The Race For 2024

[Jimmy Higgins]

I still don't get the victimhood stuff. Trump always whines about being a victim. Right-wing populism is usually about blame and punishment, left-wing populism is about victimhood and retribution. Trump is somehow merging the two.

Add in the lies, the ridiculous lies. They aren't even believable. They are so outlandish, I need to fact check he actually said them! Trump has normalized lying. Politics is stuff with exaggeration, misleading statements, and sometimes lies. Trump is just full blown bullshit mode and he produces so much, there is no way to reconcile it. Add to this all the anti-Democratic crap from the W Admin and the GOP since Clinton, it created this bizarre super cell of anti-Democracy nonsense which is tilting America towards being on the wrong side of history.

At least Hitler was deluded enough to think he was building a new world, Trump doesn't give a fuck about the world. He makes Lord Baelish look like Jimmy Carter.

 

[Politesse]

America towards being on the wrong side of history.

Si alguna vez estuvieron en el lado correcto depende de quién tu haces la pregunta.

 

[Colonel Sanders]

We are fucked!

Probably. There is no cure for stupid.
But I wonder how stupid the people are who control RW media. What are their interests? Letting Trump become King Donald the 1st might not be in the instruction set, even if keeping Biden from winning again is top priority. They probably don’t want to be “Nationalized” like Russian business.

My guess is that their dream is one of disbursement of any information they want to a tightly controlled population wherein they profit tremendously and perpetually. Imagine Fox News with billions in government subsidies and little to no competition. It'd be like the North Korean news, but with a lot more money.

 

[Colonel Sanders]

We are fucked!

Probably. There is no cure for stupid.
But I wonder how stupid the people are who control RW media. What are their interests? Letting Trump become King Donald the 1st might not be in the instruction set, even if keeping Biden from winning again is top priority. They probably don’t want to be “Nationalized” like Russian business.

I was reading an article this morning about his long history of saying things were rigged whenever he lost. He did the same thing when his stupid tv show didn't win any awards. I've never known such a psychopathic narcissist although I imagine more exist, just not one that has the power to do so much damage to the country and other parts of the world. Everyday, he's screaming if he loses the election is rigged.

I've known one and it was insane. These types are obsessive, spiteful, self-centered beyond what you think a non-violent criminal could be, and maybe most importantly they are fucking tireless.

I can't go into much detail* but I had an opposing party in a case that was a true psychopath and narcissist. Not someone who was upset or short tempered, but a for-real disturbed individual with no conscience to speak of. It was a surreal nightmare of a case that I'll never forget.

It was never difficult to catch this person lying. Quite the opposite. The thing is though, morality just wasn't a factor for this person. Like addicts, people like this are shit-grenades. They go off and everyone around them gets splattered with their shit.

Initially, these people tend to come off as charming. There's a term that's been around for some time now, known as "Love Bombing." This is what Trump has done to his followers. Tell them everything they want to hear and exploit every prejudice without ever considering consequences. The only thing cared about are the rewards he'll receive. The only wrong that ever occurs to them is when someone isn't on board with their program 100%. It's not a matter of I'm trying to do good things and they're preventing that. It's I want, I want, I want, I want, I want and they're not giving it to me so they're evil. The more they're opposed, the harder they fight. There will never be the slightest conceit e.g., "Okay, maybe I could've handled that situation a little better." Nope, no way, never going to happen; and that's because they never believe they do anything wrong, even when they harm people.

You think, okay, now that they've been beaten and shown they can't do This Thing anymore, they're right back at it. To see this happen in real life... again, it was surreal. I heard from this freak via text just a few weeks back. It's why I still carry a 9mm pistol. It's why when there's a knock on my door, the first place my mind goes to is my dresser door where I have a .357 revolver ready to go.

Trump is a true psychopath. Make no mistake about it. And the people that love him will do anything he asks.


*Dear ABA, fuck you and your tedious rules.

 

[southernhybrid]

We are fucked!

Probably. There is no cure for stupid.
But I wonder how stupid the people are who control RW media. What are their interests? Letting Trump become King Donald the 1st might not be in the instruction set, even if keeping Biden from winning again is top priority. They probably don’t want to be “Nationalized” like Russian business.

I was reading an article this morning about his long history of saying things were rigged whenever he lost. He did the same thing when his stupid tv show didn't win any awards. I've never known such a psychopathic narcissist although I imagine more exist, just not one that has the power to do so much damage to the country and other parts of the world. Everyday, he's screaming if he loses the election is rigged.

I've known one and it was insane. These types are obsessive, spiteful, self-centered beyond what you think a non-violent criminal could be, and maybe most importantly they are fucking tireless.

I can't go into much detail* but I had an opposing party in a case that was a true psychopath and narcissist. Not someone who was upset or short tempered, but a for-real disturbed individual with no conscience to speak of. It was a surreal nightmare of a case that I'll never forget.

