All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Biden's victory speech is great. Interesting when he talks of great Presidents he goes Lincoln in 1860, FDR in 1933, JFK in 1960, Obama in 2012. It's like Obama's already been pantheonized. Biden's victory is consolidating his legacy.

But also Biden is placing himself in that model of progressive Presidents, and giving ideas of who he considers models. Except for Obama, every POTUS mentioned was in office before he became senator.

So from a generational perspective it's a kind of Boomer-Milennial Alliance, and indicates that Biden's not a fan of the Democratic turn in the interim between JFK and Obama.

[BeastieRunner]

[JCAll]

People having a lot of fun today.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

People having a lot of fun today.

That was great. It's amazing feeling.

I feel genuinely elated and optimistic about Biden and also genuinely engaged and aware of what's ahead. I think we can be that at the same time. The ones here who feel let down that they didn't get the trifecta, the ones here who are thrilled that they beat the final boss of 2016.

And the thing is here's how I see it.

Whatever issues coming ahead, there's nothing that can't be overcome. SCOTUS? Midterms? McConnell? Whatever comes, however hard it gets, and so on, there's nothing that can be thrown ahead by the right that's permanent, a done deal, or insurmountable. Irritating at times, sure. Frustrating and embittering, certainly. But these aren't geniuses, they are flawed, frightened, desperate people. McConnell was cunning but he also made mistakes, he lost Arizona, and the AZ Republican Party are gonna give him the stink eye for a while. So he didn't come out of this smelling like roses. And he's gonna f--k up again eventually.

But here's the thing we have reasons to be optimistic. And when I say that I don't mean feelings I mean reasons. Inherently deep inside, you have the sense that you're right and that's enough of a powerful feeling. And that's the thing, hope is what politics is all about. Nobody, of any party, gets far in politics without a sense of hope that they can succeed, they can get far, they can try harder and better, or that their ideas will prevail.

[Mister Mets]

Biden's victory speech is great. Interesting when he talks of great Presidents he goes Lincoln in 1860, FDR in 1933, JFK in 1960, Obama in 2012. It's like Obama's already been pantheonized. Biden's victory is consolidating his legacy.

But also Biden is placing himself in that model of progressive Presidents, and giving ideas of who he considers models. Except for Obama, every POTUS mentioned was in office before he became senator.

So from a generational perspective it's a kind of Boomer-Milennial Alliance, and indicates that Biden's not a fan of the Democratic turn in the interim between JFK and Obama.

Biden predates boomers.

He will almost certainly be the silent generation's only president.

As for his Obama references, that seems unavoidable when he was Obama's VP.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Biden predates boomers.

He will almost certainly be the silent generation's only president.

Whoa...silent generation. That's James Dean's generation.

As for his Obama references, that seems unavoidable when he was Obama's VP.

He could have slipped in Reagan as a bipartisan gesture, or Bill Clinton. But the silence speaks loud.

This election is the end of Clintonism in the Democrat Party, for the forseeable future.

[InformationGeek]

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeees. Give me more, MOOOOORE!

Fox News suspended Judge Jeanine because she wanted to defend Trump’s voter fraud charges.

THAT’S how phoney baloney their lawsuits are

[Revolutionary_Jack]

By the way, Donald Trump is the third US POTUS impeached. But he's the first US POTUS who after being impeached contested a general election.

And he lost.

So that means impeachment retains its sting. The threat of it even in a very partisan situation. It's a sanction that cannot be avoided without consequences. Clinton's impeachment arguably made W. competitive against Gore and so toxic was Bill that Gore avoided campaigning with him and attaching himself to Clinton's policies trying to separate himself.

In the case of Trump his attempt to sabotage Biden with this Burisma nothingburger ended up raising attention and profile to Biden as a national level candidate. Before the Impeachment in the primaries, it didn't seem that Biden would make it, but the Impeachment became about him and everyone in the Dem primaries rallied around Biden even if they otherwise went hard on him. Also a good thing, going hard in the primaries toughened up Biden, the Dems went far harder on him than Trump did in General Election...so a robust primary is good. HRC's primary opponents save Bernie didn't do much and that added to the perception of a coronation.

On the flip side, one can argue that Impeachment cost the moderate 2018 Dems-in-Red their seat, since aside from Tulsi Gabbard (who's probably on a flight to Russia jamming to "Back in the USSR") every Dem across party lines and faction, voted for Impeachment and no Republican did. Nancy Pelosi was scapegoated hard by the Senate and POTUS as House Leader...and the Impeachment and failure to pass the Stimulus before election. So doing the right thing can extract a price but not a total rejection and not one that cannot be recovered and improved from either.

[Wildling]

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeees. Give me more, MOOOOORE!

Looks like Murdoch is ready to move on to mining Biden term outrage out of the network lemmings.

I hope Sean Manatee gets embarrasment next.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Looks like Murdoch is ready to move on to mining Biden term outrage out of the network lemmings.

I hope Sean Manatee gets embarrasment next.

Murdoch is just there to make money out of these conservative schmucks. Sure he likes oligarchy and so on, but individual Republicans, not at all.

He made money out of the ratings bonanza during this pandemic covering elections, Aaron Mishkin basically stopped GOP from seriously supporting Trump's steal the election plan by calling AZ early, and that also drew Fox attention.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

By the way, Donald Trump is the third US POTUS impeached. But he's the first US POTUS who after being impeached contested a general election.

And he lost.

