2024 U.S. Presidential election

I saw the Republican analyst Scott Jennings on a CNN late show last night and he was very angry and loud in blaming Harris and Biden and the Dems for the two attempts on Trump's life.

The other panelists didn't even bother to argue that 98% of the hateful and divisive political rhetoric of the past 10 years has come from Trump and MAGA. Instead they were saying that both sides need to turn down the heat on the rhetoric. But Jennings was having none of it. He doubled and tripled down on the Dems being responsible.

This scene and his complete irrationality made me very nervous for what's coming in November... Smart people like Scott Jennings can't see, or won't accept, that Trump is the cancer that has inflamed our country and normalized political violence.
That guy is bad faith personified. He doesn't believe most of the things he acts incensed or incredulous about on CNN. I have a hard time believing he and anyone else pretending that Democrats telling people that Trump has authoritarian tendencies is either (a) causally linked to either of the recent assassin guys or (b) somehow equivalent to the blood libel coming from Trump and Vance right now are actually that dense. Their aim is to get Democrats to stop talking about the actual things that Trump says or does, as if they're out of bounds because just mentioning them will get people angry.
 
This is an overly simplistic view of what's happening. Harris is doing more rallies on the ground than Trump. And I'm in GA and I can promise you there are just as many negative Harris ads running as negative Trump ads.
I wasn't talking about the Harris campaign, so I'm a little confused, I guess. I think the point Marshall was making was that there didn't appear to be any message coordination between the two separate pillars on the Trump side - they're operating in a vacuum, with the media campaign not being informed by the candidate or repeating anything he says on the stump in ads. The Harris ads I've seen all cover the same ground she covers in her speeches (I'm in a blue state so they're not showing a lot of negative ads here thus far).

FWIW, I think Harris is doing more rallies than Trump because Trump is old and lazy and would prefer to be on the golf course.
 
That guy is bad faith personified. He doesn't believe most of the things he acts incensed or incredulous about on CNN. I have a hard time believing he and anyone else pretending that Democrats telling people that Trump has authoritarian tendencies is either (a) causally linked to either of the recent assassin guys or (b) somehow equivalent to the blood libel coming from Trump and Vance right now are actually that dense. Their aim is to get Democrats to stop talking about the actual things that Trump says or does, as if they're out of bounds because just mentioning them will get people angry.
I watch too much CNN and see him all the time. I agree that he's a political shill who says a lot of things that he either doesn't believe or half-heartedly believes.

But he was visibly emotional last night on the Abby Phillip show essentially accusing Dems of being the hateful and violent ones because of these two assassination attempts. I don't think it was performative. And this is a guy who SHOULD know better. It's very concerning that they are now both-sidsing the hateful rhetoric and violence. That can be used in the future to justify all kinds of ugly things...
 
I wasn't talking about the Harris campaign, so I'm a little confused, I guess. I think the point Marshall was making was that there didn't appear to be any message coordination between the two separate pillars on the Trump side - they're operating in a vacuum, with the media campaign not being informed by the candidate or repeating anything he says on the stump in ads. The Harris ads I've seen all cover the same ground she covers in her speeches (I'm in a blue state so they're not showing a lot of negative ads here thus far).

FWIW, I think Harris is doing more rallies than Trump because Trump is old and lazy and would prefer to be on the golf course.
Got it. I think I misunderstood the point Marshall was making.

Trump/Vance seem to me to be going all in on energizing their base, even if it means turning off some supporters in the middle. Harris seems to be still going equally hard for the middle and her base. That to me seems to be the biggest difference in the campaigns right now - but that could also be my bias...
 
When the Republican Ohio governor and Springfield mayor and city manager all come out and say it's not true that the Haitians in Springfield are eating pets, you'd think the lie has been debunked. But YouGov did a poll and 52% of MAGA voters still believe it's happening...


The good news is that half don't believe the lies. The bad news is that they will all vote for rump anyway.
 
