This is just 24 hours of political campaigning by Trump. I’m impressed.
- In a Washington Post interview, Trump declined to endorse House Speaker Paul Ryan against his primary challenger
- He reiterated that he hasn’t endorsed Sen. John McCain and said the onetime prisoner of war "has not done a good job for the vets"
- He slapped out at Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte, saying "she has given me zero support"
- He suggested that Americans should pull their 401(k) funds out of the stock market
- He said he’s "always wanted" to receive a Purple Heart but that having one gifted to him by a supporter was "much easier"
- He said that the handling of sexual harassment has "got to be up to the individual"
- He accused Khizr Khan of being "bothered" by his plan to keep terrorists out of the country, and said that he had no regrets about his clash with the family
- He appeared to feud with a crying baby during a rally
- He reiterated that "if the election is rigged, I would not be surprised"
- The sitting president of the United States publicly called Trump "unfit to serve" and urged Republicans to withdraw their support for him.
- Trump spokesman Katrina Pierson suggested that Obama and Clinton are to blame for the death of Humayan Khan, who died in 2004, when neither were in the executive branch at the time
- An ally of Paul Manafort told our colleague John Harwood at CNBC that the campaign chairman is "mailing it in," leaving the rest of the staff "suicidal."
- Sitting GOP congressman Richard Hanna, HP head Meg Whitman and former Christie aide Maria Comella all said they plan to vote for Hillary Clinton
- The Washington Post released a transcript of its full interview with Trump, indicating among other things that he paused five times to watch TV coverage in the middle of the sit-down
- A GOP source told NBC’s Katy Tur that Reince Priebus is "apoplectic" over Trump’s refusal to endorse Ryan and is making calls to the campaign to express his "extreme displeasure"
This is a whole new level of incompetence. And he’s got three months more to top it!
http://www.snopes.com/is-green-party-candidate-jill-stein-anti-vaccine/
I have no idea why you posted that @1. Here is a rebuke.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2016/08/01/jill-stein-and-left-wing-antivaccine-dog-whistles/
Tragically, he will find a way to do that.
At some point he’s going to have to just kill someone on camera, because there will be no worse he can do. Here’s hoping he suffers a public nervous breakdown before then, preferably on November 7th, leaving the R’s no time to swap in a substitute.
Rebuke is basically guilty until proven innocent, or, you can’t prove you’re not secretly anti vac (aren’t these clear statements really dog whistles for your secret motives!). Right and I can’t PROVE Obama isn’t secretly a muslim, but all the empirical data suggests one thing, and conspiracy another.
Fuck me, an off topic derail at comment #1…
I hate American election time, it seems to bring out the worse in folks. Even ones who are reasonable the rest of the time.
That said, does anyone else feel like Trump doesn’t really want to win? If he did, he’d have pivoted more towards the centre while trying to avoid pissing off the hard right. He’s obviously not moved one nano-meter towards the centre and shitting on the parents of a KIA veteran, and dissing McCain is a sure way to piss off some of the God and Guns crowd.
frog@3: what worries me is that Trump is still pretty likely to win. When it calls for 30% chance of precipitation, I bring a rain jacket. 538 still gives Trump a bit over 30% chance of POTUS, and there ain’t no jacket thick enough to ward that off.
@3 frog: But remember, he could shoot someone in the middle of 5th avenue and not lose any votes!
The suggestion of that Trump doesn’t want to win has been around for a while. I think it’s more likely he simply doesn’t care if he wins. Maybe he actually thinks he can win by being a terrible person, either because he thinks people are stupid or that secretly people want to have no social graces. Maybe he intends to cheat, maybe he thinks Gerrymandering and restrictive voting laws will let him win, maybe he’s a Clinton conspiracy, maybe he’s a rogue AI, maybe we have one of those scenarios where he has a small radio in his ear and someone was telling him what to say but someone else put an antenna on a drive-thru whale which is interfering with the signal and now it’s spouting gibberish into Trump’s radio.
It’s amazing how many GOP leaders and ultra-rich 0.1% percenters have come out and said, vote for Hillary.
They don’t want to be on the top of the heap. When the heap is a pile of rubble once known as the USA.
It’s just a business decision.
