[worry]

One of the reasons Trump got so popular so early is directly because of Jeb Bush. There are dynasty issues, Bush-specific dynasty issues, and -- as Terez has hammered -- broader GOP establishment issues that are really turning conservative populists off. Like even though the Tea Party gets (rightfully) laughed at pretty constantly, the party schism left in its wake continues to thrive, and it's pretty distinctly not libertarian. The "small government" line is just as easily sold to vanilla conservatives, when you attach it to religion, guns, gays, and minorities.

Also it's important to keep in mind that Jeb Bush is a coward who's in no way taking the fight to Trump or Cruz. He's kind of a lost cause and all the money in the world isn't gonna save him from Trump, since all Trump has to do is mention where that money comes from.

[Terez]

To add context to what worry is saying, the Tea Party technically started out as a Ron Paul thing, people who were pissed off about his being marginalized by the media and the GOP establishment in the 2008 primary, pissed off about Obamacare and socialized medicine and all that. It was a grassroots thing that kind of got blended with other fringe grassroots groups which was then astroturfed (usurped) by a string of conservative media personalities and turned into a movement. It was never really a well-defined thing, except that it was anti-establishment and anti-government. It reached movement status in the 2010 midterm elections, especially the primaries where some incumbents lost their seats (this is rare), but the movement has been (re-)fracturing and fizzling ever since, which is to say that the general sentiment has seized the imaginations of the average GOP voters, people who are now supporting Trump and Cruz, and these people don't necessarily identify with the Tea Party any more. For some reason, that branding went sour around 2014.

Some former Tea Party heroes are now seen as establishment RINOs—people like Rubio and Eric Cantor, who got primaried out of his position as House Majority Leader in 2014. His opponent was a fringe super-religious libertarian type, and his victory was one of the few bright spots for the Tea Party in that cycle. But it's just more accurate these days to call it the anti-establishment wing of the party, rather than the Tea Party. One of the most vicious Tea Party primary challenges in 2014 was in Mississippi, where state senator Chris McDaniel challenged incumbent-since-1978 US senator Thad Cochran. It was interesting to watch Mississippian Republicans (including some in my family who are politically active) fight tooth and nail to keep McDaniel out. I voted in the GOP primary that year, and in the run-off election. McDaniel got more votes than Cochran the first time, but he didn't get a majority, so we had a run-off and Cochran won.

[worry]

From the outside, the ambivalence of GOP chickens-home-to-roost schadenfreude and genuine existential dread at the thought of these monsters having power is, uh, increasingly just sinking into heartache. Like, you get what you vote for. But then again I wouldn't wish Sam Brownback on anyone.

Today, for at least the second time, Trump has retweeted an obvious Neo-Nazi. And the fact that this won't harm him even a little bit kinda eats away at the hope for a "they know not what they do" explanation. The fact that it's his lack of dogwhistling that is so appealing to people just gets me every time.

I guess one of the hopeful things is that even though GOP rivals can only attack his personality -- since his policies aren't actually much different from theirs, all in all -- in the general election that won't be the case. Making connections between GOP policy and, say, deliberately poisoning an entire city's water supply under the guise of austerity will hopefully sink in.

[worry]

On a lighter note, for some reason Paul Ryan's youtube channel is livestreaming the weather (night and day) to an ever-repeated loop of a Muzak version of "Sexual Healing".

[Terez]

Nice.

Also, some dude went on a bender and wrote some Trump gay porn and published it on Amazon. c/o 538 on Facebook:

http://fusion.net/st...-amazon-kindle/

I'm tempted to actually buy it. (I don't do mainstream enough for Kindle Unlimited these days.)

[EmperorMagus]

Terez, on 23 January 2016 - 03:55 AM, said:

Nice.

Also, some dude went on a bender and wrote some Trump gay porn and published it on Amazon. c/o 538 on Facebook:

http://fusion.net/st...-amazon-kindle/

I'm tempted to actually buy it. (I don't do mainstream enough for Kindle Unlimited these days.)

This whole thing is golden. I'm waiting for Trump's comeback during a speech now...

[Terez]

EmperorMagus, on 23 January 2016 - 04:23 AM, said:

Terez, on 23 January 2016 - 03:55 AM, said:

Nice.

Also, some dude went on a bender and wrote some Trump gay porn and published it on Amazon. c/o 538 on Facebook:

http://fusion.net/st...-amazon-kindle/

I'm tempted to actually buy it. (I don't do mainstream enough for Kindle Unlimited these days.)

This whole thing is golden. I'm waiting for Trump's comeback during a speech now...

From some of the reviews I was starting to think it might actually be funny enough in its detail to be worth reading. But it's hard to tell from Amazon reviews; lots of them are probably just gag reviews written by people who didn't actually read it. I tried to look at the sample, but all I got was a note from the author telling me that I really, really shouldn't spend any money on it. (My brain is still thinking, "but it's only two bucks".)

[Andorion]

So it seems to me that the Republicans are caught in a trap of their own making.

But what about the Democrats? Is Hillary still a sure thing? Also what about Sanders?

[Terez]

Andorion, on 23 January 2016 - 04:27 AM, said:

So it seems to me that the Republicans are caught in a trap of their own making.

But what about the Democrats? Is Hillary still a sure thing? Also what about Sanders?

I'd estimate Bernie has about a 20% chance of winning. That's pretty low, and if things go as expected it will only get lower into March.

[Tsundoku]

Hillary for P and Bernie for VP?

