The Race For 2024

[Shadowy Man]

There’s no such thing as a “best candidate” for VP. The closest we might come would be today the one who helps you win the election. Since Biden won the election one could argue that Harris was at least a good candidate if not “the best”. Unless we have access to data from a universe in which Biden picked someone else I don’t think we’ll ever know if there was a “better” candidate out there.

In one sense, duh, counterfactuals are inaccessible to us.
That does not mean that we cannot reason about relative merits of various candidates.

Sure. The way I would view it is that there’s a threshold above which one should be. Once there though it’s a subjective matter as to who is “best”. Just grabbing a McDonalds employee might not be a good idea but if that employee went on to be the attorney general and senator of a state then they have crossed the threshold.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

You are using that word poorly. Trump supporters were using numerology and QAnon related stuff in their support of Trump. THAT is "cultish" behavior... well more actual "cult", but the point is, support for Harris on this board is not remotely cultish. The most radical you'll find is partisan.

No, it goes beyond partisan I think. Total embrace of her (when Dems were at most lukewarm toward her) as soon as Biden withdrew combined to hostility toward any criticism of her veers into the cultish for sure.

One is free to criticize politicians. The trouble is, the criticisms revolved around her race, genitals, and claims of anti-Semitism.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

The trouble with losing the Senate isn't the budget, it is the Federal benches. It is really all that matters these days.

But surely even there it would be good to have a moderating influence. A Dem president with a Dem Senate or Rep president with Rep senate can nominate more extreme judges then when restrained by a Senate controlled by the opposite party.

And the heavily partisan Democrat version of Cannon and Kacsmaryk would be?

The issue will be the GOP will block judicial nominations, opening more seats for them to fill, and we've seen the legislative Justices they've been putting on the bench. Imagine Cannon or Kacsmaryk on a Appeals Court bench?

And I am sure that Dems have their own versions of both of them.

Who?

My point is, Congress should be a moderating influence on the executive and not a rubber stamp body.

Well yeah, but the GOP stopped doing that in the 90s. Things weren't peachy keen in the 80s and previously, but they weren't remotely as toxic. Pres. Ford nominated Stevens to the Supreme Court.

So much has been complained about inflation wise, but the pandemic was 75% of the inflation wick, not Democrat spending.

No argument there, but spending made it worse.

Worse... and the US economy currently is one of the strongest on the planet. That came at the cost of a little extra inflation. Had Biden undershot... I doubt you would be saying that the recession was better than inflation.

 

[Elixir]

the US economy currently is one of the strongest on the planet.

By any objective measure it is THE BEST economy on the planet.

That came at the cost of a little extra inflation. Had Biden undershot... I doubt you would be saying that the recession was better than inflation.

It doesn't matter what the situation is; Derec is now complaining about the best economy in the world. Do you think he wouldn't be whistling the exact same tune REGARDLESS of the facts on the ground?
For the 12 years I seen his posts here, I have never seen where he has EVER express approval for anything any democrat did.

 

[laughing dog]

You are complaining that the pool was too restricted. But you have no clue whether the pool was smaller than other VP pools.

You take a pool of all people that could be considered for Veep. Then you take that pool and remove 93% of people from it.
Do you really have no clue which pool is smaller?

I have a clue your description is ridiculously silly because well over half the US citizenry could be considered for VP and 7 percent of 100 million (a low estimate) is a pool of 7 million potential candidates.

 

[Toni]

Why is it that white people, especially white male people, especially over 50 years of age are more likely to have stellar education and experience?

Why do you think? People in their 50s would likely have gone to college in the 1990s. That is well after all educational opportunities have been opened for non-whites and women - and then some, thanks to "affirmative action".

Every pool of potential candidates for VP is quite small, and is restricted to those who have the right experience, education, national presence, can pass a very stringent background investigation.

So why restrict it even more by removing people by race and gender?

Heretofore, the candidate pool has been white and male.

Obama had been elected before. Hillary was a presidential candidate. Ferraro was a vice presidential candidate.

Biden made a deliberate choice to select someone outside of those last two parameters.

And he made the same restrictive choice for SCOTUS - white men need not apply.

If there were not over 200 years of history that specifically excluded blacks and females from the potential pool of candidates, there would have been no reason to make a deliberate choice outside of white male.

Again, two wrongs do not make a right.

There are some people who are just more comfortable with certain types of people in certain positions. A lot of women prefer female gynecologists.

And OB/GYN rotations are often toxic and hostile toward male students. But I must say, a med student buddy of mine had a great experience with his preceptor. She let him get really hands on, even doing LEEPs.

Some people think that Jews are better attorneys or accountants.