@anarchobyron #4 Remember “teach the controversy!”. All she’s said on the issues has been antivax talking points, obviously pandering to antivax people. Vaccines are thoroughly tested, safe and since high vaccination rates are necessary to save lives, any attempts to reduce them are deadly. The stuff she says about Monsanto and Big Pharma somehow making huge dollars on vaccination is just the same kind of nonsense, and any associated policies only seem like they’ll lead to preventing the FDA from doing their job and to allowing ignorant / irresponsible parents to put their children at risk.
No, Jill Stein is not anti-vaccine. But, as Doug Little points out, she does use the “Big Pharma” dogwhistle a lot, and she panders to the anti-vaccine crowd. That, along with her MD, awards apparent merit to the ideology. So is there really any practical difference between an anti-vaccine candidate and one who engages in apologia for the movement?
Given the choice between Hillary, a fiscal radical, a disingenuous doctor, and the irascible golden troll-child discussed in the OP, I’m feeling no qualms about voting Clinton.
Well, hold on, to be fair, we have to give Hillary a description, too. I’m still leaning towards the new Nixon.
That transcript is something to behold, including the part about funding PACs against people like Kasich in the future.
A positive development is that the media, with a little help from Obama and Trump himself, seem finally to have figured out a narrative in which to place his statements and actions rather than being overwhelmed by them – he’s unhinged, unfit, ignorant, compulsively vengeful, and a pathological liar. Now each new outrage doesn’t distract from the previous one, because it’s another illustration of his character.
Also, David Cay Johnson’s book The Making of Donald Trump was released yesterday.
Duth Olec,
Hmmm, she doesn’t have the Nixonian paranoia, and she’s not quite hawkish enough. The only real connection is friendship with Kissinger (a war criminal with little regard for ethical standards).
Perhaps “Nixon-Lite” or “Kissinger’s Pal”.
Trump will not be satisfied with delivering the White House to the Democrats.
Apparently he wants to deliver the House and Senate as well.
gmacs,
Oh, I was mostly thinking in terms of the going with whatever is politically expedient.
Which, to be fair, isn’t really a bad thing if it’s followed up on. That’s what I’m hoping: the change in TPP stance and move on health care and general Leftward momentum won’t just be political talk.
He’s probably already started on the sequel: The Unmaking of Donald Trump.
If Trump does not win, he’ll just declare that the system was rigged against him, and/or that there was massive voter fraud.
Either way, he thinks he can leverage the publicity to increase the value of his brand.
If he does win, there are strong indications that he will have Mike Pence run both domestic and foreign policy.
Tony Schwartz, the guy who actually wrote the “Art of the Deal” book for Trump, said this:
Trump is such a compulsive liar that he even lies when he doesn’t have a reason (like covering his ass) to do so. In an interview with George Stephanopoulos, Trump claimed:
Nope. He did not get a letter. He is lying.
Here is the NFL’s response:
Newsweek published an article in which they provided details of many business transactions during in which Trump lied. Excerpt:
Link
Okay, this is not going to work. It’s too late for one thing. For another, Trump has been issuing Trumpish statements and behaving badly all his adult life.
NBC News link.
Remember the time that Trump said Federal District Court Judge Gonzalo Curiel could not be objective in the RICO trial against Trump University? Curiel was born in Indiana, has Mexican parents, and is a highly respected judge.
Well, Trump is definitely going to have to face Judge Curiel in court.
Link
I have trouble thinking that Trump actually wants to win the presidency. Right now he’s on the best publicity tour of his life, with cheering crowds and the opposition out of sight. If he wins, and has to go to work, the party will be over. Half the country despises him, and his strongest supporters are the weakest of people. He has absolutely no experience in office, and no work ethic or learning skills, an no political capital or network.
But he’s Donald Trump, and trumpery is his life. He may imagine it’s all a big show.
Even more worrisome are the reports that are starting to come out about a national security briefing held for Trump where he asked, three times no less, “If we have nuclear weapons, why can’t we use them?”. Former CIA director Hayden has stated he can’t see how he could vote from Trump and, when asked who is advising Trump on national security, he said no one.
This man is truly as serious danger to this country and the world. He must not be allowed to get his hands on the nuclear keys.
I think Trump will easily win in November. ButI have a very hard time seeing him actually being president and do the ridiculous amounts of required workand handle all that stress. Either he’ll tell Pence to ghostwrite his presidency or he’ll quit.
well he is correct to a point. The rich and powerful themselves and their associated corporate lobbyist have been having an inordinate influence in the last few years (I just had two typo’s where I hit t instead of y in years is my subconscious trying to say something?). The politicians are all talk about freedom and individual liberty while supporting only those laws and policies that that give the most benefit to the rich and powerful.
