[Cause]

I think Kamala has one of the worst wiki pages possible. If you read the section about her vice presidency over half of her accomplished according to the page have something to do with being either the first women, first black person, or first black women to achieve something. These accomplishments don’t mean nothing but it’s not the CV I am looking for when deciding who should be president.

Honestly the best thing her campaign could do is somehow glitz it up. They can reword it to focus on her personal accomplishments.

A joke I personally find particularly funny is that Trump is proof America would vote for a black man to be president before a women. I may have too low an opinion of the general electorate in the USA but for many a black women are 2 marks against her. Luckily I guess most of these people are already hardcore MAGA so maybe won’t affect her much. Someone mentioned Pete Buttigieg as a good VP pick. I think he is great. Man interviews well and he fights back. A black women and a gay man ticket though… again maybe I’m too pessimistic

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Kamala's legions seem to be winning the internet:

Quote

Coconutpilled and contextmaxxing

[... Republicans] seem bizarrely unprepared for this.

Spoiler

Prominent Republican influencer James Lindsay, better known as @ConceptualJames, has been having an absolute meltdown on X for the last 24 hours. He seems particularly upset about Harris' hypnotically bizarre "what can be, unburdened by what has been" tagline, which Lindsay described as "a Marxist and Luciferian incantation," [...] I guess, Harris is just too conceptual for James.

Coconutposting is in full swing and the memes are very good. [...] Kamala summer has officially arrived. [...]

if you're looking for some good starting points on Kamala memes, here are the Know Your Meme pages for the coconut tree meme and the unburdened meme.

Coconutpilled and contextmaxxing (garbageday.email)

Quote

Dark Brandon Never Had the Meme Capital Kamala Harris Does Right Now

[...] after Biden announced he'd be dropping out of the presidential race, endorsing Harris in his place, the vibes of the political internet, which had oscillated between terrifying and depressing, conspicuously shifted. [...]

[...] If you're oblivious to what I'm talking about, then you might have just fallen out of the metaphorical coconut tree.

But try to keep up: It's not too late to exist in the context of all in which you live and what came before you. There's still time to embrace what can be, and become unburdened by what has been.

Kamala Harris presidential campaign memes: Charli XCX, Chappell Roan, coconut tree. (slate.com)

Meanwhile... more right-wing meltdown-o-rama:

Stephen Miller Has Hypersonic Fox News Meltdown Over Biden Withdrawal (thedailybeast.com)

Putin's Pals Panic That Trump's Opponent Is No Longer Old, Sick Guy (thedailybeast.com)

Billionaire Bill Ackman Compares Biden to 'Hostage' in X Conspiracy Rant (thedailybeast.com)

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 22 July 2024 - 09:43 PM

[Macros]

I think its going to be a brexit thing.
If everyone eligible actually remotely understood what they were voting for and went and voted the GOP would crash and burn

as it stands too many apathetic will enable the scum

[amphibian]

Macros, on 23 July 2024 - 03:45 PM, said:

I think its going to be a brexit thing.
If everyone eligible actually remotely understood what they were voting for and went and voted the GOP would crash and burn

as it stands too many apathetic will enable the scum

There's more emotion in the decision calculus for low information voters. The right wing is providing an outlet for anger and bigotry (with a heap of gun rights and controlling women), which is more attractive to a big segment of the country than doing the right thing.

Being angry >>> doing the right thing for too many people.

[Cause]

Director of the secret service resigned. Seemed dems republicans all wanted her too.

I’m not really against it but I’m not for it either. The secret service protects trump, joe Biden, embassies and fights counterfeit currency. The buck stops with her as Director I suppose but I don’t think she really had or even has the time to be involved in the minutia of a single trump rally when they happen every week.

If Trumps detail fucked up, which they obviously did, is it her fault? Unless she directly contributed to the error in some way? Political expediency or accountability?

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Cause, on 23 July 2024 - 05:08 PM, said:

Director of the secret service resigned. Seemed dems republicans all wanted her too.

I'm not really against it but I'm not for it either. The secret service protects trump, joe Biden, embassies and fights counterfeit currency. The buck stops with her as Director I suppose but I don't think she really had or even has the time to be involved in the minutia of a single trump rally when they happen every week.

If Trumps detail fucked up, which they obviously did, is it her fault? Unless she directly contributed to the error in some way? Political expediency or accountability?

Reportedly Trump / Trump's people asked for more security multiple times and were refused.

She was trying to reduce costs, which might have led to hiring fewer agents and more reliance on local police.

The local police were apparently the primary source of the errors.

Worst of all... Trump's still alive! Just kidding... well, mostly...

Meanwhile... since Biden dropped out, Kamala's campaign has raised over 100 million dollars. To put that in perspective---their entire war chest was only about 240 million dollars. In the entire second quarter of 2024 Democrats raised only $264 million, while Trump and the RNC raised $331 million.

