the new normal for the GOP.

It's kinda cute that you think that there are actual factions within the Republican party or that they are going to execute some sort of power struggle for the party's soul post Trump...there isn't a soul. There hasn't been a soul. There is no party but Trump now, even if he isn't on a ballot. The Republican Party is essentially dead as an entity.

[Varysblackfyre321]

6 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

It's kinda cute that you think that there are actual factions within the Republican party or that they are going to execute some sort of power struggle for the party's soul post Trump...there isn't a soul. There hasn't been a soul. There is no party but Trump now, even if he isn't on a ballot. The Republican Party is essentially dead as an entity.

Yep. Forget going by Republicans.

Just go by Trumpist.

[DMC]

16 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

There is no party but Trump now, even if he isn't on a ballot.

If Trump loses?  Nah.  Since Reagan the GOP cannibalizes their leaders at a pretty prodigious rate.  The "GOP" will move right along and happily dispense with a 75 year old loser.  Definitely agree they have no real ideological soul, but there obviously will be competition for leadership.  And the victor will likely be the one that most convincingly says Trump wasn't as "conservative," extreme, and authoritarian as he should have been.

[Maithanet]

Interesting (to me anyway) comparison of where the national polls were at the end of 2016 compared to now. 

 - In 2016 right before the election, there were still 13% of voters that were undecided/3rd party.  Now, that number is only 4%.

 - The remaining undecided voters are disproportionately young (7% of 18-34 year olds are undecided) and Latino (8% undecided).  That doesn't sound like a group likely to swing disproportionately to Trump. 

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

It's kinda cute that you think that there are actual factions within the Republican party or that they are going to execute some sort of power struggle for the party's soul post Trump...there isn't a soul. There hasn't been a soul. There is no party but Trump now, even if he isn't on a ballot. The Republican Party is essentially dead as an entity.

I think you're misunderstanding my aim; I've posted here before that Cotton & Hawley are essentially Trump 2.0 - Trump in much more palatable form. And they'd ultimately be far more successful; Trump is a grifter who is running a con on the conspiracy-addled marks in the Republican Party. Hawley and Cotton are the real-fascist-deal.

Sasse has consistently been setting himself up as a return to old-school Republicanism, most likely because he's expecting a big Trump loss.

Now, I think it's unlikely the current Republican party will reject fascism; they associate it with their biggest wins, after all. I was simply describing the state of play.

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Maithanet said:

The remaining undecided voters are disproportionately young (7% of 18-34 year olds are undecided) and Latino (8% undecided).  That doesn't sound like a group likely to swing disproportionately to Trump. 

Much more likely they just don't vote or in the young voters case vote 3rd party.

[Zorral]

4 hours ago, Kalibear said:

This is amazing. Everyone really needs to read this. 

 

I posted the link to this on the previous thread.  It was ... amazing, but not surprising!    Partner hipped me to it which is how I'd found out.

[Maithanet]

Just now, DMC said:

Much more likely they just don't vote or in the young voters case vote 3rd party.

Good chance yes.  But that's fine for the Biden campaign, they're already up big.  Even if Trump won 75% of those voters, it would still be Biden up 55-45. 

Trump was never going to significantly expand his base, because he doesn't like reaching out to new groups and usually doesn't even bother to try.  Instead his campaign has always been to win the 2016 war again by making his opponent equally toxic so that he can win with 46% of the vote.  But Trump has proven surprisingly ineffective at attacking Biden, because Democrats and most independents are united in their loathing for Trump, and thus willing to overlook Biden's comparatively minor shortcomings. 

[Kalbear]

1 hour ago, Ran said:

The.

Polling.

Is.

Better.

Until we get the results, this does not seem like something that is set in stone. We certainly have more high-quality polling being done in the swing states, but that does not mean that it is particularly better. 

1 hour ago, Ran said:

We are not in a situation of an edge case of trying to figure out how a popular vote win leads to an electoral college loss. The GOP internal polling has been just as corrected as everyone else's to better grasp the electorate. The polling for the midterms was almost boringly accurate, based on those lessons and corrections.

The midterms didn't have Covid. Or a POTUS election.

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Maithanet said:

Good chance yes.  But that's fine for the Biden campaign, they're already up big.

Of course, was saying that as a good thing.  Biden don't need those undecideds, Trump does. 

3 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

Instead his campaign has always been to win the 2016 war again by making his opponent equally toxic so that he can win with 46% of the vote.

Somewhat ironically, in this way Trump is very much like a typical politician.  One of the first lessons of political psychology is the tendency for leaders to mistakenly fight the last war instead of evaluating the current conflict on its own standards.

