a clown car full of millionaires: the 2016 presidential primary thread

that is an accurate description

(xpost) Doing the same kind of comparison, red to peach. Just guessing: Trump tried, after a fashion, and as much as he's capable of doing, to rein himself in. He spoke the most, but had fewer 60-second segments that most everyone else.

On the other hand, that answer about women...

Read the Jonathan Chait link. Maybe he didn't rein himself in after all.

many weird moments where this felt like Wrestlemania. the total set-up gotcha thing fox did with trump at the beginning, deliberately phrasing the question in an awkward way which would result in only trump raising his hand (more iconic than 9 raised hands and having to search for his absence). the insertion of the crowd as an element, cheering and jeering at the archetypes. trump as THE villain archetype. i don't remember the exact quote, but there was a moment when rand paul broke the 4th wall by saying something about how everything was turning into a reality show contest. and then a few minutes ago i saw these pictures from earlier today:

http://i.imgur.com/FCYq3DT.png
http://i.imgur.com/lIqdM3e.png

which i get, but the timing is just super weird and i'm having a PKD moment

PKD is a good lens to view this election through

where in Trump do we have to punch holes in order to make ducks fly through the room?

didn't watch, but this Trump thing is great:

Because of his donations, he said, "when I need something they are there for me." He added "most of the people on this stage I have given to," which the other candidates leapt to deny.

i read Trump was the only candidate to denounce the Iraq war.

Paul did too, albeit obliquely.

Paul was the only one to remind people that there's this thing called the Bill of Rights too.

many weird moments where this felt like Wrestlemania.

We're getting so close:
https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2513/3714896326_510ff40e22.jpg

At first I thought it was odd that Trump singled out "the last few months" of the Bush presidency for being a catastrophe, but then I remembered that he probably lost a billion dollars or something in the crash.

Also, Trump's Twitter today is a treat.

click at your peril

https://twitter.com/RubinReport/status/629680053916299264

america sings in one voice, a truth inescapable:

https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&vertical=default&q=rand%20pubes&src=typd&lang=en

seems pretty obv to me that fox was doing the party's work trying to spike trump with those questions about being a new york business democrat until like a month ago, and putting some companies through bankruptcy. not that i felt bad for the man, but lord the sanctimony of fox ppl expressing shock and alarm about how the investor class uses the law

here's a transcript, for those who had to juggle janky ass streams the whole night. the people i was with had sky news up on youtube, but like 2/3rds through fox DMCA'd it, lol

http://time.com/3988276/republican-debate-primetime-transcript-full-text/

is there a highlights reel anywhere?

can you look into my heart?

you really need to hear the inflection of Christie scoffing at civil liberties

Really weird fact about Christie: one of his major biographical bullet points is an easily-traceable lie.

http://thinkprogress.org/election/2015/08/07/3689230/chris-christie-september-10/

getting a strong Scooby Dum vibe from the Walker vine

FOX News IS the party.

trumpy reggae party

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNcZHDopFb8

jesus christ I know all the words to that commercial =\

i'm there with ya

trumpy reggae party

― welltris (crüt), Friday, August 7, 2015 2:18 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

irl lol

Counterpunch credits Trump with "two glorious minutes of pure, unalloyed truth on national television." The Hillary wedding thing was awesome.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/08/07/trumps-triumph-billionaire-blowhard-exposes-fake-political-system/

PFTCommenter at his best: http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2015/8/7/9114747/joe-flacco-elite-gop-debate-cleveland

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CLwnUnoWsAAQyGm.jpg

Great-make America again

https://scontent-sjc2-1.cdninstagram.com/hphotos-xaf1/t51.2885-15/11282610_1615252488732772_2039018586_n.jpg

Z is for...???

the coverup

I liked how at least 3 dudes biffed their closing statements.

I promise to be the best that i can do!

Trumps politics/policies/viewpoints seems to largely intersect with the others with the only obvious difference being his manners - spun as "speaking his mind".

Once he's out then it's going to be one of these other crazies standing for Prez.

So, other than that one question about pledging to support the eventual nominee, are there any policy positions or whatever that marks Trump as an extreme outlier here?

"the insurance companies are making a fortune because they have control of the politicians...they have total control of the politicians. They’re making a fortune."

^ Trump "speaking his mind" last night while sounding like hell of a lot of sensible people I know.

Trump is a cretin with bad manners and bullying tendencies, but good luck getting HilRod to tell that much truth for two minutes in the next 10 months.

!? policy wise, as much as anyone can tell, trump is way off from GOP consensus. which they tried to ding him for last night: single payer, abortion, war (kind of). it's not like 'policy' is really the point of his whole show

i guess he 'evolved' on abortion in pretty quick fashion

anyway, is there a name for this particularly buttholeesque graph vox made?

https://twitter.com/ezraklein/status/629739700828401664

http://bl.ocks.org/mbostock/4062006

On issues like abortion he's more sensible than the GOP consensus though - certainly than some of his competitors.

He's not sensible on abortion anymore.

Right. But still way more moderate than some of his competitors here. Did he say it should be illegal?

xxxxpost "A Hope and Change?"

https://jeb2016.com/shop/lifestyle/guaca-bowle/

no Jeb! logo or anything. just a fucking bowl.

i like to think that thing is 7 ft wide

this seems a bit odd?

https://jeb2016.com/shop/clothing/my-dad-shirt/

"Jeb sums up his love for his dad in one powerful quote. Let’s hope you don’t want to step outside."

jeb contracted zazzle to do his merch

love how the dude's wearing a late '90s haircut