[Terez]

Unlikely. I won't say it's because the primary season will brew hard feelings between them. That was certainly the case with Obama and Hillary and she still managed to get a spot in his administration, if not the VP spot. I just don't think Bernie is particularly interested in being VP—it's mostly a useless job with few clear duties—and I suspect Hillary will make it some kind of diversity hire, i.e. no old white men. Many including myself suspect she wants one of the Castro brothers (Julián or Joaquín).

[Andorion]

Terez, on 23 January 2016 - 04:30 AM, said:

Andorion, on 23 January 2016 - 04:27 AM, said:

So it seems to me that the Republicans are caught in a trap of their own making.

But what about the Democrats? Is Hillary still a sure thing? Also what about Sanders?

I'd estimate Bernie has about a 20% chance of winning. That's pretty low, and if things go as expected it will only get lower into March.

But can Hillary beat the Republican nominee? Especially if its Trump riding a weird wave?

[Terez]

Andorion, on 23 January 2016 - 09:02 AM, said:

Terez, on 23 January 2016 - 04:30 AM, said:

Andorion, on 23 January 2016 - 04:27 AM, said:

So it seems to me that the Republicans are caught in a trap of their own making.

But what about the Democrats? Is Hillary still a sure thing? Also what about Sanders?

I'd estimate Bernie has about a 20% chance of winning. That's pretty low, and if things go as expected it will only get lower into March.

But can Hillary beat the Republican nominee? Especially if its Trump riding a weird wave?

At this point, my feeling is "probably". Again, the polls show Trump has a chance against her in the popular election, but the electoral college is a different story, and as bad as Hillary's favorability numbers are, Trump's are worse. Other candidates would have a better chance of beating her. Not sure if Cruz is one of them.

[worry]

Quick little bit of Twitter analysis from Chris Hayes (read bottom to top) on :



They're all still stuck in denial stage though, still waiting for the voters to shift w/o catalyst, as if it's a given.

[Studlock]

Has anyone been following the Ta-Nehisi Coates articles on Sanders on the Atlantic?

The first:

http://www.theatlant...rations/424602/

The second:

http://www.theatlant...ination/425022/

Also, a response also from the Atlantic:

http://www.theatlant...rations/426720/

I essentially agree with Coates--Sanders is resting in the similar position as white liberals (in the American sense--being moderately left-wing) when its comes to some of the original, and long-lasting problems within the USA (as in slavery, colonialism, and the long-lasting repercussion of those histories). I'm wondering what you guys think about him? Overall I think he's an old-school socialists (probably not someone I'd agree with when it comes to socialist thought) that occasionally leans on populist sentiments in his rhetoric but beyond that is pretty much a run-of-a-mill white liberal politician in American and that being so I wounder why there is such a surge around him as a counter to Hillary.

[Terez]

Because he's the only option to Hillary. Most of these people would have preferred Elizabeth Warren, but Bernie is what they got. It ranges from people who are genuinely enthusiastic about him to people like me who would prefer him to Hillary, but not by much. (I think he's a very weak candidate.)

I have been paying attention to Coates, and while I think he makes good points, it's true (as many of his critics have pointed out) that Hillary doesn't get the same kind of scrutiny because she doesn't have any audacious policies so it's hard to pin the hypocrisy label on her. I also agree with Sanders that slavery reparations are more of a non-starter in Congress than any of his other policies by a long shot, which is saying something. Bernie is definitely a product of white supremacy, perhaps a little more so than Hillary, and having spent most of his life in a sea of whiteness it should come as no surprise that he focuses more on class than race. BLM was pretty successful at getting him to look at things differently, while Hillary's response to BLM was rather less contrite.

[worry]

We all know that what a politician says and what they believe are two different things (think Obama "evolving" on gay marriage). As much as people hope to get a 100% straight shooter, that line of purism is almost certainly going to get you a Trump and not a Chomsky or whatever. The fact is, anyone running for president needs white populists. And while I agree w/ Terez that the man from Vermont probably hasn't been confronted with this kind of stuff before, I also think in his heart he's probably pro-reparations anyway and he's making a concession to Dem white populists, so Coates is right about that. Bernie's politicking rather than being honest. His other big concession to them is of course on guns, and on both of these I think it's pretty transparent.

On the other hand, I don't just think the issue a non-starter. I don't believe the US will ever pay reparations for slavery. I don't mean wait another half century or two. I mean never. The population will be an entirely mixed assortment of caramel people loooooong before it will ever be ready to reconcile the two big sins of slavery and genocide, and by then they'd have to pay every single citizen reparations.

[Terez]

worry, on 26 January 2016 - 08:51 AM, said:

On the other hand, I don't just think the issue a non-starter. I don't believe the US will ever pay reparations for slavery. I don't mean wait another half century or two. I mean never. The population will be an entirely mixed assortment of caramel people loooooong before it will ever be ready to reconcile the two big sins of slavery and genocide, and by then they'd have to pay every single citizen reparations.

I know what you are saying, but I think there will always be people who procreate only with other people of the same race. I can see the population being maybe 80% indeterminate caramel at some point, but no more than that.

[worry]

I think there will be a far future America where that will be more or less impossible. But let's say that's such a far away future as to be practically unimaginable. Point is still that no matter how far away that deadline is, even approaching infinity, slavery reparations will never happen. Bernie might (disingenuously or not) be calling them a non-starter in the current climate. I'm saying it's a non-starter unto the far horizon of America's existence. White people will be black before they deal with original sin.

[Andorion]

Can there be slavery reparations? How do you go about calculating it? Who pays it? Who gets paid?