Trump’s arc will be shorter, but the white protestant nationalist movement he leaves behind is growing and becoming more dangerous. Moreover, they are threatening this country’s constitutional legitimacy and institutional stability. America’s decline internationally is also going to potentially plague Hillary Clinton and leave Democrats looking weak. We’ve got about 2-4 years to reverse this slide and we’re going to need the cooperation of moderate republicans to do it. Can this happen while keeping Bernie Bros from abandoning Hillary and destroying a left-leaning coalition? If the country fractures into an extreme right wing and a moderate right wing on one hand, and an extreme left wing and a center-left on the other, that’s when the dynamic becomes explosive.
“Donald, listen; I’m trying to help you, buddy.”
Al is a genius. But that song should come with a Sunday Morning Warning: This song is liable to make your head spin!
Some washed-up baseball player held a rally, which drew fives of people. Perhaps Massachusetts is not the best place to get Rs whipped into a massive frenzy.
Best part of the story, though, is an angry letter to the guy, which coins the term “Trumpster fire”.
Schilling’s a Small-Government republican fan who’s had a mad on for the Democrats ever since Lincoln Chafee refused to give his video game company a life-saving loan, on the grounds that Schilling’s company didn’t qualify for the loan and anyway, they were just weeks away from defaulting on their previous loan with no new revenue in sight - so clearly it was a Democratic assassination of a good Republican, what other explanation could there be?
Schilling
1/3 because he’s delusional
1/3 because he needs the attention
1/3 because he thinks he’ll make money off of it
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Palin didn’t lose at the top of a national ticket. In the post Adlai Stevenson era that’s been political death. We’ll see if that applies to Trump himself within the GOP, he’s full of surprises, but it’s still a difference. Also Palin was to most appearances a conservative, or even moderate/conservative (in her brief stint in high office) by GOP standards. She later came a symbolize a shift away from conservatism that presaged Trump’s rightist populism. That might be trivia from a left POV but it’s a real difference within the right. A guy like Bill Kristol at first supported Palin heartily (not wise based on her substance as it turned out, but no reason he wouldn’t ideologically as it appeared), but has been implacably opposed to Trump from the get go.
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It is that but not only. A lot of people of voting for Trump because they really oppose the Democrats in general and Clinton in particular, not because they like Trump or his brand of rightist populism. Opinions simply differ as to whether Trump’s problems rise to the level of ‘letting’ Clinton win. IOW a lot of the people pissed at Ryan for not (really) supporting Trump don’t particularly like Trump. But the anti-Ryan faction certainly does include people who like Trump or Trumpism, and they are the most ardent.
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I agree with this. What exact position you took on Trump will not as of now*affect GOP politicians’ much with general electorate voters in future elections IMO. The Democrats will try to make a litmus test of it (‘nobody who supported him is fit’), it will be base motivator for them for some time to come, but won’t matter much with persuadable voters by and large IMO even 2 yrs from now. Although it may matter a lot in the GOP whether or how much a politician supported Trump. But like you say it’s hard to predict which direction that’s going to go.
*we don’t know if Trump might act much more outrageously from here on, including after the election. OTOH one school of thought is that the ‘rigged’ stuff is a two-fer to motivate elements of the base now for one last long shot at actually winning, and also lowers the bar for a bigger pat on the head to Trump by media etc. when he actually concedes gracefully after all.
Shill Schilling shilling?
Not to prolong the hijack, but Schilling turned up on Chris Matthews’ show the other night, and proceeded to demonstrate his amateur status by lighting into the host for supposedly claiming that Hillary Clinton “comes (to the debates) armed with the truth” earlier in the program, as an example of media bias, I guess. Matthews denied having said any such thing, and they went back and forth a bit, with Schilling becoming angrily insistent and saying ‘look at the tape’.
Later in the program, Matthews did just that. As shown on the tape, what he actually said was that Mrs. Clinton brought her “troops”. i.e. lawyers and policy specialists to the debates. Matthews was making an analogy to a baseball or football team with a deep bench, as compared to Trump, who often comes off as a one-man band.
Bit of a Rosanne Rosanadanna moment on Schilling’s part.
The exchange begins about 4:30.
I liked Tom Hanks.
He has truly proved that while impartial justice may be blind…
[Spoiler] …it is NOT a “blind dentist”…
[/Spoiler]
[coughs] Richard Nixon [/coughs]
Love Alec but his Trump is too broad. He has a tightened harumph mouth all the time. I always wanted someone to imitate the fishmouth tunnel effect Donald has. He has a kind of Andrew McCarthy mouth that needs accurate parody.
That was just so we could kick him around again.
TRUMP
is not worth a
**
PENCE**
but a
SHILLING
is a bit more…
…nutty.
I predict a new campaign theme song!
How bad does your life suck when you offer a porn actress 10k to stay with you, and she says no? Good on jessica drake.
I agree that his movement (a) has the* potential* to be quite dangerous. And no question, it’s the tail wagging the GOP dog from here on out: they can come up with all the autopsy reports they want to this time, but like John Boehner once said, a leader without followers is a man taking a walk. The GOP depends on the votes of the Deplorables.
I don’t see this at all, to be honest.
This entire campaign season has really pointed up the failure of our educational system to expose citizens to the basic concepts of civics.
If I were in charge, I wouldn’t propose a partisan curriculum; I’d simply propose a curriculum based on one idea: follow the money.
(On second thought, perhaps that would be considered a partisan curriculum.)
Schilling is planning on running against Elizabeth Warren for the Senate.
And this is probably not just his own idea; one would guess that the GOP leadership would REALLY like to get rid of Warren.
That they think Schilling is their best tool for the job says a lot about the GOP brain trust.
Early voting in TX tomorrow.
Got group of Dems in neighborhood going together. I’m taking my daughter (15yo), too bad she can’t come to the booth with me.
Church this morning, did a parking lot survey: 7 HRC, 2 DJT bumper stickers/signs.