HorsesAss.Org

Wednesday Open Thread

by — ,

So excited to see signs of the extended 1 Line popping up when I take light rail. Sorry I don’t know how to show a Bluesky post, but I was excited first about new maps and now the electronic signs being updated. It’s so cool to see my region doing this cool thing.

Anyway please wash your hands right now and get vaccinated or boosted if you’re eligible.

Comments

  1. 1

    “I meant to say he won’t make it another four months.”

    Dylan Byers
    @DylanByers
    NEW
    @PuckNews
    : ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, who recently interviewed Biden and was today caught in TMZ video saying he doesn’t think Biden “can serve four more years,” tells me, via spokesperson: “Earlier today I responded to a question from a passerby. I shouldn’t have.”

    In a separate statement, an ABC News spokesperson tells me, “George expressed his own point of view and not the position of ABC News.”

    TMZ video: https://tmz.com/2024/07/09/george-stephanopoulos-president-joe-biden-cant-serve-4-more-years-sidewalk-election/
    5:53 PM · Jul 9, 2024

  2. 2

    Cook is pretty much the last domino to fall into place.

    Cook Political Report
    @CookPolitical
    Today, we’re making six changes to our Electoral College Ratings.

    AZ: Toss Up to Lean R
    GA: Toss Up to Lean R
    MN: Likely D to Lean D
    #NE02: Likely D to Lean D
    NH: Likely D to Lean D
    NV: Toss Up to Lean R

    @amyewalter on the state of the race post-debate:
    From cookpolitical.com
    2:16 PM · Jul 9, 2024

    There’s nothing new here. The only thing left for Welfare Queen YLB and QoS McHillbilly to do is to continue to claim that Bi-Done simply had a cold and a case of four-week jet lag, nothing more.
    ·

  3. 3

    Quite the smackdown for a guy who’s from hardscrabble Scranton, PA.

    Josh Kraushaar
    @JoshKraushaar
    ·
    Cook Political Report: “In one set of surveys shared with me, Trump expanded his lead in Pennsylvania over Biden from four points to 10 points.”

    That would be landslide Trump territory.
    cookpolitical.com
    Six States Move Toward Trump in Electoral College Ratings | Cook Political Report
    As of July 9, the Democratic Party is living in a state of suspended animation. Despite growing calls from many in his party to leave the contest, President Joe Biden has made clear he has no…
    2:40 PM · Jul 9, 2024

  4. 4

    Coffin, nailed.

    At least it should be.

    POLITICS
    Pelosi refuses to say she supports Biden as the Democratic nominee

    Former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday refused to explicitly endorse President Joe Biden as the party’s presidential nominee, and encouraged her colleagues in Congress to pause from making public statements either for or against Biden.

    “Let’s just hold off. Whatever you’re thinking, either tell somebody privately, but you don’t have to put that out on the table until we see how we go this week,” Pelosi said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

    Hold off? From what?

    25A?

  5. 5

    Biden doesn’t have to live beyond the inauguration. Drumpy probably would croak before the 4th year too.

  8. 8

    It comes down to one thing and one thing only, vote for the D regardless if there’s even a candidate running, or lose you freedoms and social security and pornography.

    Easy choice. Only choice. R isn’t even viable.

  9. 9

    Hey how’s that Black voter outreach going?

    Former Assistant to President Donald Trump, “(Kamala Harris) is a DEI hire, right? She’s a woman. she’s colored.”

  10. 10

    Strong strong comments at the first post heart attack rally.

    “Mothers will never again be forced to watch their children overdosing & hosp–lee. We will never allow mothers to watch their child hopelessly dying in their arms, screaming, ‘What can I do? Help me God, what can I do?’ We are a nation whose once revered airports are a dirty, crowded mess.”

  11. 11

    You know the table on a 70+ year old recovering from a heart incident is 8 weeks. 2.8% of people over 70 have a second heart attack within four months of the first. Those percentages are greatly increased if the patient is generally unhealthy or has a history of heart disease.

  13. 13

    @12 no. But my 600k in CDs earning 5.5% are doing well though. Yours?

  14. 14

    @10

    What he was trying to say is ‘Hospitaliano’. He’s a big fan of the finest Italian restaurant in Manhattan and their endless breadsticks. You can OD on the breadsticks and die of Carbohydrolosis. Especially if you have had some Ivermectin in the last five years.

  15. 15

    I don’t understand these polls with Biden leading over Trump now.

    That can’t be possible.

    Polls must be broken now. Not like before.

  16. 16

    One thing I see these polls getting right is that all of the alternatives to Biden do so much worse than Biden in a matchup against Trump.

    That’s why I want Biden taken out.

  17. 17

    In our nation’s capitol President Biden is hosting a summit for an expanded NATO – that he expanded.

    Trump is resting in his Florida sex club challenging Biden to a golf tournament and bragging about things he never did.

  18. 18

    Former President Donald Trump has had two previous heart attack scares.

    On Saturday November 10th of 2019 then President Trump spent most of a day in an unscheduled visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Washington. His two previous routine physical exams, one a few months earlier in 2019 and another in 2018, were both scheduled well in advance and published on the president’s schedule ahead of time.

    Again later in 2020 when then President Trump was suddenly rushed again to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, it was worried that his sudden decline from a severe COVID-19 infection might have injured his heart bringing on another heart attack.

    In both cases White House spokespeople vigorously denied the rumors about a potential heart attack after initially appearing confused and uncertain about the reports and reporter’s questions.

  19. 19

    Trending

    #TrumpPedoFiles

    3am calls to Epstein.

    Fox news/Trump

    “Would you declassify the 9-11 files?”
    “Yeah”
    “Would you declassify the JFK files?”
    “Yeah”
    “Would you declassify the Epstein files” (At this point you can practically hear the cohost mumbling, “Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.”)
    “I guess I would I think that less so because, you know, you don’t know, you don’t want affect people’s lives if it’s phony stuff in there because there’s a lot of phony stuff with that whole world” (which I know nothing about that world just like Project 25 there are parts of that world I agree with but I don’t know anything about it)

  20. 20

    This is really none of my business.

    Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has been accused of not disclosing a yacht trip to Russia and a private helicopter flight to a palace in President Vladimir Putin’s hometown, among a slew of other gifts and loans from businessman Harlan Crow.

    Buried on page 14 of a letter that two Democratic senators sent to Attorney General Merrick Garland on Tuesday, in which they urged Garland to appoint a special counsel to probe Thomas, was an astonishing list of dozens of “likely undisclosed gifts and income” from Crow, Crow’s affiliated companies, and “other donors.”

  21. 21

    Amal’s husband to Bi-Done: GTFO.

    John Ocasio-Rodham Nolte
    @NolteNC
    George Clooney is speaking for Barack Obama in telling Joe Biden to step aside.

    Period.

    The call is now coming from inside the house.

    This is the first time I’ve thought there was a chance Biden might not be the nominee.

    This is a major, major development.

    Clooney and Obama are best friends. No way would Clooney jeopardize that relationship by going off the reservation.
    9:48 AM · Jul 10, 2024

    It’s like watching a street fight between Antifa and the alphabet people. It’s entertaining.

  22. 22

    Maybe George Clooney could be the president. ’cause Amal can’t do it, but Amal would be a better FLOTUS taking over the president’s job than DOCTOR Jill has been. At least more qualified. Plus, Democrats would actually have a Muslim living in the White House.

  24. 24

    It’s like watching a street fight between Antifa and the alphabet people.

    And in the background, the khalidi tape playing… let’s hear it…

    NOUN, VERB, HEREEEEE’s KREEEEEPPSHIIIIT…

    Wake me up last week in October for any “surprise” I may have missed.

  26. 26

    Koch Industries wants to buy one of the 4 fertilizer companies left in this country..

    And then there were three. Seen how fertilizer prices rise, squeezing farmers? Can’t be.. Lame stream media…

    I voted for David for Veep back in the day.

  28. 28

    According to Google Trends, Google searches for Project 2025 have massively overtaken searches for Taylor Swift and NFL in the past fourteen days.

    Media: Look at Biden! LOOK! LOOOOOOK!!!!!

  30. 30

    @21

    It’s safe to say that whenever our dumbfuck posts a random twitterer, it’s bullshit. Let’s see the bio….

    John Ocasio-Rodham Nolte

    @NolteNC
    Zionist

  32. 32

    The ammo vending machines will go into grocery stores first, so store shooters can replenish their supply in shootouts with cops after emptying their guns on customers.

  33. 33

    @21 “GTFO”

    You should be saying that to Crooked Clarence, not Honest Joe. As for a special counsel investigating Clarence and Sam — fuck yeah!!

  34. 34

    Microsoft settles a cloud dispute warding off European Regulators for € 20m ($22m).

    For perspective that is 1/100th of a percent of Microsoft’s 2023 profit. I’m sure they will be deterred from taking similar action in the future.

  35. 35

    The always-conniving DOCTOR Jill compelled the US Marine Corps Marching Band to compose an entry piece just for her.

    No like. It’s called Fanfare for the First Lady. The link is a 40 second clip of the piece.

    Longtime veterans of the U.S. Marine Band have characterized the situation as a first, remarking that they’ve never been asked before to provide a first lady with her own entrance music.

    Someone in the White House “had the bright idea, ‘Oh, tell the band that we want music for Jill,'” a source said. “The band had to provide music.”

    “Fanfare for the First Lady” has been performed at official White House functions headlined by the first lady, played between her entrance and her address.

    The band was “rushed” to come up with a theme for Jill Biden, a source said. The group submitted a few hurried options for the White House’s consideration. Administration officials eventually settled on “Fanfare to the First Lady.”

    Not even #CrookedHillary during her FLOTUS days would have pulled something this arrogant.

    Alas, people found out about it, a critical piece was written, and soon thereafter DOCTOR Jill lost her special song.

    Update: April 13, 2022.

    The United States Marine Band has retired “Fanfare for the First Lady,” according to a source familiar with the decision. The band quietly shelved the song following the publication of this article.

    Shameless grifting matriarch of The Biden Crime Family.

  37. 37

    The GOP Crime Convention in Milwaukee will feature numerous delegates under criminal indictment:

    “Seven battleground states are sending fake electors … to … the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee …. The fake electors … include several who are currently facing criminal charges …. They’ve been selected to serve as national committee members, delegates or alternates ….”

    https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/10/politics/fake-electors-get-tapped-as-gop-convention-delegates/index.html

    It’s like a Mafia gathering …

  39. 39

    And so, now that the tantrum has settled down the early indications are that the debate performance hasn’t had much effect on candidate preference, at least so far:

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/s32r38vj3sct3kkrijoyw/CHIP50-REPORT-105-DEBATE-2024.pdf?rlkey=nq301dg3j6bdqt42o67eo74nb&e=1&dl=0
    (leave the hash after the ? to avoid paywall)

    I’m not saying it should or shouldn’t. Nor am I saying it never will.
    I am not completely satisfied with President Biden’s response to his debate collapse. But I’m fairly satisfied just the same. He’s been out continuously in front of voters and media all over the place and he’s been campaigning effectively. It’s interesting to me how much the legacy media corporations are frustrated about this. Because a lot of President Biden’s outreach since the debate has been through alternative channels. I understand why that makes them mad. But for everyone watching the tantrum, it should be noted that it was always the campaign’s intention to rely upon alternative channels.

    Whether the campaign is aiming for base motivation or persuasion they’ve come to understand that legacy media platforms are ineffective. It’s either preaching to the choir, or preaching the Bible in a mosque. They can’t hope to reach the voters they need to reach by having the candidate appear on CNN or NPR. President Biden’s core message is a record of accomplishment. The legacy media will not cover that. They will only talk about the horse race. For the campaign to get their message out they have to get plain old regular people sharing on Tik Tok, and other socials. And Tik Tok does not accept paid political advertising.