And that attitude has been skewered, for example here:

Some people believe that Asian or Hispanic people are the best gardeners. And who doesn’t love a French chef? Or a Belgian chocolatier? Or an Italian tailor or architect? Of course we do know that none of those characteristics ensue individuals with special affinity for certain lines of work. Most if us rightly are a bit offended at the idea.

Well a Japanese gardener would be more likely trained in Japanese styles, same with French chef. But a Chinese chef could be French trained and vice versa, so yes, it is silly to assume, even if, in aggregate these things will often be true.

But some of us are more comfortable with how things have always been.

I understand change is inevitable. But that does not mean we should uncritically welcome all change. Things can stay the same only one way, but they can change in infinite ways, most of them probably for the worse.

There have been a number of female presidential candidates, going back many years. I had forgotten about Ferarro. Obama was elected POTUS, not VP, which is what I was talking about.

Given how butt hurt you are that Affirmative Action ever existed, then I completely understand how it is that you have told yourself that Affirmative Action removed all barriers to education and employment and lines of credit and mortgages and neighborhoods for all non-white male persons. Affirmative Action was in place BEFORE women were granted the legal right to credit in their own names without a male co-signer. I was an ADULT when that happened. It was still difficult for women to get a mortgage without a male co-signer, no matter her age or income, for a number of years after ECOA was passed. You are naive or deliberately obtuse to ignore the fact that such discrimination still has ramifications throughout society and that bias, racial, or gender, is definitely still an issue in the workplace and in finance and in life.

Change is simply change: it can be positive or negative and carries with it uncertainty. People who succeed tend to be those who are more accepting of and adaptable to change.

 

[Toni]

Lots of people have given you advice nand encouragement, Derec.

NAND?

How can you not remember 81 pages of advice and encouragement? You couild have gained from it, but you did not choose to.

Oh yeah, I did not post there even though I said I would. I guess I did not get drunk enough since 2021 ...

Glad that you are not getting too drunk anymore Derec. A bit sad that you needed to get drunk to post but I get it. OTOH, in a way, we are the perfect place to dump: you are anonymous and so are we so even if we worked in the next cubicle, we'd never guess who we were posting/replying to. I hope you realize that people do care about you and that we think that you are beating yourself up pretty hard and have some wrong headed ideas about what women want.

 

[Shadowy Man]

The issue will be the GOP will block judicial nominations, opening more seats for them to fill, and we've seen the legislative Justices they've been putting on the bench. Imagine Cannon or Kacsmaryk on a Appeals Court bench?

And I am sure that Dems have their own versions of both of them.

Who?

really? On an atheist discussion board you aren’t accepting his surety of a fact as sufficient?? Shocking!

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

I don't either. Frankly, this should be a blowout, perhaps not like Nixon-McGovern or Reagan-Mondale, but at least like Bush-Dukakis.
With a better candidate on the top the ticket, it most likely would be.

With the right-wing where they are today? Easily in excess of 45% of the country is voting for the guy who incited a riot on January 6th as part of a plan to seize power via the Vice President in an election he knew he lost. One can only go so far to blame the other candidate for that level of partisanship.

Even Dukakis got 45.6% of the popular vote.

Actually Dukakis won in '88.

To avoid a blowout and make the election close, Trump needs needs more than his MAGA base. He needs people to vote for him despite intensely disliking him, or for people to be staying home because they dislike both of them.

He has that vote. That demographic is called "the rest of the Republican base". What he needs to actually win are the suburbs. That also tends to be what Harris needs as well.

But who am I kidding. This forum has become hopelessly coconutpilled, and any criticism of Kamala Harris is treated as some sort of unforgivable sin.

That reflection appears to have absolutely nothing to do with what I stated. I indicated that Trump has 45% of the vote, no questions asked. Regardless of what he did in 2020, he has that vote. It has nothing to do with Harris... or Biden... or whomever the Democrats would have run.

 

[Elixir]

I indicated that Trump has 45% of the vote, no questions asked.

I think that NQA number is more like 47%.
Minimal cheating required to achieve a "win" (steal).

 

[TomC]

But even restricting it to what most people mean by that term, things like better standard of living, gifts, K1 or spousal visa, many relationships are still transactional. Especially when you have a big difference in age or attractiveness between the partners.

Disagree. Most relationships are close to parity--we only notice the odd cases.

But we are talking about an odd case - a 30 year old lawyer shacking up with a 60 year old mayor.

Nope.
We're talking about a smart, ambitious, hot woman hooking up with a strong, masculine, dude.
Sorry if you can't get one.

Or the other.
Tom

 

[Elixir]

Per Derec's witnessing, "any criticism of Kamala Harris is treated as some sort of unforgivable sin".
I realize that's at least somewhat hyperbolic, i.e. I can tellya right now her nasally tone irks the shit out of me. It's annoying and sounds solicitous.

