June 27, 2024
So, tonight (9:00 p.m. Eastern), the two ancient contestants in what both parties insist is a "binary choice" square off in what will be the only debate of the 2024 Presidential Election.
Trump, who has a habit of going weirdly off script in meandering monologues, has been trying to downplay the results ahead of time, after having spent months claiming that Biden is cognitively impaired. In reality, Biden's always made odd speech gaffs, but Trump, who in his younger days did not, now makes them frequently, suggesting that the impacts of age are catching up with him. Both men are the same age chronologically, for all practical purposes, but Biden is obviously more physically fit than Trump, who doesn't believe in exercise.
It is, of course, not a binary contest. You can vote for somebody else.
Do you intend to watch the debate?
So, who all do we have right now?
Presidential Election:
Democratic Ticket:
Biden/Harris, incumbents.
Republican Ticket:
Trump/Unknown.
American Solidarity Party:1
Sonski/Onak
Libertarian Party:2
Oliver/terMaat
Reform Party:3
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr (an independent)/Shanahan4
Green Party:5
Jill Stein/Unknown
Green Party of Alaska:6
Sherman/BluBear
Constitution Party:7
Terry/Broden
Constitution Party of Utah and Nevada:
Skousen/Combs
Party for Socialism and Liberation:8
De la Cruz/Garcia
Approval Voting Party:
Huber/Denault
Prohibition Party:9
Wood/Pietrowski
Independent:
West/Abdullah
Quite a few third parties, we'd note. Have you considered any of them?
Wyoming Senate Race:
Democratic Contest:
Scott Morrow.
GOP Contest:
John Barrasso, incumbent
Reid Rasner
John Hotz.
Wyoming House Race:
Democratic Contest:
Kyle Cameron
GOP Contest:
Harriet Hageman, incumbent.
Steve Helling
Constitution Party:
Jeff Haggit
June 28, 2024
I only watched about 30 minutes of it and could no longer stand it.
There's really no denying at this point that Biden's age makes him unfit to be President. It's not that Trump made sense, Trump's performance demonstrated that he's an unmitigated liar and constitutionally unfit for office.
Rather, the supposed binary system that Americans have bought off on means that, for most people, the choice, because they refuse to imagine another one, will between somebody whose age has caught up with him vs. somebody who doesn't have a single positive political attribute and who is a danger to democracy.
Some, like Nate Silver, and he's far from being alone, are calling for Biden to drop out of the race. If he does not, it will be to his everlasting shame. The real question is not if he should drop out, but when he should drop out.
And who, in that case, might replace him.
Joe Manchin of West Virginia. A possibility?
The other, and vital question, is how American democracy reached this state. These two choices are the worst in American history and most people don't want them (which again means, they shouldn't vote for either of them). If the country survives this election, something has to change, beyond that which will change simply because of who is elected. The system is not functioning to produce two such abysmal choices.
Almost missed, so far, as a Wyoming story, but sort of an interesting aspect of the warp and woof of our times, a Hageman staffer has been forced to resign, in this case, an intern.
A news story by "The Laramie Reporter" reveals that the intern had connections, at least in the form of social media likes, with the extreme right. The same figure has been a rising, albeit young, figure in the populist far right at UW and is on the student senate.
The entire matter is interesting in that it reveals the extent to which populism in the US right now trends highly towards the anti-democratic. The intern was found to have liked racist posts on social media, and to also have outright stated his opposition to democracy at least once. He also seems to have followed Francoist, which is stunningly bizarre. This seems to have come out of the same figure being a Christian Nationalist, which shows a really dark side of the National Conservative movement, but perhaps one that is closer to the surface than many people care to admit.
He lost his position, or resigned, the very day the blog broke the story.
June 29, 2024
The New York Times.
The Times is absolutely correct, which doesn't mean it will occur. The stunning level of refusal to accept reality will keep it from occurring.
Establishment Democrats like Robert Reich who ignored the repeated calls for Biden not to run in the first place failed to address the deer in the headlights appearance of Biden and the obvious age related mental decline following the debate (Reich may be addressing it in his entry of today). "It's only one bad day" seems to be the theme, with those commenters forgetting the truism expressed by Janis Joplin "that it's all only one f***** day man".