What he is doing is openly courting the powerless bottom of the conservative base with out any pretense not even the gloss of “Willy Horton”. He is truly anti-establishment and by his example is calling them on their hypocrisy especially in the eyes of his supporters. It is obviously giving him an edge, a toe hold that is proving very hard if not impossible to dislodge him from.
He could very much win because of it. As he is he is not beholden to anyone at all and holds no one above himself.
There is something very appealing to that compared all those who are in the corporate pocket! I think that is the root of the anti-Hillary sentiment as well, whether it is true or not it is about the perception as much as the fact.
uncle frogy
Several of the Redhead’s visitors, who normally will be staunchly backing the republican presidential candidate, are very leery of Trump. He scares them with his bombastic speech, bullying attitude, and general ignorance of how to govern. They may well show up to vote, but only downballot, leaving the president blank.
Will people please stop saying stupid things like “Trump doesn’t want to win”? Of course he wants to win. Because then he’s a WINNER and he can brag about it. If he loses, then he’s a LOSER, and we all know how bad that is.
Yeah, he reportedly didn’t expect to be the nominee when he started — he was doing it more as a publicity thing and to try to move the campaign. But now that he’s in, he has to win.
What he doesn’t want is to actually do the job of being president. That’s way too much work and focus and doing things he doesn’t feel like doing.
Menyambal #20 wrote:
But I have no trouble thinking that Trump hasn’t thought the problems with being president through very well. I suspect he imagines that it will be a lot like it is on TV or the movies — a scene where he yells at people to “do it or else!” — followed by a scene where he’s playing with his dog or sipping a fine scotch. Hey, how hard can it be?
Everyone knows this is how being president works. (from Invisible Bread)
I guess signs point to he wants to win but then let the VP do everything. He just wants to swap the roles of P and VP.
A bit like the ending of this?
I’m pretty sure mike pence (on behalf of himself and his “fearless leader”) was the first to blame Obama and Clinton for the death of Captain Khan. That fish rots from the head.
https://www.facebook.com/mikepence/posts/10153921668637862
I think Trump is a spoiled brat who for 70 years has been surrounded by people who will not tell him “No” and who will actively kiss his ass. Anyone who didn’t fit that profile was summarily fired or otherwise shoved aside. The very idea that he won’t be elected is probably inconceivable for him.
At this point I don’t think he has any endgame in place, because he isn’t playing a game. All evidence suggests he runs on 100% pure spite and id. He doesn’t donate to charities, he doesn’t have a single successful business to his name (unless you count “fleecing investors to fund your elaborate lifestyle” as a business). His entire life has been utterly self-centered.
He has made his way for 70 years on sheer force of personality. Declare that things are This Way often enough and loudly enough, and the weaker personalities around you will find a way to make that true. The more outrageous claims will be made reality for you, at least in your immediate bubble, if you have enough money. Trump has managed to spin this into a self-sustaining feedback loop.
(The feedback loop was collapsing in his business life, but the GOP’s decades of fomenting racism and ignorance gave Trump an all new realm to bring his personality to.)
I agree with Sastra@26: Trump’s idea of how the presidency works comes from movies and TV. He thinks he’ll get to be dictator of everything. He’s been the dictator of everything in his immediate vicinity until now, so why would he think anything would change?
The crying baby was a false flag operation, a plant by Trump’s enemies. So says Trump supporter, Alex Jones.
@14,
“Trump will not be satisfied with delivering the White House to the Democrats.
Apparently he wants to deliver the House and Senate as well”
YES! YES! (drools)
Somehow, this sounds symbolic for where Trump is coming from. (coughMutantcough)
“Homes in wealthier neighborhoods found to harbor more arthropod species” http://phys.org/news/2016-08-homes-wealthier-neighborhoods-harbor-arthropod.html
(Quickly googles ‘arthropods.’)
Well, okay then. Fuck all those investments.
Ahem.
Trump Taj Mahal announces it will close
QFT. He’s a classic narcissist, utterly incapable of self-criticism and with only the most distant acquaintanceship with reality. He thinks that he’s stupendously popular, that he’s going to win easily unless the election is rigged*, and that he’ll then Make America Great Again – in his own image. He doesn’t, of course, have any plan for doing that, beyond persecuting immigrants, Muslims and his personal enemies – he thinks he will just order his minions to make it happen, and it will.
