Jon Stewart for President...

The Don said:
Why ?

After four increasingly poor Republican Presidents, do you think that the GOP will swing back to putting up a better, more suitable, candidate ? :p
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If we have to have a Republican President, we need one that can out govern Nixon, not out crook him.
 
PhantomWolf said:
The sad thing is that they have had some good candidates in that time, such as McCain, it's just that the Democrats had better ones.
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bobdroege7 said:
If we have to have a Republican President, we need one that can out govern Nixon, not out crook him.
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I think I've said it here before. If you want to get elected as a Democrat, you need to be a charismatic "rock star" (like Bill or Obama)

I'm not sure what the qualification is for GOP candidates but using short words like George W Bush and Donald Trump probably isn't a bad start. GOP candidates who used long words like McCain and Romney weren't so successful.
 
Roboramma said:
Sure, Trump wasn't the first. I just don't think that it's a good thing to emulate, and since Trump I've seen many people suggesting that looking for celebrities as leaders is a good idea. I don't think it is. That's about the limit of my point here.
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I didn't mean to imply that I disagreed with your point.

Was HW really worse than Reagan? In trying to find a trend is it really a good idea to limit yourself to the most recent 4 data points?
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I was thinking about the general trend over the last 40 years. HW was a blip in the general trend.
I am actually sympathetic to the idea that something negative has been happening to our political systems, but I think you need to make a better argument than this.
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Why do I need to make a better argument? I'm not asking you to treat it as a serious thesis on the state of US politics. I thought the reference at the end to the dead raccoon made it reasonably obvious that I was being somewhat light hearted.
 
PhantomWolf said:
At the end of the day, I don't think that "better than Trump" is the bar that you want set for Presidents of the US going forwards.
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I had a hard time grasping how stupid our people were to have elected W in 2000. Surely they weren't so stupid as to elect that fool again. Okay, but come on. Americans can't be so stupid to elect Donald friggin' Trump, right?

It's now 2019, and I have zero confidence in the American people to send that criminal packing in the 2020 election. On what could/should I possibly base *raising* the bar after such a sustained national effort to continually lower it?
 
Sideroxylon said:
What were they doing? What had they achieved? What is the time frame they are working to?
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They were holding a hearing on the proposal, it's still in the works, and it's passed the committee already and is expected to pass the House soon.

But the Senate? Would you like to guess who the single worst opponent of long-term funding is?

But regardless, Again I'm happy he did it, but the shame shouldn't be born by folks in the House.
 
Any nicknames Trump could use for a dead raccoon running (or decomposing) for office?!
 
jeremyp said:
Wasn't it started by Ronald Reagan? I will concede, however, that he had a career in politics after being a film actor and before becoming president.

Also, not a presidential level, but Clint Eastwood and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The trend that actually worries me more is the trend in Republican presidents. It goes Reagan, Bush 41, Bush 43, Trump. Extrapolating, I think the next one probably will be a dead raccoon.
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Would definitely do way less harm than trumpf.
 
Brainache said:
I guess that's true. Maybe he could run with a sensible VP choice, win in a landslide, then resign.
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I think that anyone who wins the presidency is unlikely to step aside.

jeremyp said:
Wasn't it started by Ronald Reagan? I will concede, however, that he had a career in politics after being a film actor and before becoming president.

Also, not a presidential level, but Clint Eastwood and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
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Schwarzenegger might be a good president, but he's ineligible.

I have wondered about George Clooney. Easy on the eyes for sure :cool:

PhantomWolf said:
The sad thing is that they have had some good candidates in that time, such as McCain, it's just that the Democrats had better ones.
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McCain doomed himself to defeat by pushing comprehensive immigration reform. I think he might have known that. He wasn't willing to spout racist rhetoric, which is what some people on the right evidently want. Pandering to that crowd wasn't worth it to him, IMO.
 
Minoosh said:
<snip>

McCain doomed himself to defeat by pushing comprehensive immigration reform. I think he might have known that. He wasn't willing to spout racist rhetoric, which is what some people on the right evidently want. Pandering to that crowd wasn't worth it to him, IMO.
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I think you're recalling a different GE than the one I remember from '04. McCain lost because he gave up his maverick status and got behind the bailout and was still a verbal supporter of the Bush/Cheney wars. Immigration was not a big issue in '04.
 
