Trump 2016

[Malcolm]

This might also be why I slam Trump so often.




I can't tell if he's being serious or doing a really shitty modern update of Citizen Kane.

[Vince]

It was cool when the other guy said "And the waters will recede," though.

I think you know me well enough to know what I think of the Democrats. Having as our defense that our guy is only as bad as their guys isn't really a selling point. I's sum up his speech tonight as, "We're from the government and we're here to help you."

It's been the main objection by conservatives all along. We are running a Democrat.

On the up side, we are finally running the big government socially liberal candidate the establishment always wanted and press always said we needed. If he loses with a Bob Dole election map (I'm suspecting that sort of a win for Hillary) then maybe they will shut up on that score.

[GORDON]

I'm just saying that I'm not even paying attention and I still see the blatant hypocrisy coming out of this election.

[Malcolm]

Democrats hold a mock wake to mourn their dead. Oh shit, I meant "Republicans." I repeat, I cannot think of a candidate in recent history that's had his own party rebel against him this badly.

[GORDON]

On the one hand, everybody hates the party because they obviously lost their way long before Trump came along.

On the other hand, one of the reasons people mock Trump is because the party hates him.

It's insane.

[Vince]

Are you kidding? The party LOVES him. It's really funny because he's the "outsider" that hijacked the party. In turn, the party national leadership hijacked his campaign. They are using this opportunity to eject all the factions of the Republican party that they always hated but merely tolerated for their votes. Conservatives and grassroots people have been shown the door. By this point it should be obvious who the true outsider in this race was. It's the one the establishment STILL hates.

From here...

After 2008 and 2012, I realized that celebrity and hype could win over the left. It is with complete displeasure that I have realized that the right is susceptible to the exact same thing.

I've been told that what I need to understand is that people are mad. They're not thinking about policy or the Constitution-- they're just angry. That's what this is about.

Respectfully, that is not something that I need to understand. That is something you need to cure. Making poor decisions out of anger is not an instinct that I intend to coddle.

[Vince]

Good God this man is an idiot.

Okay, even if you decide to do this (which he won't unless he can do it with other people's money because he's notoriously cheap), Cruz is a popular sitting senator in TX (though TX is firmly red) and though I don't care for him, Kasich is popular in Ohio. OH is very much a swing state and I'd say almost 100% necessary for a Trump victory. You want to warm up to him and his supporters. He's the dumbest man on the planet.

[Malcolm]

Q: What did you drink tonight?
A: Moscow Mule(s). Seems fitting.

"Can you feel that?!"

[Vince]

Since we're also talking about hypocrisy in the Hillary thread, we need to apply it to Trumpets. I keep seeing replies to any Republican critics of Trump that Hillary is the enemy ans she's the one they should be attacking. And then their cheeto god spends all day today attacking the guy he already beat in the primary. My former party nominated Nixon again. Only this one is less charming.

[TPRJones]

TX is firmly red

Don't be so sure. There's already a large blue population base (a bit over 40%). A not-inconsequential part of the red is - or perhaps at this point I should say was - a conservative hispanic base. Most hispanic voters down here lean strongly conservative even though most vote Democrat, but with the way Trump has treated them it's likely the rest that would vote Republican will also go Democratic. More telling is that there's a very large segment of the Republican base here that is exactly who you think they are when you consider who would vote for Cruz. Fifty year ago they were the southern conservative Democrats before they were converted into Republicans in the 80s. They hate Trump. Not enough to vote Clinton, perhaps, but enough to stand aside and let the state turn blue at the general.

Unless something changes I fully expect Texas to turn up blue in November.

[Vince]

TX is firmly red

Don't be so sure. There's already a large blue population base (a bit over 40%). A not-inconsequential part of the red is - or perhaps at this point I should say was - a conservative hispanic base. Most hispanic voters down here lean strongly conservative even though most vote Democrat, but with the way Trump has treated them it's likely the rest that would vote Republican will also go Democratic. More telling is that there's a very large segment of the Republican base here that is exactly who you think they are when you consider who would vote for Cruz. Fifty year ago they were the southern conservative Democrats before they were converted into Republicans in the 80s. They hate Trump. Not enough to vote Clinton, perhaps, but enough to stand aside and let the state turn blue at the general.

Unless something changes I fully expect Texas to turn up blue in November.

There's a part of me that would like to see that. I'm at the point now where I think the only way to have a principled opposition party to the Democrats is to destroy the Republican party and start over. The Republican party won't allow itself to be reformed. The Democrats, while I completely disagree with them, ar pretty firm to their principles.

[Malcolm]

In Texas specifically, do you think they're going to take kindly to some city boy from Queens? Expect Mrs. Bill to put ads down there full of Trump's "I'm not against abortion" quotes. I think whatever red bias is down there just got reduced to a 50/50 toss up. As I've predicted before, a Mondale-like smackdown circa 1984 will occur. I'm not even sure Trump wins NY, and most of them still remember Hillary the senator. However, what I just saw at the RNC tells me that even if Donnie gets figuratively Mr. Garrison'd like that, he's laid down a blueprint for the next armchair megalomaniac to do the same. I would bet everything I own that they'll fall for it again. And again. And again ad nauseum. The phrase "Trumped up" will take on new meaning.

[Malcolm]

Donnie Dipshit and the rest of the sycophants hit the trifecta today.

Rick Scott:

Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) said "if we're not supporting Donald Trump we're helping Hillary Clinton," when questioned about Sen. Ted Cruz’s refusal to officially endorse the Republican presidential candidate.