    Even if they are trying to persuade squishy Republican moderates to be repelled by Trump’s insane embrace of Russian authoritarian rule, radical white nationalism and nationwide abortion bans, they won’t find them sitting at home watching The CBS Evening News. That may be very bad news for CBS and Paramount. But President Biden isn’t the cause of that bad news. Nor is it his responsibility to reenergize their failing business model. The traditional approaches don’t work and haven’t worked for a while. And so perhaps it shouldn’t surprise us to see MAGAts attempting to goad Democrats into leaning into them as “the only way to settle our questions”. And some dumber Democrats are bound to fall for that. They always do – ight before they lose their next campaign and go to work for one of those legacy media networks.

    If Jon Stewart is right when he insists that there is plenty of time for Democrats to reconsider our options, then he’s also saying that there is plenty of time to let the process as it stands right now continue to play out. And his joining calls for Democrats to conjure up some kind of custom built week-long televised media circus to “open up the nomination” needs to be viewed in the proper light coming from someone whose fortune and identity begin and end in a dying media format. After all, “late night talk” wasn’t over exposed, worn out and running on fumes, then Stewart would not have been able to successfully lampoon it for sixteen years the way he did before he finally pulled the plug.

    My point is right now there appears to be no shortage of time and no actual reason supported in evidence to argue that Democrats must do something RIGHT NOW!!! And if it should turn out that something does need to be done eventually, it probably should not take the form of a prolonged cable television event that only freaks and weirdos Democratic base voters and political junkies will watch. We already know they will vote for our nominee.

  40. 40

    35,
    You should realize that Becket Adams is a proto-JBSer with a notoriously troubling social media history who works for Scotty Walker and Christopher Rufo (Koch funded).

    IOW he’s full of shit most of the time.

  41. 41

    NYT caught straight fabricating a quote from Rep. Pelosi in which they had her questioning President Biden’s role as the nominee. It never happened. They made it up. Like some common FB friends in CO.

    The journalistic decline of the NYT under Sulzberger and Kahn is breathtaking.
    Fair to say it’s also been profitable for them.

    Why do any of you still read or subscribe?
    They are FOX news only with a better holiday gift catalog.

  44. 44

    @29 – I won’t be disappointed, no matter what. The big disappointment is going to be the result. You folks aren’t going to be happy in November.

  45. 45

    Biden’s job

    Pretty much invalidates the subpoenas.

    Congress may not directly intervene into Executive branch functions. There is no constitutionally valid, legislative purpose behind such a subpoena. The President answers to the people who elected him.

    Trump lost. Biden won.

  46. 46

    So many 3am phone messages Trump left for his good friend Epstein.

    Hundreds.

    I wonder what that’s about?
    I’m kidding, of course. We all know what those calls were about.
    “When you’re a star they let you. You can do anything.”

  47. 47

    Open your horizons into The Heterosexual Neanderthal Virus world and Google not just “Man kills Wife” but also “Man kills Girlfriend”. Seems more girlfriends take out the boyfriends than wives do to husbands.

    All at the expense of the taxpayers! The Virus is nasty

  48. 48

    @46 he’s a heterosexual, kind of explains it

  50. 50

    @49

    Good to see that the Heterosexual Neanderthal Virus hasn’t gotten you yet. Whats the matter, your hubby a Heterosexual Neanderthal?

  51. 51

    No no no, he seemed like a creep. I knew him but we had a falling out and I never talked to him about personal stuff.

    Sixty calls in the month I married Melania? Well that’s fake. From my personal phone number you have the phone records. Well there’s a lot of phony stuff in that world. Who among us doesn’t have a scumbag child rapist they call sixty times in a month?

    How many flights? I can think of maybe one. Seven?

    #TrumpPedoFiles

  52. 52

    @52

    Well THAT’S embarrassing. Remember way back when, like just under a week ago when the times published that OpEd by Matthew Walther about how he doesn’t vote and you shouldn’t either because it doesn’t matter. Well the internet being what it is turns out he published the same OpEd, more or less in 2018 (The Week).

    And Michigan where he lives has sunshine laws on voting. You can’t see who someone voted for but you can see if they voted. And he voted at least in 2020 and 2022.

    Encouraging people NOT to vote is an actual voter suppression tactic.

    Remember when the Times had a legal department and researchers?

  53. 53

    @ 52

    I’m shocked that people would post things they don’t really believe on the internet.

    Like it’s totally just residual jet lag from that trip 12 days before the debate that messed up Bi-Done.

  55. 55

    More fun from the fact checkless New York Times:

    That Neuroligist that visited then White House eight times the ram this week.

    Joe Biden was not at the White House on five of the days. That would have been totally easy to check.

    Query, dates on visitors log and matching presidential schedule.

    Nah. Just run Neurologist keeps going to White House so…

  56. 56

    @44 “You folks aren’t going to be happy in November.”

    This shows how stupid you are. It’s not about us. Our feelings are inconsequential. It’s about what kind of country we are, what its role in the world is, and whether it’s led by a decent person or a morally bankrupt one. These issues are larger than any of us.

  58. 58

    Before, Republicans were throwing things at a wall to see if anything would stick. Hunter. Laptop. Family loans. Biting dogs.

    Lots of spaghetti sauce streaks on that wall. Now they’re throwing a neurologist to see if he’ll stick to the wall.

  59. 59

    Hey, Trump got outspent by #CrookedHillary 2:1 and still beat her, so losing half of the donations to dementia isn’t a problem for Bi-Done, amirite?

    President Joe Biden’s campaign has already suffered a major slowdown in donations and officials are bracing for a seismic fundraising hit, with the fallout from a debate nearly two weeks ago taking a sizable toll on operations, according to four sources close to the re-election effort.

    “It’s already disastrous,” one of the sources close to Biden’s re-election said of fundraising.

    “The money has absolutely shut off,” another source close to the re-election said.

    Two of the sources said this month is on a path to be down by possibly half — “or much more,” one of them said — from large donors alone. Sources emphasized that the donations were down across the board.