And she's already secured enough delegates to win the nomination.

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 23 July 2024 - 05:36 PM

[worry]

amphibian, on 23 July 2024 - 04:08 PM, said:

Macros, on 23 July 2024 - 03:45 PM, said:

I think its going to be a brexit thing.
If everyone eligible actually remotely understood what they were voting for and went and voted the GOP would crash and burn

as it stands too many apathetic will enable the scum

There's more emotion in the decision calculus for low information voters. The right wing is providing an outlet for anger and bigotry (with a heap of gun rights and controlling women), which is more attractive to a big segment of the country than doing the right thing.

Being angry >>> doing the right thing for too many people.

This is a fact for too many people, as you say, but I don't know why it would drive this election, at least solely. It's a factor for sure, but not a foregone conclusion. Trump already has those people locked down. And they are in decline, especially since 2016 -- over 20 million boomers have died since then, while about 40 million younger people have entered the voting age window. The electoral college always makes things more dicey than they have to be, as 2020 showed (Biden's massive popular vote win vs. the slim-ish win margins in key purple states). But it's entirely doable.

[worry]

We may have to wait and see how the GOP calling Harris a childless cat lady -- despite being a married stepmother of two -- plays with suburban moms.

[Mezla PigDog]

Never underestimate the internalised misogyny of female voters. I'm hoping the younger generation are more progressive but fear it is even more ingrained than subconscious homophobia an old racism.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

worry, on 23 July 2024 - 09:14 PM, said:

We may have to wait and see how the GOP calling Harris a childless cat lady -- despite being a married stepmother of two -- plays with suburban moms.

I'd expect a large number of voters to assume her "children" are actually actors and/or lizard people and/or demons as part of a grand conspiracy to make it seem like Trump &co are lying.

Then again maybe Trump and the GOP will lean hard into "children don't count unless you give birth to them"?... Natural born children?

They've already resurrected a mutation of Birtherism to attack her with. Falsely claiming that since her parents weren't US citizens when she was born she's not a "natural born citizen" and so not eligible to run for president.

FACT FOCUS: A look at false claims around Kamala Harris and her campaign for the White House - ABC News (go.com)

Though of course Trump has said he wants to end birthright citizenship. Did he also say he wanted to have that apply retroactively?...

[worry]

That may be true, but that large number of voters are already in Trump's camp, and I don't know who else it will attract. Worth noting that birtherism -- as racist as it was, and as deep-seatedly racist as this country is -- didn't actually work against Obama. He won both of his elections handily. I do take the point about internalized misogyny, but again, a lot of that is already baked into Trump's support -- and where it isn't, those folks helped lose him the 2020 election (e.g. Georgia suburban women). Not to mention how crucial non-white voters are to Dems in every presidential election. We are kind of in uncharted waters with the potential of misogynoir affecting an actual presidential nominee, so I don't mean to paint things as rosy. But doom seems like a premature call, particularly with the shocking (to me, at least) enthusiasm already pouring out for Harris.

GOP leadership, for what it's worth, appear to be worried that race and gender are losing issues for attacks, and are warning their racist, sexist mouthpieces to stop doing that. My guess is that they will not stop doing that. We'll see!

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Wonder if Trump and Harris will go head to head on Trump saying she shouldn't even be a citizen, going on about how terrible immigrants are, with Harris saying she's a shining example of how wonderful birthright citizenship is, and Trump responding with some variant on how she's a great example of how terrible it is.

Seems like the fringe legal theory Trump and his cronies invoked actually might apply retroactively, to revoke her citizenship:

Quote

According to one argument — which most legal experts reject — the "jurisdiction" phrase [in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution] excludes noncitizens because they can't vote, serve on juries, or be tried for treason.

[...] "An executive order could specify to federal agencies that the children of noncitizens are not citizens, [...] Why shouldn't the president act to defend the clear meaning of the 14th Amendment?"

Can Trump revoke birthright citizenship? Nearly all on left and right say no. - POLITICO

... OTOH I imagine that making that explicit might encourage people who would lose their citizenship (and right to vote, among many other things) to vote....

Still, I wouldn't be shocked if Trump started talking about revoking her citizenship and deporting her... to somewhere. Probably a prison for the criminally insane... maybe on an island he can safely nuke if necessary?

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 23 July 2024 - 11:49 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

Trump doesn't really laugh. He smirks; he bares his teeth silently. [... Trump's father] drilled into his son that "laughing is to make yourself vulnerable, it's to let down your guard in some way, it's to lose a little bit of control. And that can't happen."

Trump has struggled to come up with attack lines against her[... except for] one specific target: Harris's laugh. "I call her 'laughing Kamala,'" he said. "Have you ever watched her laugh? She is crazy. You can tell a lot by a laugh … She is nuts." Harris does indeed laugh;

Spoiler

on TikTok, videos of her cackling joyfully during panel discussions and interviews have been making the rounds, with most commenters failing to find them anything but endearing. [...]

