US Politics, July 2024 - "Will you just drop out, man?"

My guess is he withdraws by the middle of this week or not at all. Congress comes back on Monday and they’re all going to go on the record one way or the other then.

(or was that right? You get my meaning...)

With ballots not being set and no final convention vote I can't see Republicans successfully obstructing Harris from the ballot anywhere but redoing primaries months after the fact seems like something that might actually violate state election codes.

I think the "blitz primary" idea is not to do a real primary with voters, it would just be with delegates. It seems totally unworkable to me and also I can't imagine why Harris would agree to such a thing. If Biden gets out, Harris is not going to be all like "let the people decide," she's going to aggressively make the case for why it should be her.

I transcribe a lot of interviews. Everyone talks like that when you lay it out word by word. EVERYONE. That's why you don't run unedited transcripts unless you're deliberately trying to make the person seem like a fool.

somehow I doubt that the interviews you transcribe are from people who have a team to prepare them for the interviews, with the objective of convincing millions of people that they are competent and and clear-headed. He's a politician for god's sake, performing competency and authority is half the job, and he used to be able to do it easily, and he can't anymore!

ignore my extremely competent formatting, i meant to do that

We should promise Joe that we'll give him credit for the 4D chess move of staying in until it was too scary and thus getting the Copmala Left on board with her candidacy. Just about everyone I've seen who was making barred out VP jokes is like "no, yeah, put her in coach she's a functional person."

Biden must formally release his delegates before they can vote for anyone else on the first ballot at the convention. If not, he has enough delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot. Unlikely he'll die before then so it's totally in his hands.

It is clear from his public statements that his self-image and pride are telling him he's a good president, his brain is just fine, and people should shut up about his dropping out. It will take considerable pressure from Dem leadership to alter his determination to proceed. Could still happen, though.

That "blitz primary" idea is just a stupid non-starter ginned up by people who fear Kamala can't win and are desperate to find an alternative that looks like a halfway legitimate process. Here news for them: vice presidents are designed to step into the vacancy left by a departing president. It's why they exist. Kamala was voted into that position. She is the only one endowed with that kind of legitimacy. It's Biden or it's Kamala. Them's the options, but only Biden has the power to decide it's not going to be him. That's it in a nutshell.

Yeah exactly, Harris has put in the time as VP and absolutely can claim that mantle under these circumstances. If there had been an open primary, of course other candidates would not have just handed it to her, but this is a different situation. And I think people like Newsom and Whitmer are probably (?) smart enough to understand that. Even if it potentially means them having to wait til 2032 to run.

Has Kamala been asked about any of this? Released any kind of statement?

well there's Z_tbd's post upthread, but that was Tuesday, a lot has changed since then

The only quote I've seen from her was the "It's about our fucking democracy" line from the meeting with Dem governors. She can't possibly say anything at this point that could be leaked anywhere, she has to be the completely loyal lieutenant unless Biden withdraws. Otherwise she'll look conniving and power hungry, which would be very bad regardless of the outcome.

(sorry I meant his WaPo link from a post 6 hours ago, not a post from Tuesday)

yes tipsy otm

to borrow frogbs' analogy, the QB that's gonna be the new one doesn't mention that before the ink has dried, it's just bad form

Well of course just wondering if any journalists have attempted to eke out anything telling from her eg "if Joe steps down would you accept the nomination?" etc

the only answer she could give to that would be "Joe's not going anywhere. next question."

Harris was born in October '64, I'm gonna give her a few months credit and say she'd be the first Gen X president if she managed to get elected.

The script is a museum piece. She can't say a word, not one, about Biden or his legacy other than continuing it.

October 1964 means she started kindergarten in the 1969/70 school year along with all the gen X born Jan-August 1965.

Trump being the first two-time loser since Adlai Stevenson would be great, above and beyond the losing. What a bizarre pairing--they'd have so much to talk about.

No surprises, but Biden can’t even do radio interviews without his handlers prepping the questions in advance

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/07/media/biden-interview-radio-host-philadelphia/index.html

Trump people are literally selling "I'm voting for the felon" T-shirts. I don't know how many they're selling, but it is not the knockout punch people want it to be. I do think it matters, I think there are people who are less likely to vote for him because of it. But it's not disqualifying to a sizable number of voters, obviously.

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Sunday, July 7, 2024 4:34 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

“I heard sleepy joe wouldn’t debate me because they’re saying I’m a felon. well you know folks, there's a lot of felons out there, some are saying there might be too many felons out there actually. some of them are very nice people from what I’ve heard. someone told me sleepy joe himself might have something to do with that”

Is it uncommon to vet questions in advance? Feel like if I was President of the USA I'd want to be prepared. Wouldn't matter if it was TV, Radio, Newspaper, or whatever.

