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Merged 2024 Election Thread

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I'd like to believe that (regarding RFK Jr.) but find it difficult.

This article is typical of the reporting at the time.

It turns out that the son of Robert F Kennedy and nephew of John F Kennedy, Democratic giants who maintain widespread admiration in the party, is actually more popular among Republicans – including some of the most influential rightwing voices in the US

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...edy-jr-independent-candidate-republican-voter
 
The electoral college is one thing that is wrong here, but I also dislike the primaries. The Iowa people are really fired up to determine the fate of our country. Apparently 8 years of Trump is not enough. He will still be something of a figure in 2026 elections even if he loses the presidency.

And silly Iowa has all this power even though they only have 6 electoral votes.
 
Thought the Iowa primary was a big thing in 2016, and now, there has not been much change since 2016. Once the voters had moved on to election in 2016, some 50-55% of Iowa has been supporting Trump since 2016.
https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2023/1...s-another-alarm-is-raised-by-new-census-data/

Neither Biden nor Trump flipped any counties in the state, although Biden came within 2% of flipping Dallas County, a suburb of Des Moines. Jefferson County was also very close, having gone for Trump by a similarly tight margin four years earlier.
 
I understand how difficult it can be for decent people to believe that there really are people who enjoy seeing others suffer, especially others who don't happen to look and/or think exactly like them. There's no doubt that nurture does indeed greatly affect how people turn out, but there are enough examples of badly nurtured individuals who manage to turn out just fine to make it clear that nature also plays a role.

After a lifetime as the quintessential bleeding heart liberal, the last few years have finally forced me to accept the fact that a small but significant fraction of my fellow human beings really are, by nature, selfish scumbags. They exist in all classes of all societies, and I am no longer prepared to make excuses for their appalling, consciously made, choices.

I hear ya. But I disagree with you about one thing: the fraction of our fellow human beings that are, by nature, selfish scumbags is not 'small' by any means. They far outnumber those that aren't.
 
I understand how difficult it can be for decent people to believe that there really are people who enjoy seeing others suffer, especially others who don't happen to look and/or think exactly like them. There's no doubt that nurture does indeed greatly affect how people turn out, but there are enough examples of badly nurtured individuals who manage to turn out just fine to make it clear that nature also plays a role.

After a lifetime as the quintessential bleeding heart liberal, the last few years have finally forced me to accept the fact that a small but significant fraction of my fellow human beings really are, by nature, selfish scumbags. They exist in all classes of all societies, and I am no longer prepared to make excuses for their appalling, consciously made, choices.

My thoughts keep returning to Mark Twain's short story, The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg. The citizens of this town had a reputation for honesty, decency, and clean living, but one man's scheme successfully demonstrated their true nature.

So, here were people in our lives we thought of as good and trustworthy, and along comes Trump who gives them permission to express the hatefulness they've hidden under their veneer of citizenship.

He encourages them to give up citizenship altogether and join the selfish, bigoted, greedy, hateful cult/mob. He gives them permission to be the "authentic" a-holes, or simply the soulless frauds they always were.

It's been so disappointing seeing nastiness of people we trusted and must now keep a measured distance from.

My fear is that next year America will turn out to be Hadleyburg with too few honest citizens to counter the corruption.
 
My thoughts keep returning to Mark Twain's short story, The Man Who Corrupted Hadleyburg. The citizens of this town had a reputation for honesty, decency, and clean living, but one man's scheme successfully demonstrated their true nature.

So, here were people in our lives we thought of as good and trustworthy, and along comes Trump who gives them permission to express the hatefulness they've hidden under their veneer of citizenship. He encourages them to give up citizenship altogether and join the selfish, bigoted, greedy, hateful cult/mob. He gives them permission to be the "authentic" a-holes, or simply the soulless frauds they always were.
It's been so disappointing seeing nastiness of people we trusted and must now keep a measured distance from.

My fear is that next year America will turn out to be Hadleyburg with too few honest citizens to counter the corruption.

I find the more someone feels the need to express publicly just how 'patriotic' they are, the bigger scumbag they usually are. They try to disguise their bigoted, ugly, fascist selves behind the veneer of being 'patriotic'.
 
I find the more someone feels the need to express publicly just how 'patriotic' they are, the bigger scumbag they usually are. They try to disguise their bigoted, ugly, fascist selves behind the veneer of being 'patriotic'.

"America First!" means "me first. Don't tread on me. I tread on you!"
 
Colorado Supreme Court rules Trump disqualified from holding presidency

https://www.msnbc.com/deadline-whit...ump-colorado-14th-amendment-ruling-rcna128710

I honestly did not think any court in the USA would have the courage make this ruling.

Some key points

- All seven of the Colorado Supreme Court justices are Democrat appointees. In countries where politics and the judiciary are separate, this fact would not matter, but America is not one of those countries.

- The Colorado District Court earlier ruled that The Fat Orange Turd can be on the ballot: Judge Sarah Wallace last month said that while he did engage in insurrection, she claimed that the president is not an officer of the United States. If this is true, then WTF does "Office of the President of the United States" actually mean?

- The Colorado Supreme Court agrees with her that he engaged in insurrection, but disagrees that section 3 of the 14th amendment does not apply to the President.

This probably will not survive an appeal to SCOTUS, but there are some glimmers of hope.

Firstly, despite SCOTUS being a 6-3 Republican majority, they have a track record of ruling against The Fat Orange Turd on pretty much every issue that has come before them.

Secondly, they must all be acutely aware of The Fat Orange Turd's authoritarian bent. He has made it clear that he wants to be a dictator, and that he is plotting revenge against everyone who has been disloyal to him. That will include some of his own appointees. on SCOTUS.