Why? It’s certainly not out of the question that he could win, but what evidence we have (the polls – both those on the election itself, and on the public’s (dis)approval of the candidates – and the reported turmoil in the Republican camp) suggest he will lose.
*That he’s started suggesting that it might well be rigged indictes that a small corner of his mind recognises that things are not going all that well for him – he’s erecting his psychological defences against losing.
Lynna @17
And expand his brand into new markets. I can’t wait to get a set Trump brand truck nuts for the torqueless wonder (1995 4 cylinder Ford Ranger).
I think there is some real money to be had in a campaign poster with a GOP elephant on it, inside a red circle, with a red slash mark through the elephant. Have paypal account, will buy.
Sung to the tune of “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General”
From “The Pirates of Penzance” by Gilbert and Sullivan
I’m not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
When lacking information, I’m known to just prevaricate.
Do not ask me for my tax returns, no one will ever see them.
I’m the best at paying taxes. I’m the best, and that’s my anthem.
Chapters 7 and 11 are legal tools I often use.
I’m the best at making others pay so I can avoid my dues.
We’re gonna build a wall. We’ll build a wall and keep the rapists out.
And I’ll send the bill to Mexico. I’ll send the bill. They best look out.
I’ve slept with married women, and that’s not my lone perversity,
I’m also good at screwing students at my university.
And now you all are wondering how my party did miscalculate.
I’m not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
And now he has us wondering how his party did miscalculate
He’s not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
I know our mythic history from birther-gate to Muslim hate.
Rafael killed JFK and they’re coming for our guns – you wait.
I didn’t say it. Others said it. Why would they if it isn’t true?
I’m just asking questions. Just asking. JAQing Off is what I do.
Muslims dancing in the street, dancing all along the Jersey shore.
Dancing by the thousands. When the towers fell they gave out a roar.
I read it. The Inquirer has all the news. How could you doubt
That journalistic tour de force in which no tabloid myth’s left out?
I hailed the massacre of Muslim hordes with bullets made from swine.
I said it, so it’s true. It’s true. Now don’t let facts my tale malign.
And now you all are wondering how my party did miscalculate.
I’m not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
And now he has us wondering how his party did miscalculate
He’s not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
In fact, when I know what is meant by “civilized” and “courtesy”,
When I can tell Virginia from the Garden State (New Jersey),
When I no longer cheer assaulting anyone who questions me,
When I give up mocking people who live with disability,
When I’m against the slander of the parents of our servicemen,
When I think we need to honor our NATO allies now and then,
In short, when I’ve a smattering of facts instead of flummery,
You’ll say no candidate could have a more superb recovery!
For my diplomatic knowledge, though I’m plucky and adventury,
Has only been brought down to the beginning of LAST century.
And now you all are wondering how my party did miscalculate.
I’m not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
And now he has us wondering how his party did miscalculate
He’s not the usual model for a presidential candidate.
The song that brings Trump to mind for me is DJ Khaled’s:
All I do is win win win no matter what
Got money on my mind I can’t ever get enough
And every time I step up in the building
Everybody’s hands go UP!
And they stay there, and they stay there, and they stay there
Cause all I do is win win win, and if you’re going in
Put your hands in the air make ’em stay there!
Well, sure, all those things suggest that he will lose, which is why it’s necessary for people who should fucking know better to make an endless drone of “TRUMP’S GONNA WIN!” part of the background noise of every progressive’s life online, until they’re too shell-shocked and depressed to even move, let alone get to the polls. That way Trump can win and they get to watch the country burn.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/03/climate-crisis-media-relegates-greatest-challenge-hurtle-us-collapse-planet
This is really the only thing that matters.
@birgerjohansson #32
In Italy, the left underestimated Berlusconi. And he won, hands down, for twenty years.
In UK, Brexit was grossly underestimated. And it won.
The GOP grossly underestimated Trump, and he won the primaries, hands down.
Go on, keep underestimating populist anger.
F.O.
Do you have any suggestions?
Or are you just going to kill yourself?
This also floating around.
https://youtu.be/pjdL777SdEI
@chigau #44
?
Not sure why I would want to kill myself.
Policy on climate change is, alone, enough to pick Clinton over Trump.
After that, let’s pay less attention to the POTUS circus and a bit more to the rest of the political process.