The bolt is shot. Some Democrats who were to vote for Biden will now not vote at all, or go to third parties. Republicans on the fence will in fact fold back into Trump. Wavering independents will fall towards him, or fall towards not voting at all.
The reality is that Biden needs to step aside in the race. The other reality is, he won't.
Biden will keep running, and Trump will win in the fall.
Footnotes:
1. The American Solidarity Party is a Christian Democratic party that's centrist in nature, which should not be confused with Christian Nationalism, which it would generally be in opposition to.
2. For some time the third-largest party in the US, the Libertarian Party has seemingly fallen into hard times as libertarian ideas have been co opted by some elements of the Republican Party, which ironically in its populist mode of present, it's also radically opposed to, but doesn't realize it.
3. A number of parties have had the "reform" label for at least a couple of decades. This party is generally centrist in nature.
4. Kennedy has the Reform Party's nomination, but isn't running from it. He's an independent.
5. The environmental party.
6. I have no idea why Alaska's Green Party has separated from the main Green Party, but it certainly has no chance of electing a President.
7. The Constitution Party is a populist party and is where the "Freedom Caucus" people actually belong.
8. A radical left wing party.
9. A really old party, it was at one time a significant one but has waned since the repeal of prohibition.
June 30, 2024
Predictably, there's a lot of Democratic true believer "nothing to see here" type of comments regarding President Biden and the recent debates, maintaining nothing whatsoever will happen in regard to his poor performance.
Not likely.
I'm reminded of Monty Python's classic scene of King Arthur confronting the Black Knight.
"Just a flesh wound".
July 2, 2024
The post election reaction on the Democratic side has been interesting, and unfortunately a bit predictable.
The closer a commenter is to the Biden Presidency, either officially or emotionally, the more likely the comments are that the debate just didn't matter.
It did.
As things distance out, that is recognized. The New York Times, Maureen Doud, The Atlanta Journal Constitution, and others, have all asked Biden to drop out. He should, but the voices he's now hearing, from his family, and from inside Democrats, are urging him to stay in the race. Those are the voices that he's going to listen to.
And that's what will reelect Donald Trump in the Fall.
It's not too late to pick a new Democrat. It's not the case that only Joe Biden can beat Trump. Indeed, people thought Biden was going to be a one-term President in the first place, and didn't want him to run again. Nobody likes the thought of Harris being the President when Biden dies.
Of course, what's going on is emblematic of the Democratic Party itself. It's not true that "only Biden" can beat Trump, but probably only Biden can embrace the full slate of the Democratic left's agenda, somewhat, and still have a chance at beating Trump. Any other Democrat who had a chance would have to run much more from the center. Ironically, that would also mean that such a candidate would have a much better chance of winning overall. But the far left of the Democratic Party, like the far right of the Republican Party, is no compromise in nature.
Time remains, but it won't be taken advantage of. The Democratic Party will simply hand the election to Trump, and more than that, may very well hand the Senate to the GOP as well.
Cont:
A party of Democratic governors is going to meet with Biden regarding his staying in the race, or gettin out.
Congressman Lloyd Doggett has called for him to get out.
Manchin was going to announce that he wanted Biden to back out on one of the Sunday news shows, but was talked out of it.
Democrats who are begging to realize that he might get out, are rallying around the worst possible option for his replacement, Kamala Harris.
July 3, 2024
Oh shoot, why not just have a ballot initiative requiring us to vote by raising our hands after we walked to the polls, so we can get as antiquated as possible.
July 4, 2024
President Biden told staffers he's staying in the race. At the same time, support for him to do so is rapidly evaporating in the Democratic Party, with even Jim Clyburn suggesting that he should consider dropping out. It was Clyburn's supportin 2024 which secured South Carolina for Biden.
Meanwhile, Anne Applebaum has published an article in The Atlantic urging Democrats to pick a new candidate, and noting that the British manage to hold thier entire election in a six week cycle. The French, whom she doesn't cite, are doing it even more quickly than that.
Newly released grand jury material shows that Trump’s name appears multiple times on Jeffrey Epstein’s message logs and seven times Epstein’s private jet flight logs, that Epstein flew on Trump’s jet with a young girl of indeterminate age and that girls who Epstein trafficked worked at Mar-A-Lago. A girl that Epstein trafficked mentioned visiting Trump’s casino in a recently released deposition transcript.