    Besides, since it’s in his wallet somewhere the money will eventually turn up, amirite?

  60. 60

    Building a log cabin takes time.

    Melania Trump hosts Trump Tower penthouse fundraiser for Log Cabin Republicans, raises $1.4M

    So does building a president. For future president Barron Trump, the effort begins early.

    It was the first campaign event of the year at the Trumps’ personal residence, and was Melania’s second solo appearance in support of her husband’s presidential campaign, after she hosted an LCR event at Mar-a-Lago in April.
    …
    The funds raised go to an outreach initiative for swing-state voters, namely suburban women, and gay and lesbian conservatives in battleground states. The event set a fund-raising record for the LCR, according to its president, Charles Moran.

    Kennedys, Bushes, Clintons, Trumps. Politics is a family business. I’d include The Biden Crime Family on that list, except the fraud, grifting, and traitorism has already been too broadly exposed. In ten years DOCTOR Jill will finally be eligible for probation.

  61. 61

    @ 60

    $1.4 million doesn’t sound like much, but it’s half of the July fundraising haul that the Bi-Done campaign will be forced to announce.

  62. 62

    2024 ELECTIONS
    Biden support slips in deep blue New York: ‘We’re a battleground state now’

    If not now, then soon.

    A contested race in New York exacerbates Biden’s reelection troubles as members of his party continue to call for him to step aside or question his fitness for office — including three members of the state’s House delegation. And it would cost him time and money he’d rather be spending on the country’s six swing states, siphoning millions of dollars to play in the costliest media market in the country.

    “The money that needs to be spent here will be subtracted from other areas he’s going to lose,” former Democratic New York Gov. David Paterson said.

  67. 67

    Or, not so quietly.

    Alex Thompson
    @AlexThomp
    Re: the growing criticism of biden, the Clooney op-ed etc, Morning Joe says:

    “The Biden campaign and many Democratic officials do believe that Barack Obama is quietly working behind the scenes to orchestrate this”
    5:16 AM · Jul 11, 2024

    Imagine having to pick an asshole like Biden as your running mate because of his “experience” in order to ensure a 2008 election win. Obama’s been waiting a very long time for this opportunity.

  69. 69

    That Biden recession has been around the corner for almost four years now.

    The Consumer Price Index, a measurement of the average change in prices for a commonly purchased basket of goods and services, dropped 0.1% from May, which helped to slow the annual rate of inflation to 3% from 3.3% in May, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ latest report.

    Falling gas prices as well as a drop in new and used car prices helped to usher in the first month-on-month decline since May 2020, BLS data showed. On an annual basis, consumer prices are increasing at their slowest pace since June 2023, matching the lowest annual rate since early 2021.

  70. 70

    Imagine having to pick an asshole like Biden as your running mate because of his “experience”

    Shoulda gone with Caribou Barbie, right?

    One thing you have to give Republicans. They disavow any and all acountability for past failure. For them, it’s as if it never even happened. Once upon a time this Village Idiot publicly performed lavish tongue baths of John McCain’s sour taint. Now it’s as if McSame never even existed. Yet McSame saw the future of his party: “Fuck it!”

  71. 71

    69,
    IIRC Blessed Saint Ronald Reagan got a parade for a much higher inflation rate.

  72. 72

    On CNN, True Gretch wants Bi-Done exposed for the walking, talking vegetable that he is.

    [CNN’s ABBY] PHILLIP: What more should he do to shut this conversation down? Should he, as some people have suggested, just go ahead and take a cognitive test and demand that Donald Trump do the same?

    WHITMER: I don’t think that it hurt, to be honest. But at the end of the day —

    PHILLIP: So, you think that he should take a cognitive test?

    WHITMER: I don’t think it would hurt.

  73. 73

    He’s been a joke his whole fucking career. It’s time for everyone to laugh at him.

    It’s a spoof video of Biden being told by George Clooney that his time on the job is up.

    “Although I wish I was here with better news, the fact is that you and I are sitting here today because this will be your last week of employment,” Clooney explains to a befuddled-looking Biden, who just stares vacantly.

    “This is not an assessment of your productivity,” Clooney hastens to add. “Try not to take this personally.”

    Biden then insists, “Well, I just had a bad night.”

  74. 74

    @ 71

    IIRC Blessed Saint Ronald Reagan got a parade for a much higher inflation rate.

    You don’t. That wasn’t a parade. It was a bulldozing of a Mondale.

    It was Morning In America.

  75. 75

    In case you’re wondering, I wasn’t bothered at all with Nancy Reagan’s astrologer running our nation during Ronnie’s. um, decline.

  76. 76

    I wasn’t bothered at all with Nancy Reagan’s astrologer running our nation during Ronnie’s. um, decline.

    Similary not “bothered at all” with drumpf sprinkled all over the Eppie papers.

  77. 77

    73 –

    When someone who does make-believe for a living tells you it’s time to retire, you might consider that as good advice and just do so.

  78. 78

    A few basic facts about the legal and political process have to be acknowledged before anyone, whoever they might be, proposes any sort of path to “opening up the nomination”.

    First is that President Biden already has won the requisite number of convention delegates according to the rules adopted through democratic process and incorporated into each state’s primary system. Legally those delegates are bound to President Biden through at least any first balloting. And any attempt to get around that violates a bunch of laws. Keep that in mind first.

    Second is that there has always existed a pressure campaign to get Biden to decline the nomination. At various times it has gained momentum or disappeared from view. But it has always been present. That is the nature of competitive politics in a party system. There are always ambitious potential candidates and their backers, donors, and supporters. They have their interests. And they are always trying to assert them. Before he won a second term there was a quiet effort, led by Sen. Joe LIEberman among others, to try to convince President Bill Clinton to “save the presidency” by declining to run. A candidate like Hillary Clinton saw that kind of party influence and insider engineering as an opportunity. Joe Biden never did.