Foolmewunz said:
I think you're recalling a different GE than the one I remember from '04. McCain lost because he gave up his maverick status and got behind the bailout and was still a verbal supporter of the Bush/Cheney wars. Immigration was not a big issue in '04.
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McCain wasn't in that was he? Wikipedia implies Bush was nominated unopposed in 2004.
 
jeremyp said:
McCain wasn't in that was he? Wikipedia implies Bush was nominated unopposed in 2004.
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Foolmewunz said:
Duuuh! '08.
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John McCain took part in 2000, when he competed with George W. Bush for the Republican nomination and was soundly defeated. And he also played a significant part in the 2004 campaign, although not as a competing candidate.

Here's an excerpt from a 2008 article about McCain's 2000 defeat:

Ann Banks in The Nation said:
Eight years ago this month, John McCain took the New Hampshire primary and was favored to win in South Carolina. Had he succeeded, he would likely have thwarted the presidential aspirations of George W. Bush and become the Republican nominee. But Bush strategist Karl Rove came to the rescue with a vicious smear tactic.

Rove invented a uniquely injurious fiction for his operatives to circulate via a phony poll. Voters were asked, "Would you be more or less likely to vote for John McCain…if you knew he had fathered an illegitimate black child?" This was no random slur. McCain was at the time campaigning with his dark-skinned daughter, Bridget, adopted from Bangladesh.

It worked. Owing largely to the Rove-orchestrated whispering campaign, Bush prevailed in South Carolina and secured the Republican nomination. The rest is history–specifically the tragic and blighted history of our young century. It worked in another way as well. Too shaken to defend himself, McCain emerged from the bruising episode less maverick reformer and more Manchurian candidate.

The former crusader against the Republican establishment has since turned into a Bush-hugging, business-as-usual politician...
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And here's an excerpt from a 2004 article about John McCain's role in that election:

Richard Gooding in Vanity Fair said:
One day he was being courted as John Kerry’s running mate; another day he was rumored to be replacing Dick Cheney on the Bush ticket. On many days he was defending his Democratic friend against the attacks of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth; at the same time, he was campaigning side by side with his newer friend, the president, once even hugging him and getting a kiss on the forehead in return. Both candidates have used his image to their advantage in their TV ads.

And with nearly every report about Senator John McCain and the unprecedented tightrope he’s navigated, there’s been a reference to the ugliness of four years ago—the South Carolina Republican primary of 2000, the do-or-die battle of George W. Bush’s political life to that point.

McCain says “it’s over,” he’s buried the hatchet, it’s no longer worth revisiting. But the evidence of this political year says otherwise: the ghosts of South Carolina—the power of going negative and the quandary of how to respond to it; the role of consultants and of surrogate groups; the question of a candidate’s responsibility—just won’t go away...
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While there are many reasons why McCain lost the general election in 2008, I think the events of 2000 and 2004 should be taken into account as part of the picture.
 
Mumbles said:
They were holding a hearing on the proposal, it's still in the works, and it's passed the committee already and is expected to pass the House soon.

But the Senate? Would you like to guess who the single worst opponent of long-term funding is?

But regardless, Again I'm happy he did it, but the shame shouldn't be born by folks in the House.
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I would hazard a guess that Stewart made his stance at this point BECAUSE of the Senate being the next step. Hence why he's gone after McConnell so hard, because he's seen them drag their feet every time this has come up. He even says as much in the video.

He wasn't shaming people of the house that showed up, he was shaming the hypocritical ******** that perpetually said, "Never forget the first responders" ad nauseum after 9/11 happened. Those same people who now, apparently, forgot to show up to a committee dedicated to the first responders. Even IF they weren't "required" to be there, showing up proves you actually care and want to hear their story.

Stewart even refers to one of the congressman who said, "We have a lot of things going on up here." Does that sound like they are giving it their upmost effort? No. Hell no. After experiencing what he has the previous 2 times this has come up for renewal, I'd say that he's well founded in his assumption that congress will continue to dick around.
 
quadraginta said:
It's preferable to any lower bar.
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It's possible to get lower?

But seriously. The bar needs to be set higher than "Better then Trump" because the Trump bar is so low that it leaves a lot of room between terrible and average that is still above his set bar. Presidents need to be be better than an average politician to make the county work well, so there needs to be a higher standard below which a candidate is just unacceptable to voters.
 
PhantomWolf said:
But seriously. The bar needs to be set higher than "Better then Trump" because the Trump bar is so low that it leaves a lot of room between terrible and average that is still above his set bar.
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Which is why it's a good thing we've got 20-something Democrats + Bernie running and every one of them is a bar far-higher. At this point, however, I have very little confidence that enough of my fellow Americans care/are smart enough to elect any of them.
 
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