So that means impeachment retains its sting. The threat of it even in a very partisan situation. It's a sanction that cannot be avoided without consequences. Clinton's impeachment arguably made W. competitive against Gore and so toxic was Bill that Gore avoided campaigning with him and attaching himself to Clinton's policies trying to separate himself.

In the case of Trump his attempt to sabotage Biden with this Burisma nothingburger ended up raising attention and profile to Biden as a national level candidate. Before the Impeachment in the primaries, it didn't seem that Biden would make it, but the Impeachment became about him and everyone in the Dem primaries rallied around Biden even if they otherwise went hard on him. Also a good thing, going hard in the primaries toughened up Biden, the Dems went far harder on him than Trump did in General Election...so a robust primary is good. HRC's primary opponents save Bernie didn't do much and that added to the perception of a coronation.

On the flip side, one can argue that Impeachment cost the moderate 2018 Dems-in-Red their seat, since aside from Tulsi Gabbard (who's probably on a flight to Russia jamming to "Back in the USSR") every Dem across party lines and faction, voted for Impeachment and no Republican did. Nancy Pelosi was scapegoated hard by the Senate and POTUS as House Leader...and the Impeachment and failure to pass the Stimulus before election. So doing the right thing can extract a price but not a total rejection and not one that cannot be recovered and improved from either.

Honestly that's just an example of too small a sample size. Despite Trump's impeachment he had the second most votes of all time in an election, did better with Republicans and did better than any Republican since the 1960's in the minority vote. If you go simply off the data we know with this election, then Trump actually did very well for a Republican in recent memory. I think 30 said it, but if you look up the old 2016 map the decisive states were still Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania. Even keeping Georgia and Arizona, those three states going Trump give him the election. Those were essentially coinflips in 2020 and it was largely white working class Obama voters that defected to Trump. So the election was really decided off the one demographic Trump did worse in going back to the Vice President of the former President they supported in states that were already razor thin before anyways.

I mean I guess you could say the impeachment got them back rather than simply being back with someone associated with Obama, or the pandemic, or the economy. But the reality is Biden hardly ran on the impeachment and it just wasn't a big talking point in the media. Most polling data also indicates that the impeachment didn't really effect the country's opinion of Trump. The same people that liked and disliked Trump retained their stances before and after.

There's just far too little data to say the impeachment mattered at all. Trump still performed extremely well. He's going to finish with like 2 million more votes than any Presidential candidate ever aside from his opponent, did great within his party and did very well in demographics Republicans struggle with. That's two good of a performance on top of a sample size of one to draw any conclusions.

Also as far as it's impact on Biden, the impeachment and acquital all happened several months before he rallied back to win the primary. Like the impeachment was December, Bernie surged in Jan/Feb, and Biden came back in early in March. The timeline just doesn't add up.

Though I do agree the tougher primary did help Biden. Trump's inability to launch an effective attack was underwhelming compared to Sanders, Buttigieg, Harris, and Warren who all took bites out of him at various points. It also helped that the primary played to a natural conclusion and didn't have the perception of a thumb on the scale so that people could unify after the fact.

As far as the House goes, I think it's pretty blatent that 2018 was the real backlash to Trump and alot of those candidates that won just weren't that good if you had turnout. Most people don't vote in miderms and that was the first time in a long time that Dems decides to actually show up for one of those. That got people in that weren't sustainable in a more high profile election. Also Pelosi made a huge calculation era with the stimulus. She didn't come off well.

[Tami]

This is definitely one for the history books



Some say the world will end in fire/ Others say at Four Seasons Total Landscaping north of the Tacony-Palmyra bridge, near the porn shop

Some say the campaign ends in fire
Some say in ice.
Rudy has tasted of desire
While tucking in his shirt,
So next to the adult bookstore
At Four Seasons Total Landscaping
Is nice,
And will suffice.

Twitter Link

[JCAll]

Imagine heading to the adult video store, and ending up at a Rudy Guiliani press conference instead. You were having a nice day, now you have to listen to Guiliani, how embarrassing.

Thank god you're wearing a mask. Someone could recognize you and think you support Rudy Guiliani. People's lives have been ruined by that sort of thing.

[JackDaw]

I can assure you whatever Trump might do in the next two months will pale compared to anything he had in mind for the next four years.

I know a fair number of board members fear that.

But I really don’t see it, and am predicting:-

1/ He will do nothing radical or extreme

2/ He will concentrate on doing things that benefit him personally

He’s an unpleasant guy, but he’s not insane. Self interest is at the heart of everything he does. Pursuing a scorched earth policy would dis-benefit him so he won’t take that line.

There’s also the point that it would be extremely difficult now for him to get anything particularly damaging done...unlike most on these boards I think a significant number of Republicans will now looking to distance themselves from him now he’s a dead man walking. Potential for damage is limited.

It’s a subjective opinion...but one I deeply believe is right.

[GindyPosts]

Biden's victory speech is great. Interesting when he talks of great Presidents he goes Lincoln in 1860, FDR in 1933, JFK in 1960, Obama in 2012. It's like Obama's already been pantheonized. Biden's victory is consolidating his legacy.

But also Biden is placing himself in that model of progressive Presidents, and giving ideas of who he considers models. Except for Obama, every POTUS mentioned was in office before he became senator.

So from a generational perspective it's a kind of Boomer-Milennial Alliance, and indicates that Biden's not a fan of the Democratic turn in the interim between JFK and Obama.

People largely ignore or want to ignore the entire existence of anyone from Generation X. It was dismissed as a failed generation to the point nobody even argues about them in debates.