I guess Rick doesn't know there are more than two parties, nor does he want anyone else to learn such forbidden lore. Nothing wins people to your side like offering them no middle ground and alienating them.

Trump talks to Bernie boosters after Tim Kaine accepted the offer to be the second-most powerful woman in the country.

Trump called Kaine “an ethically challenged insider” in a statement following the announcement.

It is moments like this which convince me no higher power is paying attention to this world. Lightning should be pouring forth from the sky.

“The Bernie Sanders supporters are furious with the choice of Tim Kaine, who represents the opposite of what Bernie stands for. Philly fight?” he tweeted Saturday morning, making an appeal to Sanders voters, as he did during his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.

Donnie Dumbass appears to remain ignorant of the fact that no matter how much a voter hates Bernie, Hillary, or Tim, statistically speaking they hate him more.

More Oswald-Cruz conspiracy talk because ... well, you know how toxic break-ups can get.

A day after accepting the Republican presidential nomination, Trump touted the national tabloid as a credible source worthy of a Pulitzer Prize, and said the newspaper would not have run the photo if it was “wrong.” Moreover, Trump said, the Cruz camp “never denied” that it was Rafael Cruz in the photo with the man who assassinated President John F. Kennedy.

[Vince]

I don't think it'll be Mondale bad. The country is simply too divided for it to be that lopsided. I'm sticking to the Dole size loss. Looking at Trump getting about 10 states. And NY won't be one of them. Won't even bee in question within an hour of the polls closing. I don't know if a higher power is paying attention or not, but with that in mind...

Not only did they lift some significant lines from Michelle Obama for Melania's speech, Ivanka lifted a pretty big one with "With my father, all things are possible."

Um... Jesus Christ called and said stop lifting his material or he's sending his lawyer and that'll really fuck you up. Not really sure how the evangelical leaders are sleeping these days. I guess the forty pieces of silver make it easier.

[TheCatt]

Agree with Vince. Count on Trump in the 150-200 range, electorally. 5-7.5M votes down. More than 10 states, but some of those states are irrelevant.

[Malcolm]

He has plenty of time to dig a deeper hole.

[Vince]

One of the things I think is going to be interesting to see is how their negatives impact things. One of the podcasts I started listening to replacing radio pundits that used to be small government before kneeing before the orange Xerxes is Steve Deace. Probably far too Christian for most here, but he has a history with working campaigns. Worked with Huckabee (says he'd gladly trade in his success in talk radio and just be a radio sports guy if he could go back in time) and Romney and others. One of the interesting things he discusses in some depth are these polls. He says without seeing and understanding the internals, these are largely useless. Pollsters try to determine the meaning of the polls (the general "Trump vs Clinton" numbers they give you) by analyzing the internals and trying to make sense of them. Some do it a lot better than others. One of the better ones is Nate Silver at 538 (at least for now).

At any rate, one of the things Deace was talking about are negatives. No matter what, a candidate never gets more than 2 to 4 points more than their approval number. So even if people agree with you 80% of the time, but 80% of the people think you'r an asshole, you're going to lose to the guy that people agree with 20% of the time but 80% want to have a beer with him. And you're probably not going to get more than about 25% of the vote.

So what happens when both candidates combined are disliked by 60-70% of the population? This might be uncharted territory as far as trying to make sense of polling numbers.

[Malcolm]

WTF?

Donald Trump said his latest proposal to stop immigration "from any nation that has been compromised by terrorism" is an "expansion" of his blanket ban on Muslims, in an interview aired Sunday.

"I actually don't think it's a rollback. In fact, you could say it's an expansion," Trump told NBC's Chuck Todd on "Meet the Press." "I'm looking now at territory. People were so upset when I used the word Muslim. Oh, you can't use the word Muslim. Remember this. And I'm OK with that, because I'm talking territory instead of Muslim."
Trump has not defined which countries would be included in that list of territories.

But in the interview aired Sunday, Trump refused to rule out banning individuals from top US allies like France and Germany, agreeing that "they have totally been" compromised by terrorism.

Well, I guess the UK's out. And if we're talking countries compromised by terrorism, I guess no help for Israel.

Why I am so sure this walking puss stain of a person will lose? Michael Moore thinks he'll win.

But wait, Donnie Disconnected can't help but defend the dude from Fox who's getting destroyed.

The latest episode of Trump’s victim-blaming came Sunday morning when he appeared on NBC’s Meet The Press. There, Trump was asked about Fox News’ Roger Ailes resignation earlier this week after Gretchen Carlson’s bombshell harassment lawsuit and after over 20 other women reportedly came forward alleging sexual misconduct from Ailes.
Trump’s response to the question was simply jaw-dropping. Trump stated that he felt “very badly” for Ailes (not for the women, though). Trump also praised Ailes as a “very, very talented person,” applauding the way he built Fox News into a media powerhouse.

Then Trump started attacking the women who had come forward. “I can tell you that some of the women that are complaining, I know how much he's helped them," he said.

That'll secure the female vote.

[Vince]

Now is the time a smart candidate would shut up until it looks like the Democrats stop doing great damage to themselves. Every time DWS speaks she's getting booed off the stage.

What's the over/under for Trump stepping on his dick and getting the news cycle switched over to the latest stupid thing he's said? I'm betting he ALMOST makes it through today, but by time for his bedtime tweet h'll pooch it.

[Malcolm]

Yes, they do.

Trump + Reddit AMA = wtf.