Finally, if there is one thing all the justices will realize, it is that authoritarians and dictators have no use for a judicial system. One of the first things dictators do after dissolving parliaments is to eliminate those pesky courts that keep getting in the way of his visions of grandeur....

Der Trumpenführer will have no use for a supreme court.
 
A note re how some of these BS polls are giving us BS results. Here's a hypothetical example:

They ask 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans their opinion. But the samples come from a district that has 1,000 Republican voters and 15,000 Democrats.

That might be an exaggeration but it realistic that all these polls showing Trump beating Biden make no sense. Every voter in the country can't be a low information voter.

Too many are misreading the 2024 polls. Here’s a better way.

They do say the polls show the race neck and neck and that might be true, but when the news media says over and over Trump is ahead in a tied poll, that is not true.
 
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Republicans threaten to remove Joe Biden from ballots in retaliation for the Colorado ruling.

It's hilarious. Once again Trump calls it political and his minions believe it. That impeachment inquiry is falling apart before it even gets started. Now Jordan wants Garland to turn over some evidence he used to get subpoenas (not sure if he's going to include evidence behind his own subpoena at some point). :rolleyes:

House GOP hits AG Merrick Garland with subpoena over Trump DOJ investigation of Senate staffers
WASHINGTON – The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Attorney General Merrick Garland on Tuesday for information about the Justice Department surveilling a Senate staffer during the investigation about Donald Trump before the 2016 election.

The Justice Department has told the House panel that the investigation of the so-called Steele dossier occurred during the Trump administration before Garland took office, the inquiry resulted in the conviction of a Senate staffer and Garland has updated policies for congressional investigations.
 
A note re how some of these BS polls are giving us BS results. Here's a hypothetical example:

They ask 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans their opinion. But the samples come from a district that has 1,000 Republican voters and 15,000 Democrats.
That's not how polling works.

Reputable polling companies work hard to ensure that their sample is representative. That means if, say, 10% of the population is over 70 and 20% under 30 then 10% of the people in the sample will be over 70 and 20% under 30. Same for things like educational level, ethnicity etc. The sample must be a representative cross section of the entire population. Then they ask them who they are currently planning to vote for, their opinion of Biden and Trump etc.
 
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A note re how some of these BS polls are giving us BS results. Here's a hypothetical example:

They ask 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans their opinion. But the samples come from a district that has 1,000 Republican voters and 15,000 Democrats.

That might be an exaggeration but it realistic that all these polls showing Trump beating Biden make no sense. Every voter in the country can't be a low information voter.

Too many are misreading the 2024 polls. Here’s a better way.

They do say the polls show the race neck and neck and that might be true, but when the news media says over and over Trump is ahead in a tied poll, that is not true.

Low information voters win elections!
 
That's not how polling works. ...
Of course not. It was an example from the news but I don't have a link.

It's not unknown for these people to give dishonest results like the one I cited above where survey question were slanted to make it look like mail-in ballots had false results.

My concern is the lousy job the mainstream news is doing when they report on these polls and get it wrong to make headlines like Trump beats Biden.

And speaking of poor reporting, they are doing it again, reporting daily or more often on every thing Trump says. Of course Trump knows that which is why he keeps saying outrageous things.
 
Just out of interest, how important is this ruling in Colorado going to be? It seems Trump will only be off the Colorado primary ballot. He will still win the primaries for the GOP meaning he will still end up as the nominee. Will this also mean he cannot be on the general election ballot? That would seem like a more reasonable area for the Supreme Court of Colorado to rule on rather than on an internal party primary. For the most part, I would expect the parties to make their own judgment about who can run in their pwn party primary. For example, Cenk Uyghur was denied a place on the Democratic primary ballots for a few states because he doesn’t meet the constitutional requirements. Would the Supreme Court of other states be expected to intervene if Uyghur was allowed onto a primary ballot elsewhere?
 
Of course not. It was an example from the news but I don't have a link.

It's not unknown for these people to give dishonest results like the one I cited above where survey question were slanted to make it look like mail-in ballots had false results.

My concern is the lousy job the mainstream news is doing when they report on these polls and get it wrong to make headlines like Trump beats Biden.

And speaking of poor reporting, they are doing it again, reporting daily or more often on every thing Trump says. Of course Trump knows that which is why he keeps saying outrageous things.

The thing is if a presidential candidate that is likely to win the party nomination and be near favourite to win the election, says he wants to be a dictator or starts talking about immigrants destroying the blood of the nation, then of course the media would and should cover it even if he is only saying it to get in the news. People need to be aware of his fascistic outbursts.

You might say “but if they cover him he might win” which suggests that in your opinion the job of the media is to take a side in the election. I don’t see why that should be so.
 
Just out of interest, how important is this ruling in Colorado going to be? It seems Trump will only be off the Colorado primary ballot. He will still win the primaries for the GOP meaning he will still end up as the nominee. Will this also mean he cannot be on the general election ballot? That would seem like a more reasonable area for the Supreme Court of Colorado to rule on rather than on an internal party primary. For the most part, I would expect the parties to make their own judgment about who can run in their pwn party primary. For example, Cenk Uyghur was denied a place on the Democratic primary ballots for a few states because he doesn’t meet the constitutional requirements. Would the Supreme Court of other states be expected to intervene if Uyghur was allowed onto a primary ballot elsewhere?
Apparently it means he can't be on the general ballot either and if people write the name in he can't serve. It would also mean he can't run as an independent or 3rd party. That might just mean he can't win the EC votes from Colorado.

And then there is the issue of other states doing the same.

Re-evaluating my bet to myself in the other thread (the threads overlap), this will give SCOTUS an excuse to rule against the plaintiffs.
 
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