Let’s not underestimate Trump, belittling him seems to have little effect on his popularity and success.
Reaching to his supporters and trying to understand their motives rather than just dismissing them as subhumans might be more effective.
The attitude that we are superior and they are idiots has backfired already.
Talking ABOUT Trump reinforces him.
Talking WITH his supporters may lessen his grip on their fears instead.
numerobis @ #6 — He’s below 30% tonight on 538. He’s gone down to 26.7% chance of winning since earlier today, while Clinton is at 73.2%. Trump has dived steadily over the last several days. Ohio, North Carolina, Nevada, and Iowa have flipped to blue. Arizona and Georgia are lighter shades of pink.
I wish 538 was looking at the Congressional races.
Good news! Still way too high.
For congress: Not enough polling yet I suspect?
I’m not worried about Trump winning. I really don’t see how he can do it. He’ll probably get 60-60% of the white male vote, maybe 40% of the white female vote, but I don’t see how he gets even 10% of just about any other constituency. And there are plenty of people with strong motivation to get out and vote against him–the Latin@ vote alone could flip a few states to Clinton.
I’m much more worried about what happens when he loses. Even under the best case scenario, I don’t see Clinton winning a second term, as long as the goppers come back to their senses and nominate a halfway competent candidate. But what really scares me is how the right wing gun fellating white males react to his loss. He and his minions are already bleating about a rigged election; I wouldn’t be at all surprised if an insurrection breaks out. Right wing gun fellating white males do not give in easily.
How many of Bungling Bundy Militia gave up without going for their weapons? All but one.
I think Nerd is right. They are more John Wayne than Daniel Inouye
Best case scenario: Clinton, as the incumbent president and nominee of the centre-right Democratic-Republican party, is defeated in her reelection bid by the Progressive Party candidate. The Tantrums and Conspiracy Theories Party’s Trump-Stein ticket gets less than 1% of the vote despite the Let-It-Berners’ insistence that they’re really gonna do it this time!
*”center-right”. My computer is a POS. :(
Not too concerned about Trump winning at this point; I mean yes, now that it’s clear Trump will use nukes no matter what I’m reasonably sure the US will be pre-emptively bombed if Trump wins, but the Democrats filched Republican values so cleanly that Trump’s base is almost entirely racists at this point. As long the left remember the lessons of 1930s Germany and decide that right now, it’s more important to resist Trump than punish Clinton for impurity, the world’ll be fine.
No, what concerns me is that the left is focusing on Clinton and not all the state legislatures and governors and representatives they don’t campaign for. A president doesn’t get anything done without a Congress they work with (which is why voting for a third party is throwing your vote away: neither the Greens or the Libertarians have anyone in Congress, so nothing they want will ever pass without so many concessions it’s not worth passing. As an independent much more left wing than a lot of Democrats, Sanders would have had similar problems, but at least he was a senator so he’s got more to work with than the third parties do). And the awful shit happening to, say, transgender people, is because of the states, and the best the Federal government can do is sue the state. The American left have this fixation on the President having sole power but it’s so much more complex than that.
And guess where the Kochs are spending their money now they don’t want Trump to win?
> Even under the best case scenario, I don’t see Clinton winning a second term, as long as the goppers come back to their senses and nominate a halfway competent candidate.
Well putting aside that it’ll probably be Ted Cruz, it’s hard to imagine the bubble of unreality that sustains the GOP deflating rather than popping outright. You have to be deeply delusional to see Trump as viable. A likeable candidate has to live more in the real world, or at least vaguely adjacent to it like Mitt Romney.
More importantly I expect Clinton will have a much easier re-election than an election. The US freaks out about giving Clinton power, but tends to be fine with her once she has it.
@saad:
I highly recommend you never gamble with your money.
Meanwhile, it has also been established that Trump has tiny, tiny hands*.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/03/donald-trump-hand-display-madame-tussaud-wax-museum
(* – Assuming the value of tiny equals 0.19inches less than average. )
Tiny, tiny, tiny.
It is really amusing that people think he doesn’t want to win. I’m with “daved” that of course he wants to win. However, Trump is so incompetent, so unskilled, and so childlike that it becomes almost unbelievable. People start to think, “Nobody can possibly be that stupid or incompetent, he must be doing it on purpose” but I don’t think so. He is really that incompetent and he is really that childish. Just listen to the news that his campaign is “mailing it in”. Even his campaign has given up.