It was never difficult to catch this person lying. Quite the opposite. The thing is though, morality just wasn't a factor for this person. Like addicts, people like this are shit-grenades. They go off and everyone around them gets splattered with their shit.

Initially, these people tend to come off as charming. There's a term that's been around for some time now, known as "Love Bombing." This is what Trump has done to his followers. Tell them everything they want to hear and exploit every prejudice without ever considering consequences. The only thing cared about are the rewards he'll receive. The only wrong that ever occurs to them is when someone isn't on board with their program 100%. It's not a matter of I'm trying to do good things and they're preventing that. It's I want, I want, I want, I want, I want and they're not giving it to me so they're evil. The more they're opposed, the harder they fight. There will never be the slightest conceit e.g., "Okay, maybe I could've handled that situation a little better." Nope, no way, never going to happen; and that's because they never believe they do anything wrong, even when they harm people.

You think, okay, now that they've been beaten and shown they can't do This Thing anymore, they're right back at it. To see this happen in real life... again, it was surreal. I heard from this freak via text just a few weeks back. It's why I still carry a 9mm pistol. It's why when there's a knock on my door, the first place my mind goes to is my dresser door where I have a .357 revolver ready to go.

Trump is a true psychopath. Make no mistake about it. And the people that love him will do anything he asks.


*Dear ABA, fuck you and your tedious rules.

While I have never met one, I have read a couple of books about psychopathy. Yes. They often are charming, at least at first. Psychopathy is actually a disease of the frontal cortex, one that leaves the person with no moral compass at all. Add narcissism and you have Trump. While some of these mental cases are violent, many aren't. They just take advantage of others, often via financial crimes. Trump isn't personally violent, but he inspires violences in others, as you implied. I was reading an article this morning about how he has even lured some Black and Hispanic folks in New York City, into his cult. He told them he would do much more for them, compared to Biden. They deny his obvious racism. Cult members I've spoken to, tell me things, like, "Oh he says a lot of things that he really doesn't mean." Most of these people are very religious, so I imagine they are easy to manipulate into a cult that tells them what they want to hear.

Sadly, we have no effective treatment for psychopathy.

 

[TomC]

Psychopathy is actually a disease of the frontal cortex, one that leaves the person with no moral compass at all. Add narcissism and you have Trump.

To reach Trump's levels of psychotic behavior you need a gigantic family fortune that has protected you from the consequences of your choices for your entire life.
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

The Shaky Foundation of Trump’s Lead: Disengaged Voters

The polls have shown Donald Trump with an edge for eight straight months, but there’s one big flashing warning sign suggesting that his advantage might not be quite as stable as it looks. That warning sign: His narrow lead is built on gains among voters who aren’t paying close attention to...

www.yahoo.com

The polls have shown Donald Trump with an edge for eight straight months, but there’s one big flashing warning sign suggesting that his advantage might not be quite as stable as it looks.

That warning sign: His narrow lead is built on gains among voters who aren’t paying close attention to politics, who don’t follow traditional news and who don’t regularly vote.

To an extent that hasn’t been true in New York Times/Siena College polling in the last eight years, disengaged voters are driving the overall polling results and the story line about the election.

President Joe Biden has actually led the last three Times/Siena national polls among those who voted in the 2020 election, even as he has trailed among registered voters overall. And looking back over the last few years, almost all of Trump’s gains have come from these less engaged voters.

Was this reported by the news media?: No,

 

[bilby]

Was this reported by the news media?: No,

You literally quoted a report by the news media.

So, tautologically: Yes,

 

[ZiprHead]

^^^ This is true and I accept the wet noodle lashing.

 

[Derec]

Islamists in the US are working to defeat Biden over his lukewarm support for Israel. I guess anything except total opposition to Israel is acceptable to them.
'Democrats will learn a lesson': Some Muslims work to defeat Biden in battleground states

Human rights Prof. Hassan Abdel Salam has spent the past seven years teaching his students at the University of Minnesota about genocides around the world. On the last day of his class on global Islamophobia in April,

A class on "global islamophobia"? What a joke US universities are becoming!

Abdel Salam, 48, is among a group of Muslim activists, including several Minnesotans, who are organizing in nine swing states in opposition to Biden's re-election. The group's leaders say they want to politically punish the president for what they describe as enabling mass civilian casualties in Gaza.

I bet this Abdel Salam creep has no words of condemnation for Hamas, even though they started this war by massacring >1000 Israelis and kidnaping hundreds. And they are making civilian casualties more likely though their tactics of hiding among the civilian population and stealing aid. But no, Israel is wrong for defending itself, Hamas is not wrong for starting a war of aggression.