    Historically, Democrats are a little unique for this kind of pressure campaign to challenge incumbents. LBJ faced it. Carter faced it. Both were very much like Biden in that they were never really party or beltway insiders. As a single father Biden famously spent three decades traveling home to his family in Delaware rather than staying in Washington to cultivate alliances. Carter was an unknown peanut farmer from Georgia who was uncomfortable with the pressure cooker system of beltway parties and receptions. LBJ was a crude, foul-mouthed, dirt-poor outsider from rural east Texas who was mostly looked down upon by his fellow Democratic lawmakers, especially the ivy leaguers from New England.

    Joe Biden was never anyone’s “inspiring choice”. But among all the candidates in 2020 he alone demonstrated early on the ability to assemble the diverse coalition needed to win. And though he may have represented “the past” as well as “stability” for voters frightened by COVID and Trump, his building of that coalition was very future focused.

    Because America is now a complex, diverse, multi-racial, and multi-cultural society. For democracy to survive candidates must be able to reflect that fact and establish their bona fides in communicating to all Americans. But Republicans don’t have a market lock on chauvanism and revanchism in American life. Plenty of Democratic lawmakers, party hacks, and media personalities are just as wedded to the old idea of America as a nation of affluent white men. And especially if their interests are limited to a region, state, or district, they don’t have the same imperitive to reflect the true nature of America as a president. Keep that in mind as you see mostly older white men raising their voices here.

    It can hardly be in doubt that President Biden is aware of all these basic facts about his campaign this year, and about his political identity. So for any pressure campaign to be persuasive it would have to demostrate to him that he is losing the diverse coalition of support that is key to his victory, and that some other potential candidate exists who has an equal ability to reassemble that coalition.

    I have not seen one single beltway insider or party operative perspective that even bothers to address that. They may mention that some particular potential replacement “has a great track record” or “has a national platform” or some other vauge platitudes. But none of them, not a single one so far, is pointing to any specific name and declaring that “this person can bring all these different, diverse, and complex groups and interests together. And I think that’s very important. Not because I don’t think such people exist. But because it tells me that the people mounting this pressure campaign don’t actually give a fuck about what is probably the single most important qualification. I can’t listen to people like that until they either decide to get serious or wake the fuck up to 2024.

    This is where America is. This is who we are. Republicans may not have to worry about it in the immediate future. But we all see it and know it. And the fact that the GOP has resigned from any responsibility or intention to represent even a bare majority of Americans is both why they have been losing and why they have abandoned democracy in principle. So it may not seem “fair” to some shithead somewhere that of the two parties only Democrats have to do this hard work, while Republicans sit back and concentrate on frightening old white people. But that’s the price of democracy.

    If American democracy is going to survive 2024 it will only do it by electing a president who is willing and able to shoulder that burden. And any imaginary West Wing scenario to get around the primaries to find some other candidate in the next few weeks has to make that its only mission.

    But that won’t happen and anyone who is being honest knows it already. Factions will fight based on factional interest. There will be lawsuits. And some of those lawsuits will be filed by Republicans and Trump. And even if Democrats can pull it off, choose a new broad coalition building candidate in just a few weeks, and go on to win in November, there will still be lawsuits and challenges. And Trump, MAGA, Republicans, and Republicans in Congress will all cite that as justification for the next coup attempt. That we all know they are planning.

    American democracy needs Democrats to win. And Democrats need to win in a way that cannot be easily discredited. The people who propose to blow up the nomination process bear the burden of explaining how their “exciting” ideas would acheive that outcome and not just hand us Hubert Humphrey.

    So far all I see is a lot of vague wish-casting from mostly media hacks and small-time hustlers.

  79. 79

    @ 78

    Legally those delegates are bound to President Biden through at least any first balloting.

    Are those federal laws, state laws, or both, which compel (force?) delegates to vote for the candidate they are pledged to support? It’s not like these are EC delegates, after all. Is “legally” the correct term to be using here?

    And for those delegates who illegally vote their conscience or choose to properly represent those Democrats they represent by voting against the candidate to whom they are pledged, will they be immediately arrested by 1) the FBI 2) federal marshals 3) the military 4) state police 5) members of a militia hired by the DNC? And will these thugs with guns and zip ties also be wearing jackboots?

  80. 80

    “… there has always existed a pressure campaign to get Biden to decline the nomination.”

    Perhaps Biden should listen to those pressures.

    “ Joe Biden was never anyone’s “inspiring choice”.”

    No kidding!

  81. 81

    @ 78

    Joe Biden was never anyone’s “inspiring choice”. But among all the candidates in 2020 he alone demonstrated early on the ability to assemble the diverse coalitionsell enough future appointments in order to receive in exchange the endorsements from DNC bigwigs needed to win.

    Not possessing a moral code was a definite advantage to him.

  82. 82

    Hard not to smile at it, too.

    Jonathan Martin
    @jmart
    It’s hard to overstate the despair among some Dem delegates + many Dem officials and aides. *including* those working on Biden’s campaign. Sadness, anger and shock that this is real.
    3:55 PM · Jul 10, 2024

  83. 83

    The call is coming from inside the house.

    Some Biden Advisers Are Discussing How to Convince Him to Step Aside
    Close allies of the president are developing a case for why he should end his re-election campaign, though it is not clear that the discussions have reached him.

    Some longtime aides and advisers to President Biden have become increasingly convinced that he will have to step aside from the campaign, and in recent days they have been trying to come up with ways to persuade him that he should, according to three people briefed on the matter.
    …
    They said they have to make the case to the president, who remains convinced of the strength of his campaign, that he cannot win against former President Donald J. Trump. They have to persuade him to believe that another candidate, like Vice President Kamala Harris, could beat Mr. Trump. And they have to assure Mr. Biden that, should he step aside, the process to choose another candidate would be orderly and not devolve into chaos in the Democratic Party.

    Those discussions were recounted by three people familiar with them who, like others in this article, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive situation. There is no indication that any of the discussions have reached Mr. Biden himself, one of the informed people said.

    And pardons. There has to be a get out of conviction free deal for POS Hunter. And POS Jim.