I’m concerned that this campaign may have damaged my WTF muscle. Every day, I read something which, a year ago, would have had me shouting at the screen and pounding the keyboard. But now, my reaction is jaded: “meh, more of the same. Wake me up when he punches a baby”.
frog:
What happens in that case? Do the electors get to vote for him anyway, with the votes going to Pence?
It is technically possible for the Electoral College to completely disregard the popular vote and pick who they want; the popular vote is just advice for the college not a mandate. Allowed, but so unlikely it is basically inconceivable and unprecedented. grasping at straws, I know, but as long as the straw exists, grasp at it. Something like Drumph may be motivation for a precedent. ( I doubt it, still grasping at imaginary straws)
Why would Clinton have a hard time winning reelection in four years?
It’s unusual for the incumbent to be turfed (that’s the point of term limits). As mentioned above, Clinton is popular when she’s in office.
I suspect she’s more likely to win a landslide as the Democrats finish consuming the GOP. The election after that is the earliest I see real opposition from the left, and probably not for a while after.
numerobis@62:
–>I don’t know if you are old enough to remember how the first Clinton got into the White House? Yes, the economy was tanking in 1992, but there was a not-insignificant feeling that 12 years of the Reagan Plan (Bush Sr was his VP) was enough and it was time to elect the young, charismatic bubba with different ideas.
The real test for Hillary will be the economy. If our economy is good in 4 years, she will be able to get re-elected. If it tanks (as is entirely possible), she’ll lose hands down. This is also why it’s so important to win down-ticket races: Her plan is pretty much the New Deal, to create jobs via infrastructure improvement. She needs Congress to go along with that and approve budgets, preferably in the first two years so the rev-up time will be early and the full roar of the economic engine will be going right around 2020.
If the economy tanks, almost any president is cooked. The only way to control that is to slash spending early so you get a recession around mid-term, then open up the spending valves and ride to the election on a wave of optimism. That’s what Cameron did — but then he got himself ousted by trying to paint himself as savior twice in a year.
What a Maroon claimed that even under the best case scenario the GOP would beat her — I don’t see how I could be confident of that either way, four years ahead of time before she’s even been elected.
numerobis,
Really just a feeling–I don’t have a lot of confidence in Clinton’s ability to make people like her. I really think if the gop had nominated a competent candidate this year (Bush, Rubio, maybe even Cruz) they would have won. And I’m worried that four years from now they’ll come to their senses and do just that.
Nerd, militantagnostic, I hope you’re right, but this country has a history of white men taking up arms when they see their privilege threatened, and the Trump campaign is stoking that feeling right now (“It’s rigged!”). At the very least, I expect a rise in right-wing terrorism.
At first I thought that Hillary’s line of attack against Trump asking whether we should trust him with the nuclear codes was a bit hyperbolic. I mean I figured there were scads of filters and fail safes to prevent a rogue President from launching nukes on a whim or out of pique. But then I saw Hayden’s interview on MSNBC and my blood ran cold. It tuns out that the President is the final filter and fail safe! When he says launch, we launch. The system is designed for speed and decisiveness. Let that sink in for a moment. If Trump gets testy or annoyed or just a bit peeved at, say, the Chinese or the Russians or even ISIS he has the power and authority to send them to a radioactive hell. ISIS couldn’t do too much about it, but the other two? I don’t think I need to spell it out. We can’t let this emotionally unstable wretch get to that position. He needs to be stopped by any means possible.
I thought independent confirmation from the president and the secretary of defense was needed.
Silver Fox @66
I wouldn’t count on that – there are enough Muslims in the world that some would respond to such an atrocity with lone wolf attacks or form cells. It would be a great recruiting tool. ISIS could be completely wiped and still come back strong than ever and be so dispersed that it would be nearly impossible to defeat.
they can do anything they want, but to be sure, there is nothing in the US constitution that says Pence must be the “next choice”.
the VP is only in the line of succession to a president, not a candidate.
Ichthyic, #69
You’re right. I’ve tried a few times in the past and am terrible at it.
Lawrence O’Donnell also did a segment about this. It’s a scary system.
I’m reading the book I mentioned above @ #12 (the author is David Cay Johnston – sorry). Trump is a deeply, deeply damaged human being. He’s pathologically vindictive, delights in attacking and witnessing the misfortune of those he thinks have wronged him, and sees this as an element of his strength.