[Kalbear]

14 minutes ago, DMC said:

If Trump loses?  Nah.  Since Reagan the GOP cannibalizes their leaders at a pretty prodigious rate.  The "GOP" will move right along and happily dispense with a 75 year old loser.  Definitely agree they have no real ideological soul, but there obviously will be competition for leadership.  And the victor will likely be the one that most convincingly says Trump wasn't as "conservative," extreme, and authoritarian as he should have been.

I don't think this is accurate; the amount of worship Trump himself gets is not going to easily dissipate. Romney and McCain were disposable, but Trump has a fanbase the same bizarre way that Kardashians do. A better example would probably be Palin, who had a really weird post-election run with a lot more followers than one would expect - and a LOT of influence on what the Republican party would become.

No, I think that Trump's influence is going to be felt for a long time. 

[Maithanet]

1 minute ago, Kalibear said:

Until we get the results, this does not seem like something that is set in stone. We certainly have more high-quality polling being done in the swing states, but that does not mean that it is particularly better.

Biden is in a stronger position in the polls right now than Clinton was at any point in 2016.  Polls could be wrong, but that much is unequivocal. 

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Maithanet said:

Biden is in a stronger position in the polls right now than Clinton was at any point in 2016.  Polls could be wrong, but that much is unequivocal. 

Agreed! And the US was in a stronger position against Afghanistan than Russia was at any point in their war. 

I'm saying that the idea that the polling is better or more accurate when we don't actually have the results seems a bit shortsighted. IF the polls are accurate and IF the system is largely the same as it has been the last 40+ years then Biden has an easy win. 

But those IFs are doing a LOT of heavy lifting, and being particularly assured when you're building your foundation on sand isn't wise. 

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Kalibear said:

A better example would probably be Palin, who had a really weird post-election run with a lot more followers than one would expect - and a LOT of influence on what the Republican party would become.

No, I think that Trump's influence is going to be felt for a long time. 

K, first of all, yes - his influence will obviously be felt for a long time.  Dubya's influence is still being felt, but that doesn't mean the GOP turned on him once it was politically expedient.  Second of all, I agree that Trump will undoubtedly maintain a media presence, but I - and I thought GW's discussion - was referring to officeholding or office-seeking leaders.  If Trump loses he's done in that regard.  Third, if your example is Palin's post-election run, well, sure.  That didn't exactly work out for her - and she hardly wielded any direct influence on the trajectory of the Republican party, rather she was a symbol that personified its worst trends.  So, yeah, in that way Trump will definitely be like Palin.

[Jaxom 1974]

4 minutes ago, Kalibear said:

I don't think this is accurate; the amount of worship Trump himself gets is not going to easily dissipate. Romney and McCain were disposable, but Trump has a fanbase the same bizarre way that Kardashians do. A better example would probably be Palin, who had a really weird post-election run with a lot more followers than one would expect - and a LOT of influence on what the Republican party would become.

No, I think that Trump's influence is going to be felt for a long time. 

Exactly.  

Honestly, the Republicans under Trump are the true RINOs.  Trump might not be extreme enough for the Cottons of the party, but he's enough to be the golden cow to which they'll seek to be "better" than, goose step higher than, oppress more than...

[DMC]

1 minute ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Trump might not be extreme enough for the Cottons of the party, but he's enough to be the golden cow to which they'll seek to be "better" than, goose step higher than, oppress more than...

Well, again, if you're describing this as the the GOP becoming the "party of Trump," then that would similarly mean the GOP during the Obama administration was the "party of Dubya."  I don't recall anybody calling them that.

[Kalbear]

2 minutes ago, DMC said:

K, first of all, yes - his influence will obviously be felt for a long time.  Dubya's influence is still being felt, but that doesn't mean the GOP turned on him once it was politically expedient.

Trump isn't polling nearly as badly as Bush is. Which is about the biggest indictment of the US population as I can possibly think. If people want to know where my pessimism is, it's that Trump has a 43% approval rate when over 200k US citizens have died and 25 million more people got added to unemployment and 8 million more people got added to the ranks of those in poverty - and that's not even getting into ALL THE OTHER BULLSHIT. 

43%. 

Fuuuuuuck

Quote

  Second of all, I agree that Trump will undoubtedly maintain a media presence, but I - and I thought GW's discussion - was referring to officeholding or office-seeking leaders.  If Trump loses he's done in that regard. 

I think it's going to be office seekers. His endorsement and his rallying is going to be felt for a long time. 

And honestly? If he loses, he'll run in 2024 unless he's in jail. Or maybe even then. 