  84. 84

    I Voted Biden in ’20, But I Won’t Vote for Dems This Year – by Jennifer Sey, DC Examiner

    I’ve voted for the Democratic candidate for president in every election since I could vote, all the way back to 1988. Now, at 55 years old, I’m a registered independent. And I will not vote for any Democratic candidate for president in this election, very possibly in any election ever again.

    . . . But their handling of COVID-19 was such a trespass of the Democrats’ own stated values (severely restricting our speech and movement, violating our bodily autonomy, forcing women out of the workforce to care for their children, enacting policies that harmed the poorest among us the most, shutting down public schools while private schools remained open) that I doubt I could ever bring myself to vote that way again.

    . . . I deeply regret my vote for Biden in 2020. I did it out of some combination of habit, lingering but fading Trump derangement syndrome, and mistakenly believing that if Biden won, the Democrats would stop their illiberal COVID-19 policies when it was no longer a viable political strategy to position themselves as everything that is the opposite of Donald Trump. (Go ahead, laugh at me. I don’t mind.)

    I thought that once Trump was out of the way, the Democrats would be free, and willing, to forge ahead with opening schools to benefit the nation’s nearly 100 million public school children. Biden could open the schools and declare that he’d beat COVID! I feared the feud and polarization would just continue if Trump won, with Democratic governors going even harder against him.

    I was wrong about it all.

    The Democrats were in too deep to turn back. It was the sunk-cost fallacy writ large. After Biden won, the party continued to press the same ineffective lockdown, distancing, and demonizing of the unmasked and unvaccinated strategies because not to do so would be an admission that it was all for naught in the first place. (It was.)

    I fear we are in the same sunk-cost fallacy death spiral right now.

    . . . I don’t care who steps in to be the Democratic candidate. I won’t be voting for him or her. I won’t forgive the Democrats’ destructive lies during the pandemic. And I won’t believe them when they say this is the only candidate, whether it’s Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) or Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) or any other authoritarian who has been lying about Biden’s fitness for the past two years, who can save our democracy now. Why would I when they’ve been lying about Biden’s fitness for years? . . .

  85. 85

    If this isn’t a measure of Bi-Done’s strength and control over his party, I don’t know what is.

    In a first, US Senate panel rejects Biden judicial nominee in New York

    Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia broke with his fellow Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee and joined with Republicans on a 10-11 vote to reject advancing U.S. Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn’s nomination to become a life-tenured district court judge for the full chamber’s consideration.

    The election year vote marked the first time during Biden’s presidency that the panel had ever voted to reject one of his nominees. While some past nominations have stalled out or been blocked before the committee could consider them, the panel had never before voted down one of Biden’s judicial nominees.

    Maybe Bi-Done can nominate POS Hunter for the seat now.

  86. 86

    He’s been a joke his whole fucking career.

    That is quite the self projection. You’re a joke.

    You can’t post a single comment with any evidence to support your opining.

    And then, clearly, you don’t want to acknowledge any real factual information such as the Heterosexual Neanderthal virus.

    I thought this blog was a place that had rules that no bullshit lies can be posted. What a joke of moderating.

  87. 87

    If Biden steps down, at the encouragement of others or on his own accord, he will be doing so for the betterment of the Country, so this is a good thing. He’s got my vote regardless. It really doesn’t matter to me.

    But don’t ever expect a fucking Repuke to go anything to better this country, they are truly a bunch of fuckwads.

  90. 90

    79,
    Both state and federal laws. Election lawsuits could be brought in both venues, varying by state, including a not insignificant portion of swing states.

    81,
    Proof citation missing. Obviously unintentional. /s

    Concern trolling or lining up more media hacks to flex their self-appointed powers doesn’t do anything to overcome the practical requirements that must be met before any responsible person in President Biden’s position would step aside.

    There is no process. There is no plan to overcome the legal challenges. There is no money to pay for all of that. There is no objectively qualified candidate. And yes, I’m afraid that includes the current vice president, although I would argue that she comes closest.

    Convince Joe Biden he’s wrong. To do that you’ve got to put up the practical plan, the money, and the numbers. Without that it’s just a great big loud TAN SUIT*. Biden opponents in the party who have such a plan can speak out and should be sharing it widely so that it can be examined and tested by all. The rest really should shut the fuck up and get to work. Their choice. They can get to work supporting the nominee. Or they can get to work putting together the necessary coalition building plan to produce an alternative nominee (maybe they’ll have something ready in four years). Or they can admit that they aren’t up to it, don’t care for the hard work ahead, and simply quit the party and go become another EEN-DEE-PEN-DUNCE like so many old white men before them have done. Democrats are committed to democracy. It’s in the name. That commitment only gets harder as we move into the future. It means different communications styles and plenty of compromise. Someone like George Clooney spends his days being pampered and tended to by sycophants and yes-men whose most important job is to always remind him how incredibly wonderful, talented, and wise he is. If another older white man like that isn’t up for the hard work, I’m not going to be surprised. But I’m also not interested in giving up on democracy just to have “star power” on board. Things just don’t work that way anymore. Millennial voters never watched ER and don’t really know who George Clooney is. He is not the DILF he thinks he is.

    *Why this analogy? Because just as there are some cloistered, socially retarded, political gym rats in the media and elsewhere who think they can appoint themselves the authority to tell the president what color suit he may wear on what occasions, so too are there such Village Idiots who believe it is their province to declare a campaign over whenever a candidate should fall short of some performance standard that they’ve created out of thin air to serve their own needs.

  91. 91

    @89 yes Bob, you are not an original. The horses should be careful, you might kill them.

  92. 92

    @84,
    Who the fuck is she and why should I care?

    To begin with, that’s old news, my friend. She got driven out of her high octane Corpo job for being too much of a crank. C-suite offices come with a lovely pair of handcuffs that she didn’t like wearing. So with nothing better to do she’s been full-time shitting on Democrats on Twitter for the last two years +. So what?