He said he and other Abandon Biden leaders are evaluating third-party candidates and plan to make an endorsement this summer. And if Trump wins because of their work, "the big gift that would come out of punishing the president is that an entire party ... becomes a pro-Palestinian party against the occupation and will begin to look for equity much more aggressively than we have in the past," Abdel Salam said.

The confluence of leftism and Islamism is on display here by his causal use of the word "equity". What exactly does he mean by it here? Because in the clause preceding it he wants Dems to become a "pro-Palestinian party". How is that equitable?

Ellison said that, among other actions, Trump closed the Palestine Liberation Organization's diplomatic mission in Washington, D.C.; moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem; stopped funding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees; and brokered the 2020 Abraham Accords to try to bring Israel and other Arab countries to peace "without doing anything for Palestine."

Yeah, how dare he seek a peace agreement among those actually interested in peace (Hamas is definitely not). Moving the embassy to the capital of Israel is just fulfilling the US law that was passed in 1995. And closing a PLO mission and defunding Hamas' handmaiden UNRWA was long overdue as well.

"In order for moral advancement to take place, we cannot move into the formula of what is the lesser of two evils," he said.

Cthulhu for America: why vote for the lesser evil?

 

[Derec]

An opinion piece by Ezra Klein:
Seven Theories for Why Biden Is Losing (and What He Should Do About It)

The seven possible reasons are "the polls are wrong, it’s the media’s fault, it’s a bad time to be an incumbent, voters are angry about rising prices and high interest rates, voters think Biden is too liberal, voters think Biden is too old and Democrats need to redefine Trump".

The whole article is worth reading, and the true reason is almost certainly some combination of all of these, but let me just focus on the "he is too liberal" part, as I have been saying the same thing.

The Biden administration has worried about shoring up its left flank, particularly since the war in Gaza. But the Times/Siena poll found that while Biden is losing only 2 percent of his “very liberal” voters from 2020 to Trump, he is losing 16 percent of his supporters who described themselves as moderate and conservative.

This is a big deal. The left wing of the Democratic Party has been pulling Biden hard to the left ever since he was nominated. That's why I have been joking that he is like King Theoden (RIP Bernard Hill) under the spell of Sandy Wormtongue (aka AOC) and Bernie Sandersman the White.

His support for left-wing policies like wanton spending ($3.5T in new non-infrastructure spending into an already overheating and inflationary economy) embrace of AOC's nuttier ideas like her climate paramilitaries etc. Even on Gaza he has been pulled to the Left - he started out with strong assurances of support for Israel and recognition that Hamas must be destroyed, but now he is cancelling arms shipments and saying Israel should not invade Rafah (from where Tel Aviv was attacked with a rocket barrage just yesterday). Pathetic!

In 2020, Biden ran as the moderate alternative in a Democratic primary contest in which Bernie Sanders led many of the polls. Biden vocally opposed ideas like defunding the police. But after the primaries, Biden welcomed the left into his coalition and his government. On the substance, I prefer the Biden of 2024 to the Biden of 1995, but the shift might have cost him a political identity that was once central to his success.

Yep. He ran as a moderate, and then fell under the spell of the sorcerer and his apprentice. I think if he was younger, he would have been able to resist this corrosive influence.
I think a similar thing has happened to Bernie himself, earlier in the 2020 campaign (i.e. in 2019). 2016 Bernie was, of course, very left, and even called himself a "socialist". However, he was his own man, with unique ideas and was even a bit mavericky. Most importantly, he did not subscribe wholeheartedly to New New Left ideas such as identity politics or hostility toward Israel. By the time of the 2020 campaign, he let himself be influenced by the likes of AOC, Rashida Tlaib and even Linda "Cockroach" Sarsour.

I don’t know if Trump’s effort to run to the center on abortion will work, but he’s definitely going to try, even if it offends his base. Is there any issue on which Biden is doing the same?

I don't think so. Biden definitely should defy his left fringe more often. It would both be good policy and good politics, as it would make him more popular with moderates and independents. The left fringe is too hard to please (just look at how they opposed Al "Mr. Climate" Gore in 2000!) and it's a fool's errand to try to appease them. Same goes for the Islamist "Abandon Biden" and "Death to America" contingent in states such as Michigan and Minnesota.

 

[scombrid]

the “Islamists” prefer Trump? Seems odd.

 

[TomC]

the “Islamists” prefer Trump? Seems odd.

That's easy to explain.

Trump doesn't believe in basic American values. Neither do Islamic terrorists.
Or Putin.

That's what they have in common.
It appears that they are winning the war against multi-ethnic, secular, democracy.
Tom

 

[Loren Pechtel]

the “Islamists” prefer Trump? Seems odd.