"The woman continually laughs this ridiculous laugh," the far-right Australian commentator [Miss Internalized Misogny Australia] said [...] insisting that Harris's laugh is somehow a sign of psychological depravity or narcotic-induced lack of inhibitions, conservatives are doing their best to couple Harris in people's subconscious with a specific reaction: disgust.

[...] disgust has long been the weapon of choice for conservatives faced with women who try to gain political power. [... Studies have found that "conservatives"] are more likely to have disgust reactions triggered by specific images [author could be more specific] than liberals, which makes them more likely in turn to "make harsher moral judgments."

[...] as women became more politically active in the United States, wild rumors circulated that some who went to vaudeville shows or comic movies ended up laughing themselves to death. "Fun-loving women [...] were being terrorized into believing that their unrestrained pleasure could destroy them."[...]

Part of what makes the attacks on Harris's laugh seem so bizarre is that her laugh is both genuine and contagious—a sign of a woman expressing joy without neurosis or self-consciousness or repression. [...]

"Let me just tell you something: I have my mother's laugh," Harris [said ...] "And I grew up around a bunch of women in particular who laughed from the belly. They laughed. They would sit around the kitchen, drinking their coffee, telling big stories with big laughs." They also taught her, she said, not to be limited by "other people's perception" of how a person should be. What Trump interprets as vulnerability may end up being a sign of Harris's greatest strength.

Kamala Harris and the Threat of a Woman's Laugh - The Atlantic

OTOH... according to survey-based psychology research, a lot of Trump supporters are motivated by status anxiety and perceived threat to the ideas of race and gender hierarchies and divisions of labor they've internalized. They may be "triggered" by liberated women or young people or the children of immigrants or people of color or Democrats (etc. etc.) laughing at them. The GOP seems fond of running ads in which Democrats are laughing in slow motion. And while those types probably already supported Trump, they could become more motivated to turn out and vote. So it could backfire. But it seems like the internet is doing an excellent job of turning it into a greater positive. In a new national poll since Biden dropped out Harris is leading Trump by 2 points, but multiple swing state polls prior to Biden dropping out had Trump substantially ahead of her, so we'll see... I have a feeling that her campaign (helped by all the internet support, and all the cash) will be able to substantially boost her numbers.

It will be interesting to find out her position on Gaza, and see whether that makes a substantial difference in likely voter turn-out...

[Mentalist]

I would presume that just like in 2016, this is going to hinge on the Rust Belt swing states. So my concern is whether Harris can energize the Dems in those states enough to get high turnout to carry them.

[HoosierDaddy]

Turnout is key. That's why I think Biden stepped aside. The turnout would be so low because there was zero energy to vote for Biden, and ONLY energy to vote against Trump. Low turnout is a Trump cakewalk and that would have also destroyed down-ballot tickets.

Harris might actually get more people to come to the polls. Maybe.


Good god does the electoral college need reforming/done away with.

I listened to a great podcast the other day about the decline in American democracy. When minority rule becomes the norm because the minority has rigged the rules so much that it is nearly impossible for the majority to overcome, is democracy really present?

[Lady Bliss]

The popularity vote is the only just way. Electoral college must go. Hopefully the last minute excitement helps her.

[Macros]

The Dems would need a super majority to even think about electoral reform yeah? The GOP will never change it, it's part of how they keep power?

[worry]

That plus more -- an Amendment to the Constitution can be proposed if 2/3 if of both legislative chambers vote Yea. Then it goes to the state legislatures to ratify, and requires 3/4 (38 of 50) to say Yea. Only then does the change happen.

There's a couple other ways for the states themselves to propose an Amendment, but that basically never happens.

[worry]

I mean that specifically for the Electoral College, which is enshrined in the Constitution. Not to discount other kinds of electoral reform which can be done through normal legislation, and doesn't require a super-majority but would (at least at present) require a simple majority in the House and 60 willing Dems in the Senate to overcome the filibuster, plus a SCOTUS who wouldn't squash it ASAP.

This post has been edited by worry: 26 July 2024 - 10:42 AM

[Tsundoku]

worry, on 26 July 2024 - 10:41 AM, said:

I mean that specifically for the Electoral College, which is enshrined in the Constitution. Not to discount other kinds of electoral reform which can be done through normal legislation, and doesn't require a super-majority but would (at least at present) require a simple majority in the House and 60 willing Dems in the Senate to overcome the filibuster, plus a SCOTUS who wouldn't squash it ASAP.

Yeah, good luck with that.

For starters, you guys really, really need to ditch the stupid different states and counties voting systems. One system, one method FFS!
And gut the GOP control of electoral commissions or whatever you call them over there. You know, the ones responsible for carrying out the elections and maintaining voter rolls.