    Second of all, like most super-wealthy elites who’ve never really worked in the real world, she’s incapable of seeing anything from the perspective of the workers who keep the trains running on time. She’s no better than the cranky old farts angry that their favorite casino doesn’t let them chain smoke anymore. Jacked up to the gills on diet pills and anti-depressants, she wants her “Grande in a venti cup, 20-pump vanilla, 20-pump hazelnut, whole milk, 190 degree, add whip and extra caramel drizzle latte” NOW and no waiting. She’s Karen on steroids but low on her mood stabilizers with no time to get to Rite Aid.

    As your president in our next pandemic let’s make “brand presidents” into essential workers right along side fast food workers and teachers.

  93. 93

    @91 Could be boob, sure, but more likely liddle maxpuddle stroking its popgun.

  94. 94

    It’s going to be great to see Liz Cheney dragged off to prison in chains without a trial for having opposed and criticized Trump.

    Fuck that cunt.

  95. 95

    @63 “Alito is slowly dying”

    I don’t wish prolonged suffering on anyone. For his sake, I hope it speeds up.

  96. 96

    @65 “when Trump wins the NPV”

    Won’t happen. But if Trump gets 270 electoral votes, I’ll peacefully abide by the result, and what I won’t do is:

    Join a violent mob and storm the Capitol to prevent certification;
    Lie about the election being stolen or ben an election denier;
    Or threaten election workers and their families.

    I’m not a Republican; and Democrats and Republicans aren’t the same.

  97. 97

    @93 at first I thought the same thing but now I’m leaning more to Bob…..my bet Bob, he lived here

  99. 99

    @71 “Blessed Saint Ronald Reagan”

    Only Blessed? Not Beatified? Is that because of Iran Contra? The S & L scandal? The highest unemployment since the 1930s? An occultist running the White House and making presidential decisions with an ouija board after the onset of his mental decline? All of the above?

  101. 101

    If you think I’m smiling about Liz being executed, imagine my grin when I learn that Goldy, Darrell and Carl have been arrested, the server seized, and the hunt has begun to find you stupid libbie cunts.

    I’m grinning ear to ear just thinking about it.

    Trump and Project 2025 forever, bitches!!

  102. 102

    @74 “Morning In America” looked more like permanent night to America’s working class: Double-digit unemployment followed by four decades of stagnant wages while the richer grew ever richer.

  103. 103

    @75 “In case you’re wondering, I wasn’t bothered at all with Nancy Reagan’s astrologer running our nation during Ronnie’s. um, decline.”

    Are you willing to take a cognitive test? It’s easy and painless, all you do is blow into a tube …

  104. 104

    Bi-Done’s legacy will be incarceration of half of his corrupt family and the installation of the second Trump term.

    Amanda Terkel
    @aterkel
    Several of Biden’s closest allies, including 3 people directly involved in re-election efforts, told
    @jonallendc

    @natashakorecki

    @carolelee
    they now see his chances of winning as zero.

    “He needs to drop out,” one Biden campaign official said. “He will never recover from this.”

    “No one involved in the effort thinks he has a path,” said a second person working to elect him.

    https://nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/biden-reelection-insiders-no-path-debate-rcna161296
    9:30 AM · Jul 11, 2024

  105. 105

    @78 “And the fact that the GOP has resigned from any responsibility or intention to represent even a bare majority of Americans is both why they have been losing and why they have abandoned democracy in principle.”

    I think it’s more accurate to say they’ve decided if Hitler could take over a country with 33% popular support, they can too. They only need to get the camel into the tent, not through the eye of a needle, and then empower their leader by passing enabling acts.

  106. 106

    @80 Biden was never anyone’s inspiring choice, but he was an inspired choice. He beat Trump, which is what he was nominated for, then had one of the most productive terms in postwar history, which no one really expected.

  107. 107

    @84

    I’ve been such a lifelong Democrat that I’m going to take 8,000 words to describe why I love the Hard line Conservative Republican position on multiple issues in the pages of a Right Wing Crank publication..

    Other greatest hits:

    Fifty-two years ago this month, Title IX was enacted to prohibit sex discrimination in educational programs and activities at institutions that receive federal funding. And for all of its wide-reaching impacts, it is best known for mandating equality in sports between the sexes.

    This was predicated on the commonsense truth that men and women are biologically different, and without sex-based categories in sports, girls and women would never have the opportunity to compete on an equal playing field.

    or

    When I was a child, I brought 20 pairs of Levi’s 501 jeans to the inaugural Goodwill Games in Moscow in 1986, a competition in which I competed as a gymnast representing Team USA. These jeans were pure gold, and I was able to trade them for leotards with the best gymnasts in the world. Why? Because the jeans represented America. They represented freedom.

    Now, DEI-saturated employees inside of Levi’s are afraid to speak up in meetings, lest they say a wrong word and get ousted for wrongthink. I know this firsthand from employees on my team, designers too afraid to speak for fear of retribution for using the unacceptable term “guys” when addressing their peers. Or letting “lame” slip out to describe a graphic T-shirt design, thus being accused of ableism. The silent obedience leaves the door open for misguided self-appointed gurus to make any and all decisions unchallenged. I suspect this is exactly what happened with Alissa Heinerscheid at Bud Light when she hired transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney.

  108. 108

    @81 A two-time Trump voter touting “moral code” as a qualification for office is side-splittingly funny. 🤡🍿🤣😂💩

  109. 109

    I’m almost on the verge of fessing up to being a fascist. Almost.

    Just fucking with you libbie twats.

    Trump and Project 2025 forever!!

  110. 110

    @84 Very unlikely this person ever voted for Democrats, and she certainly didn’t vote for Biden. She’s an outspoken anti-masker and anti-vaxxer, writes about “woke culture” and “cancel culture” for New York Post, and her company is criticized as anti-gay and anti-trans. “Rightwing” is written all over her.

  111. 111

    @92 “Who the fuck is she and why should I care?”

    College gymnast who rose through the marketing ranks at Levi Strauss & Co.

    “She got driven out of her high octane Corpo job for being too much of a crank.”