Now let the pillorying begin.

This terrible thing bears approximately the same relationship to Donald Trump's faults, as a BLM protest with some broken windows and maybe a couple hundred grand in property damage does to trying to violently overthrow a Presidential election after losing by more than 7 million votes.

This time it's going to be selling out America to the Russians and rendering it a dictatorship so The Donald doesn't have to go to prison.
But that's pretty much the same thing as having an annoying nasal tone, in The Book of Derec....

 

[Derec]

Nope.
We're talking about a smart, ambitious, hot woman hooking up with a strong, masculine, dude.

Nope again.
"Smart, ambitious, hot reasonably attractive woman" was hooking up with an old, not terribly attractive dude who helped her political career.

Sorry if you can't get one.

Personal attacks are beneath you. Leave that shit to the Ilk (they know who they are).

 

[Derec]

This terrible thing bears approximately the same relationship to Donald Trump's faults, as a BLM protest with some broken windows and maybe a couple hundred grand in property damage

Try again. There were many billions in property damage in multiple cities, city blocks occupied for weeks (on in the case of Minneapolis over a year), several people dead (including an 8 year girl in Atlanta) and many injured.

does to trying to violently overthrow a Presidential election after losing by more than 7 million votes.

I do not defend 1/6. But neither should the 2020 insurrection be downplayed. Just like the 1/6 crowd, the #BLM/Antifa should have been prosecuted to the full extent of the law. They burned down buidings and vehicles, they vandalized and looted countless businesses and they took parts of cities hostage for an extended period of time. Instead, they got sweetheart deals (no prison time for Wendy's arsonists in Atlanta, mere year in prison for the two lawyers who torched a police vehicle in NYC, 10 years for an arsonist who killed a man in Minneapolis) or were not prosecuted at all.

This time it's going to be selling out America to the Russians and rendering it a dictatorship so The Donald doesn't have to go to prison.
But that's pretty much the same thing as having an annoying nasal tone, in The Book of Derec....

Nasal tone is least of my worries about the Kamala Harris presidency. I think she is too far left and that she has terrible judgment. Look at how quick she has been to express support for the striking longshoremen even though the demands of the Union are entirely unreasonable.

 

[Politesse]

Now let the pillorying begin.

Tonalist pig!

 

[laughing dog]

Lots of people have given you advice nand encouragement, Derec.

NAND?

How can you not remember 81 pages of advice and encouragement? You couild have gained from it, but you did not choose to.

Oh yeah, I did not post there even though I said I would. I guess I did not get drunk enough since 2021 ...

Glad that you are not getting too drunk anymore Derec. A bit sad that you needed to get drunk to post but I get it.

I don't know about getting too drunk to post, but sometimes it helps to get drunk in order to make sense of posts..

 

[ZiprHead]

The Boss has endorsed KH.

 

[thebeave]

The Boss has endorsed KH.

This guy? BFD.

 

[ZiprHead]

Springfield businessman dubbed a "traitor" and threatened for defending Haitian employees

Jamie McGregor said he has received hundreds of violent threats from supporters of former President Donald Trump

www.salon.com

A businessman in Springfield, Ohio has received death threats and been labeled a traitor after defending his Haitian employees, The New York Times reported.

Jamie McGregor, a fifth-generation Springfield resident and the owner of McGregor Metal, first hired Haitian workers after a large population of Haitian immigrants settled in the Ohio town in 2020. They now make up 10% of McGregor’s team of over 300 employees.

Chaos and violence descended on Springfield after a false rumor that Haitian immigrants in the town were eating local pets was spread nationally by Republican nominee Donald Trump and his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio. Amid that campaign, McGregor felt the need to speak up and defend the Haitian employees who are crucial to his business’ success.

“They come to work every day. They don’t cause drama. They’re on time,” he told The New York Times earlier this month. He also defended his employees on PBS NewsHour, noting that his Haitian employees are also his most reliable.

Since then, McGregor has faced a number of death threats, including posters around town with his face printed alongside the word, "traitor," forcing him to increase security at his business.

“Why are you importing Third World savages who eat animals and giving them jobs over United States citizens?” a voicemail left for McGregor said.

McGregor, who is a lifelong Republican and two-time Trump voter, has since purchased a gun, something he had previously vowed never to do.

But that step was advised by the FBI, whose agents visited McGregor’s family home on Sept. 12 and told him to take the threats seriously, saying they had found several to be "credible." They told him to keep his blinds shut, vary his driving routes, lock his business doors and wear gloves when opening his mail.

Ah, those Trumpers are such nice people.

 

[ZiprHead]

The Boss has endorsed KH.

This guy? BFD.

View attachment 48026

I don't know who that is and the only Boss I recognize is Springsteen.