Quote

Third, if your example is Palin's post-election run, well, sure.  That didn't exactly work out for her - and she hardly wielded any direct influence on the trajectory of the Republican party, rather she was a symbol that personified its worst trends.  So, yeah, in that way Trump will definitely be like Palin.

It worked out okay. Not super crazy long, but there's a direct line from her bullshit to birtherism of Trump to his rise. But I think there's going to be a lot more of that. That's what he's good at, and he's not going to run out of air. 

[Maithanet]

1 minute ago, Kalibear said:

Agreed! And the US was in a stronger position against Afghanistan than Russia was at any point in their war. 

I'm saying that the idea that the polling is better or more accurate when we don't actually have the results seems a bit shortsighted. IF the polls are accurate and IF the system is largely the same as it has been the last 40+ years then Biden has an easy win. 

But those IFs are doing a LOT of heavy lifting, and being particularly assured when you're building your foundation on sand isn't wise. 

There are plenty of things to be still worried about wrt the 2020 election.  But I still see Trump's ability to steal the election as something that can happen on the margins.  If the election is Biden +10, then Trump's house of sand will fall apart on election night.  If he can regain a bit of ground and the margin is more like Biden +5, then maybe he and some Republican legislatures can muddy the waters enough to steal it. 

I remember the last time we talked about this, you had a long list of things that Republicans will do to steal the election.  Almost everything on that list was things Republicans have done in the past (voter roll purges, misinformation, long lines in minority districts, voter intimidation where possible), Trump was just going to do them to an unprecedented degree.  But early voting has started, and while we've seen all of those things, not to any particularly new degree.  If Trump is planning on calling out the Proud Boys on election day to scare Democrats, he's going to find that 80%+ of Democrats have already voted. 

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Maithanet said:

I remember the last time we talked about this, you had a long list of things that Republicans will do to steal the election.  Almost everything on that list was things Republicans have done in the past (voter roll purges, misinformation, long lines in minority districts, voter intimidation where possible), Trump was just going to do them to an unprecedented degree.  But early voting has started, and while we've seen all of those things, not to any particularly new degree.  If Trump is planning on calling out the Proud Boys on election day to scare Democrats, he's going to find that 80%+ of Democrats have already voted. 

This is fair. At the same time, a lot of the things aren't just Republicans that I'm still quite worried about. Voter rolls, registration fuckups, signature mismatches, rejecting of ballots - all of these can still happen in massive dosages, and can happen both from external actors and Republican domestic terrorists. In some places where they've started counting this is not as big a concern (Georgia, NC, Florida). In other cases where they have to by law wait until the last minute this is going to be a MAJOR potential issue.

Plus, remember that you don't need to change that many effects. You could easily fuck things up later in the election and it be enough to turn the tide. In some ways that'd be better - it's much harder to detect that sort of thing than widescale fuckery. 

And then there's the night of election bullshit, where Trump declares himself a winner based on early counting and the media hasn't learned anything. NBC doing this bullshit town hall is a great example of this phenomenon, as is a lot of media giving any airtime to Giuliani's bullshit about Hunter Biden. Or the next leak, which will be about Burisma emails. 

All else being equal it's better to bank all of these votes, especially when they can be counted and tallied and processed. That is good news and is a good sign. But the polls? The polls are based on 40 years of assumptions that are all very much gone right now, and they can be a hell of a lot more swingy than any polls we've seen in most of our lifetimes because of that. It's great that polls have Biden so much up! It's still not that powerful of an augury.

[DMC]

12 minutes ago, Kalibear said:

I think it's going to be office seekers. His endorsement and his rallying is going to be felt for a long time. 

And honestly? If he loses, he'll run in 2024 unless he's in jail. Or maybe even then. 

I think you're vastly underestimating the inclination for Republicans both in government and the electorate to instantly turn on losers.  And that's what Trump will be..if he loses.  Plus you're vastly underestimating the GOP electorate's ADD - and this extends to the American public, the political media, and especially the right wing media.  I think we all agree that the GOP will become even more extreme and authoritarian, but that's really just describing the continued trends in polarization the past 40 years.

If Trump loses convincingly he won't have a chance in 2024.  Again, people simply aren't going to have the attention span to care about his whining for four years that the election was "stolen."

19 minutes ago, Kalibear said:

It worked out okay. Not super crazy long, but there's a direct line from her bullshit to birtherism of Trump to his rise.

Right - like I said, she personified the party's worst trends.  But at a personal level her political career was pretty well immediately caput and she didn't even last long as an influential rightwing media personality (I'll grant Trump could definitely be much more successful here).