I got a few Jewish friends who could hook you up!

ETA: I see Jason already invited you to join the tribe, but just like boats or being rich, you don't need either if your friends are rich, have a boat, or are Jewish. All the perks with none of the responsibility!
Thanks! That is awesome. What? You want to send me a pager? I'm going to sleep on this before I sign on the dotted line.
 
Seems weird that months from now we could be harkening back to “normal times”…the months before the 2024 election.

I think there will be some violence after this election. That said, the more I think about it, the less worried I am about continued widespread violence if Harris wins. Biden is POTUS and the transfer from Biden to Harris will not be contentious. We will go from Biden as Commander-in-Chief to Harris. Neither the Biden Administration nor a potential Harris Administration has "owning the MAGAs" as a top policy objective. They will want to calm things down as quickly as possible. There will be no repeat of January 6th because they will order proper security.

That said, we do need to beef up the resources assigned to protecting Trump for the next 49 days. If Congress needs to give the Secret Service more money - then do it!
 
Someone I follow on X suggested that all who can should vote early. The rationale is concern that the MAGAites will do something to disrupt voting/access to polling places.

Thoughts? Totally crazy or a reasonable suggestion?
 
Anybody seen this new documentary "War Games" where they simulate another Jan 6 situation where the challenging candidate (Trump) denies he lost the election? General Wesley Clark, Steve Bullock, Heidi Heitkamp and a bunch of other former government officials participate.

I haven't seen it but I heard Doug Jones interviewed about it. The big vulnerability that it supposedly reveals is that senior military officials could be sympathetic to Trump and clusters of the military could begin to peel away. He also said that in their simulation the uprisings happen in state capitals, not DC.

I'm glad there are serious people working on this. I'm sure the DOJ and FBI have plans in place to shutdown Trump's communication channels the minute he incites any violence.

Doug Jones interview is on the latest Lincoln Project podcast...
 
I think there will be some violence after this election. That said, the more I think about it, the less worried I am about continued widespread violence if Harris wins. Biden is POTUS and the transfer from Biden to Harris will not be contentious. We will go from Biden as Commander-in-Chief to Harris. Neither the Biden Administration nor a potential Harris Administration has "owning the MAGAs" as a top policy objective. They will want to calm things down as quickly as possible. There will be no repeat of January 6th because they will order proper security.

That said, we do need to beef up the resources assigned to protecting Trump for the next 49 days. If Congress needs to give the Secret Service more money - then do it!
I do think there will be some violence as well. And I hope the very worst of it are just some small pockets of crazy cranks that end up facing the law. If Kamala does win there will be some orderly fashion to things. And as you stated, it’s going to be a focus to maintain calm.

But I don’t think public anger will stop swelling. So much radicalization has taken place over the years. If Trump does lose he’ll be martyred in some way, and there will be someone else to take his place and start this all over again.

Ok, who needs a drink?
 
He doesn't have official acts/immunity to fall back on this time.
But does he care? He's going to jail if he loses the election. Maybe he calculates that he can gain leverage to negotiate some type of blanket pardon if he incites civil unrest around the country.

That may sound like a crazy idea to some but this is the same guy who sent an angry mob to the Capitol to stop an election certification and didn't send in the national guard for 3 hours.
 
But does he care? He's going to jail if he loses the election. Maybe he calculates that he can gain leverage to negotiate some type of blanket pardon if he incites civil unrest around the country.

That may sound like a crazy idea to some but this is the same guy who sent an angry mob to the Capitol to stop an election certification and didn't send in the national guard for 3 hours.
I do see that as a plausible scenario. A lot of dominoes would have to fall in place but I do see a scenario where a pardon could be considered just to further facilitate national calm. Is that the right or wrong thing to do? I don’t know. A similar decision was made for Nixon and there has been debate about that. It’s sort of a damned if you do, damned if you don’t type thing.
 
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