Yeah, it's bad journalism. Guarantee you Stephanopoulos did not show them any questions in advance.

I honestly think the majority of Dems in Congress will call for Biden to exit this week

The more this is negotiated behind the scenes and Biden is given every chance to bow out gracefully with a big bundle of red roses in his arms and a cheering audience of Democratic elected officials to see him off the election stage, the better this will turn out in the end. Sadly, Democrats aren't known for choreographing this sort of dance, where the chorus line is all smiles and high-stepping in unison, but they need to learn how to do just that, and quickly.

To be fair, nobody has ever tried to orchestrate anything like this before. And all the scenarios for it playing out anything close to smoothly depend on a whole lot of massive egos managing to work together quickly under massive stress. Probably gonna be messy (the longer Biden holds on, the messier it gets).

“Stop fucking around.” (I still think he would’ve made a good governor for CA. Certainly better than piece of shit Arnold Schwarzenegger)

It’s time to stop fucking around. If the Convicted Felon wins, we lose our Democracy. Joe Biden has effectively served US with honor, decency, and dignity. It’s time for Joe Biden to step down.

— Rob Reiner (@robreiner) July 7, 2024

Sadly, Democrats aren't known for choreographing this sort of dance

they did in the 2020 primary...

this can't be sustainable, right? once he's lost Rob Reiner

Reiner literally held a fucking event for Harris two days after the debate. He’s about as important a donor as you can imagine

Rob Reiner: “I’ve seen enough”

The dominoes are falling with the donors and Congress. The DNC needs to pull the lever yesterday

The DNC knew about this mess more than a year ago but better late than never.

Am totally excited to see the Lord come down and make a proclamation.

Good evening!

I actually saw Carl Reiner about a year before he passed away. Amazingly funny, and he spent some time shitting on Reagan

Full Democratic Caucus meeting on Tuesday. Shit got really real

I think you need to calm down

Thanks for the advice. I’ll take it to heart

Sorry beamish, I disagree with a lot of what you say, as I do with almost all of the posters here, but I like seeing your posts! I think you go too far sometimes, though

that philly journalist has been let go.

We're all Kremlinologists here. Our disagreements aren't as great as our similarities.

yes

most of the posts I make are just spontaneous reactions that I end up feeling badly about. I'm sorry

I'm sure a lot of similar stories have been told but I figured I'd take a minute to talk about my Grandmother, who had a very long and storied career. She was a published author who'd written a dozen books, a minor media figure for some time, and along with my Grandpa (not my real one, but I called him that since I never knew my real Grandpa) built up a health food empire which nearly became a national brand. They retired when she was 77 and at that point she was still very sharp and active; a common joke in the family was that she was going to outlive us all. They moved to the mountains in Virginia and I didn't see her for a while, until Grandpa unfortunately passed away from cancer, a condition he had hid from the family for some reason. I didn't spend any real time with her until a couple years after that when I'd come to visit (I was a college student then so I didn't exactly have much money to travel) and right away it was clear that she was...not really herself. She seemed happy but didn't really engage much in conversation, stared off into space a lot, and went to bed alarmingly early. She was nice enough to cook for me - her cooking always was the best - but it just didn't taste right this time. She drove me to this tennis club she hung out at and her driving scared the shit out of me. She went really slow and kept pulling over to let people pass. Despite that she was still fairly functional. She remembered things and could answer whatever you asked. But something was clearly off.

Anyway, you obviously know where this is going...that is where I think Biden is now. He seems fairly lucid...sometimes. Even more or less up for the job, given the fact that he's surrounded himself with smart and capable people. But things declined really quickly. The next time I saw Grandma was at my brother's wedding and she was, to put it bluntly, really fucking weird. She had a friend she was travelling with and it was clear that this friend was there because she couldn't really get by on her own. Shortly after that you could barely have a conversation with her anymore. It all happened so fast.

From the age of about 84 she was basically nonfunctional as a human being - I believe that's the age she was when I helped move her into an assisted living apartment, and I noticed her short-term memory was completely shot...she had no idea what you had said to her even a minute ago. Amazingly she is still alive. Who knows, she may outlive us all yet.

No matter what we think will happen or should happen, we’re all a little rattled, aren’t we? It’s OK to admit that.

Xpost to Dan S.

thanks Raymond

Lookit who shows up at 1:51. Christmas Present confronts Christmas Past.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dos-3sF5L0E

My bff is very Beltway (her daughter is interning for a big Dem congressman atm) and will be on the Hill on Tuesday doing a panel for her day job - when I get the gossip, I will share the gossip!

She has stopped making Biden donations and has told them why.

Bigger Congressional names (Beyer is my congressman) : https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/joe-biden-2024-race-senior-house-democrats-step-aside/