Trump flails around, Biden does. All of America's opponents would prefer a Trump victory so long as the generals don't let him get his finger on the button.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

It seems the topic Biden is weakest on is the economy. The deluded masses actually think inflation has hurt them, even though it is down from its peak. What do they know about the general state of the economy? All they know about is their grocery bill and the price of gas, which doesn't tell them anything they need to know.

 

[Derec]

the “Islamists” prefer Trump? Seems odd.

They explained it in the article.

They say they oppose Donald Trump, too, but are OK if their efforts help re-elect the former president who once banned Muslims from the United States and threatens to do it again.
"By defeating [Biden], it would signal to the entire political landscape that defending genocide could lead to your defeat, so beware," Abdel Salam said. "That's my goal … promote the message throughout the nation and ensure it's a consistent one."
He said he and other Abandon Biden leaders are evaluating third-party candidates and plan to make an endorsement this summer. And if Trump wins because of their work, "the big gift that would come out of punishing the president is that an entire party ... becomes a pro-Palestinian party against the occupation and will begin to look for equity much more aggressively than we have in the past," Abdel Salam said.

Primary objective seems to be to punish Biden, but they are also hoping that the 2nd Trump term will push the Democratic Party toward their position (i.e. against Israel) the same way the first Trump term pushed the Democrats to the left more generally.

Btw, I saw another article on the same theme. This time starring the horrid Rashida Tlaib.

Tlaib: Pro-Palestinian voters will make Biden pay for defending ‘genocidal maniac Netanyahu’

NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFP)
Far-left US Rep. Rashida Tlaib warns that pro-Palestinian Americans will make President Joe Biden’s administration and congressional lawmakers pay for their support for Israel in the upcoming election season.
“It is disgraceful that the Biden administration and my colleagues in Congress continue to smear [anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian students on college campuses] for protesting to save lives — no matter their faith or ethnicity. It is cowardly. But we’re not going to forget in November, are we?” says Tlaib in a speech at the People’s Conference for Palestine in Detroit.

Btw, the keynote speaker at that conference was the widow of a recently deceased PFLP terror leader. He died in prison a year before his scheduled release.

The conference has included speakers affiliated with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine — a US-designated terror group. Panelists have been heard expressing support for terrorism and other acts of violent “resistance” against Israel, including Hamas’s October 7 onslaught during which some 1,200 Israelis were killed and 252 were taken hostage, mostly civilians.

Tlaib should be censured for sure for her speaking at this conference. Perhaps she should also be expelled from the Democratic Party.

“President Biden, I hope you hear us loud and clear. Attacking the authority of the International Criminal Court and interfering in the legal process is nothing more than an attempt to prevent the genocidal maniac [Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu and senior Israeli officials from being held accountable for their crimes against humanity,” Tlaib says to cheers from the large crowd at today’s conference.

No words of condemnation for the terrorist maniacs who would initiate real genocide if they had the power - people like Yaya Sinwar and Ismail Haniyeh. Typical of Rashida Tlaib really.

 

[Derec]

It seems the topic Biden is weakest on is the economy. The deluded masses actually think inflation has hurt them, even though it is down from its peak.

The high inflation definitely hurt people. Inflation rate may have come down, but that is just the rate of change. The cumulative effect of the last 3 years is still with us.

As are the higher interest rates made necessary in order to bring the inflation down.

The economy looks good on paper. But the reality is different for many people. Take housing. If you own your home, and perhaps a rental property too, things look good. If you are a young couple house hunting, things look dismal - the real estate prices are sky high, and the interest rates are also much higher than before. Btw, the high interest rates are also responsible for less churn in the real estate market. People who are still paying on their mortgage, but would like to sell and buy another property stay put instead because they are loathe to give up their <3% mortgage rate - which is free money right now since the inflation rate is around 3% itself.

 

[unapologetic]

It seems the topic Biden is weakest on is the economy. The deluded masses actually think inflation has hurt them, even though it is down from its peak. What do they know about the general state of the economy? All they know about is their grocery bill and the price of gas, which doesn't tell them anything they need to know.

We shouldn't blame the inflation on Biden.
Businesses are bouncing back from the lockdown.
I saw this comming, why didn't anyone else?
I knew it in 2020 when congress gave us taxpayers cash, trying to prevent a depression.
Even if Rump won in 2020, he couldn't have prevented the bounce-back inflation we are currently experiencing.
Just be glad it isn't worse.

 

[Elixir]

Just be glad it isn't worse.

It would be, if Rump had won.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Kids these days:

The growing gender gap among young people

Elaine Kamarck and Jordan Muchnick analyze the shifting political ideologies of young voters and the growing gender gap among them.

www.brookings.edu

History is littered with examples of nations suffering from the consequences of young men finding themselves idle without purpose.
We may be in the opening stages of a social backlash to the progressive social movements of the past decades. When significant societal change occurs, some may feel left behind or cheated. Right now, young men fall into that camp.