    Specifically, for being a bigoted anti-gay and anti-trans crank.

  112. 112

    @101 What will you do with yourself then? With them and HA gone, what will you do with all the time on your hands? Spend all day hitting the bottle? Aren’t you kind of doing that now, though?

  114. 114

    @109 “I’m almost on the verge of fessing up to being a fascist.”

    Such a confession would be redundant, given the overwhelming damning evidence.

  115. 115

    Biden just introduced Zelensky as “President Putin”.

    No lie.

    Everyone feelin’ good about November?

  117. 117

    Bob is expressing himself for the true character that he is – a Heterosexual Neanderthal with the HN Virus. He’s delusional to think that he’s right in it all happening as he suggests it will. He thinks he is safe, but I’m sure he’s not. Or the horse might get it instead of him. He’ll be crying like someone in Gaza/Isreal.

    He’s grinning from ear to ear now, but wait till he gets his.

  118. 118

    @115

    “President Putin?” Biden said, correcting himself. “President Zelensky. I’m so focused on beating Putin.”

    Helps if you just focus on one thing like “Is Ronnie Johnson, my doctor here” A thing that still hasn’t been corrected.

  119. 119

    @118

    But why. Putin is a great guy. Helps me all the time. I wanna be just like him. I’d love to put anyone who runs against me in a Gulag.

  120. 120

    You’ve all seen my totally hot wife Mercedes. *1

    Why did Marla Maples sue me for sex in that dressing room. *2

    (Biden’s) got homes in the Virgin Islands, Nantucket, Lake Tahoe, Kiawah Island.*3

    *all still uncorrected.

    1 No, she is neither a car nor is that her name
    2 Marla is your second wife. It was your FIRST wife Ivanna who also accused you of abuse and sexual assault. And pay Ms Carol the money you deadbeat felon.
    3. Maybe you’re thinking of Epstein as Biden has houses in none of those places though I understand you have underaged Hos in all area codes.

  121. 121

    Remember when I glitched out and needed to reboot twice and no one demanded I resign?

  122. 122

    The Republican nominee gets a fascist play date at his private sex club in Florida.

    Claims he’s going to have an imaginary negotiation to reach an imaginary peace accord between two countries he isn’t meeting with.

    It’s literally delusional.
    Same as it ever was. Will the media even notice?

  123. 123

    “@ 107 Who the hell wears other girls’ leotards?“

    Well…you do, when your wife or daughter isn’t pegging you.

  125. 125

    Gonna eventually have to work our way through the Liz Cheney’s to get to the Dave Reicherts.

    Tough stuff. But in order to win the day a real fascist has to dig down in search of hidden reserves of cheerful purpose and tenacious resolve when the blood and teeth start flying.

  127. 127

    @126

    If y’all aren’t following Mark Mullet running a GOP campaign for Governor it’s kind of fun.

    LAW AND ORDER!

    I’m for nuclear Power but I still have LITERALLY no idea where to store the waste but BUILD THE PLANTS (McCain for President, Plants, NO YUCCA MOUNTAIN)

    Gas Taxes! We can’t be helping the climate by waging war on cars!

    School Vouchers!

    I’m endorsed by the Washington Hospitality Industry! I own food businesses. WISHA’s constant fight against a liveable wage just makes sense.

    FARM SUBSIDIES ease workplace safety too!

    I know Mark personally. He’s a good guy. But he’s the guy the GOP drove out of the party in the 2000s because he’s ok with having a gay kid and doesn’t give a fuck if you go to church weekly but other than that, he’s conservative to the core. And so, he doesn’t stand a chance. Why go with Republican light when you can have Reichert. Why go with fake Democrat when Bob Ferguson is going to be the next Gov.

  128. 128

    @126 Never heard of it. You know way more about it than I do. It seems a correction is in order. I’m not your father, brother, or son.

  129. 129

    Want to talk about a DEI president? George W. Bush. There’s an affirmative action president. Got the job because of his daddy. Totally incompetent. Ignored warnings about al Qaeda, and after we were attacked, went to war against the wrong country and squandered the lives of over 4,400 American troops. The subprime crisis happened on his watch, and because of his deregulation, plunging America into the worst depression since the 1930s. The guy was a total clusterfuck. Don’t talk to me about “DEI presidents” unless you’re discussing W.

  130. 130

    Behind the scenes advisors are said to be…

    That’s become my new favorite way to make shit up.
    And you fucking leftist pussies fall for it.

  131. 131

    @ 126

    Look up “pegging” on Google.

    Robinhood Dumbfuck Rabbit had to be told what BBC means, too.

    The ironic thing is that he’s been engaging in both for years, but doesn’t/didn’t know the slang terms that describe them.

  132. 132

    @ 121

    Mitch “Yertle” McConnell spews:
    …
    Remember when I glitched out and needed to reboot twice and no one demanded I resign?

    Oh, I remember plenty of calls for your resignation, Cocaine Mitch. I also remember that you announced that you would step down from your leadership position after November.

    AP News
    https://apnews.com › article › mitch-mcconnell-senate-r…
    Feb 28, 2024 — McConnell will step down as the Senate Republican leader in November after a record run in the job. Mitch McConnell, the longest-serving …

    I’m sorry, was the intent of @ 121 to preserve Bi-Done’s candidacy? Because comparing the two octagenarians isn’t a persuasive way to do that.

  133. 133

    I don’t know about sticking the landing, but “President Putin” and “Vice President Trump” were happy with Bi-Done’s performance last night.

    Sahil Kapur
    @sahilkapur
    Biden world is feeling good about the NATO press conference. Per one source in his orbit, they believe it should comfort open-minded skeptics who had legit questions post-debate on Biden’s ability to battle Trump and offer a second-term vision; they believe he stuck the landing.
    7:28 PM · Jul 11, 2024

  134. 134

    Joy Behar is big mad at George Clooney.

    For telling Biden he’s too far gone to run again in an op-ed, instead of face-to-face.

  135. 135

    Who the fuck is Joy Behar?

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