A Jane Doe witness at Ghislane Maxwell's trial stated that she was introduced to Trump by Epstein when she was 14 years old.
This at least raises a set of questions, if nothing else, what did Trump know about Epstein?
Finally, barbequed dog?
July 5, 2024
Joining the rising number of press outlets calling for Biden to withdraw is the influential British magazine, The Economist:
Why Biden must withdraw (economist.com)
cont:
Now that it appears increasingly likely that Joe Biden will drop out (contrary to my expectations), and may even be reaching the inevitable stage, Trump is increasingly off his game. Used to insulting his opponents, now that he doesn't know who his opponent is, he doesn't seem to know what to do. An insult game only works if you visably have somebody to insult. Without that, it might seem that he stands for nothing much. He's managed some weak insults against VP Harris, but frankly it's unlikely that she'd be the Democratic nominee.
Today, on things he stands for, he eeked out this:
So he's disavowing those who are his hardcore allies and who have been getting in front of him as it now appears that Project 2025, in the hands of a capable opponent, might be a real liability. But this is a week denial.
July 6, 2024
All along, the American public has not wanted these two ancient candidates, and yet they will not yield to the public desires. Biden isn't yielding to reality at this point.
July 8, 2024
I listed to the This Week interview of President Biden. From the audio, I came away more convinced than ever that Biden needs to step aside in the election It left me, at least, with no confidence whatsoever.
In an odd turn of events, MAGA members are fuming over the results of the French Election:
France
In an amazing one week long rally, the French left and Macron's Ensemble stages a comeback with the left wing NFP now having the majority of seats in the French Assembly and Ensemble the second largest.
None of the parties have enough seats to form a government, and nobody is certain what will occur. If a government is to be formed, it will have to be a coalition government.
July 8, 2024.
Some are even accusing the French left of cheating in the election, with quite a few taking the same line as Le Pen supporters and claiming the alliance of French left wing parties "unnatural".
July 9, 2024
President Biden wrote a lengthy letter to Democratic leaders on his reamining in the race.
Related threads:
I ran this back in February, at which time it was already obvious that Joe Biden needed to go:
Lex Anteinternet: Why isn't anyone suggesting that Tammy Duckworth r...:
I'm not endorsing Duckworth, and I'm sure she has left of center opinions that I have problems with, but there's no earthly way that a guy with contempt for veterans and whose views toward women appears rather, well whatever, could handle a smart, female combat veteran, like Tammy Duckworth.
Fifty-five years old, lost her legs in combat, Asian American, PhD, and a mother. She's the anti-Elise Stefanik.
Trump and his supporters couldn't handle her, and Trump would insult every single veteran, Asian American and woman in the country within 12 hours.
Curious.
Right now, the stunning level of density in thought in the Democratic Party is really on display. Joe Biden is as done as dinner in this election. If the Democrats are to beat Trump, they need to shuffle him out the door before the primary. The line that nothing happened at the debate, or that he's just fine, or that it was only one bad day is frankly absurd.
He needs to drop out of the race.
In no way shape or form does Kamala Harris need to replace him.
Harris grates on the nerves of a lot of non Democrats, and just about everyone in the middle of the country. She has a grating voice and comes across as snarky. She'll do worse, or at least no better than Biden would have. She needs to go too.
The Democrats have some strong potential younger candidates. Tammy Duckworth is the one that can't be beat. She's much younger than the geezer running on both sides.
And she's everything Trump has a problem with. She's a woman. She's not "white". She's lost a leg, and in combat at that.
Trump would have a difficult time not being a complete asshole, and insult Asians, women, veterans, and the disabled.
Shoot, Duckworth is a mother.
Harris is a snarky sounding lawyer. He could make snide remarks about her all day, and a lot of people would secretly laugh at them.
A Duckworth/Manchin ticket would be unbeatable. A Duckworth/Klobachar ticket probably would be.
I'd still vote for the American Solidarity Party candidates, as I have deep problems with the Democratic embrace of such things as abortion. But the "oh, nothing is wrong with Biden" and "let's nominate the second most worst candidate" thinking of the Democrats is simply amazing.
Democrats don't lose elections. They throw them away.
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