US Politics, September 2024 -- “I’m Not Going to Apologize For Posting a Joke”

Tapper: Trump is traveling with a veritable legion of doom of bigots and liars. Perhaps none so depraved as this woman, Laura Loomer. Just on Sunday, she posted an insanely racist message that if Harris, whose mom was an Indian immigrant, wins, the White House will 'smell like… pic.twitter.com/J6938cwfmF

— Kamala HQ (@KamalaHQ) September 11, 2024

particularly insane considering who Vance's wife is

It's over:

As my friend @taylorswift13 so eloquently stated, now is the time to research and choose the candidate that speaks to you and your beliefs. Only 54 days left until the election. Make sure you are registered to vote! Your vote in this election may be one of the most important… pic.twitter.com/hN9OaBfH2Z

— Stevie Nicks (@StevieNicks) September 11, 2024

I'm open to explanations of how this is not otm but I fear very much that it is. But that's also why it matters which question you ask, in terms of getting survey data and having it mean anything.

― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Wednesday, September 11, 2024 2:01 PM (four hours ago)

Good point about what we call the 'script' (the list of questions we ask the voters at the doors/phones and the list of answer choices). A good campaign should test different versions on a small scale before deciding on a main script for the major canvassing push.

sad side effect of the Mango Mussolini's bullshit

WASHINGTON, Sept 11 (Reuters) - Haitian Americans said they fear for their safety after Donald Trump repeated a false and derogatory claim during this week's presidential debate about immigrants in Ohio.

Haitian community leaders across the U.S. said the Republican candidate's remarks about immigrants eating household pets during his debate with Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris could put lives at risk and further inflame tensions in the small city of Springfield, Ohio, where thousands of recent Haitian arrivals have boosted the local economy but also strained the safety net.

Mentioned the hand-on-chin last night:

https://i.postimg.cc/NMJm8Tgg/chin.jpg

Reminded me so much of Obama's "Please, Governor, proceed" in 2012.

I love the Stevie Nicks post, "from a childless dog lady".

Trump couldn't really lose this debate because he is who he is, but he presented a particularly angry version of himself this time, and repeated insane conspiracy theories (Hatians eating pets in Ohio, millions of criminals crossing the border, "illegals" getting trans surgery in prison etc etc). The depressing thing is that nobody cares and nobody takes notice of these statements.

The burden was all on Harris. She had to prove herself. It was Harris's debate to win or lose. I think she won

also his mouth looked really weird the entire time

NEW: A General Services Administration spox tells NPR that as of 11 a.m. ET today there have been 306,422 visitors to https://t.co/WXfQ7iuhYq referred from Taylor Swifts’s URL she shared on Instagram last night

— Elena Moore (@ElenaMMoore) September 11, 2024

I love the Stevie Nicks post, "from a childless dog lady"

Some people want kids, other people want cocaine blown up their assholes. It’s all about choices.

the debate was really good tv. i’ve been enjoying rewatching clips posted online all day today. hard to pick a favorite

note that Nicks did not offer an endorsement, just GOTV hype

C'mon, the dog lady thing is a giveaway

She's never going back again.

yes the "childless dog lady" was a total give away

she wants us to go our own way

Trump's horribleness is totally normalized now. I hate it

yeah, I wonder if Musk's offer to impregnate Swift would've even occurred had he not signed on with that sleaze camp

nobody cares and nobody takes notice of these statements

That's true. That's why you haven't seen any clips circulating on the news, it's not the subject of any late night comedy monologues, nothing. Just pebbles dropped into an empty mine shaft.

two things are true, Harris won and Trump lost, badly.

Trump only lost badly if he lost a few thousand votes in each of the critical swing states. Otherwise all he did was show his ass in public one more time, when we've all seen more of his ass than we care to see in this lifetime.

he reinforced his 'senior yells at cloud' reputation but some voters clearly like that act

Harris otoh undoubtedly won. She almost certainly solidified her standing with her natural voting base and gained some favor from voters who had felt unsure about her because of their lack of familiarity with her. Her answer on abortion probably amped up quite a few new young women voters, if they were watching. We'll all see better the results when some of the dust has settled. The Taylor Swift endorsement might have even outweighed the debate in terms of consequences to the election.

The depressing thing is that nobody cares and nobody takes notice of these statements.

what universe do you inhabit because these statements are literally the only thing anyone has talked about for the past day. I am at a relatively new job (for a financial services company) where no one ever talks politics and I walked in and the first thing someone said to me was "did you watch the debate????" My boss turned to me halfway through the day enraged about the 'after birth abortion' rhetoric.

Wowwww at Miller. The whole “no, I’m going to ask YOU a question” crossfire table turning thing is so embarrassing… like, “what are you doing, I’m a journalist, I’m not competing against you”… it seems to come from a false sense of confidence wrt one’s ability to intimidate others. It’s like shitty Batman villain stuff, Maxwell Smart dumb crap

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/11/opinion/trump-harris-debate-joseph-gordon-levitt.html

^ the best thing I have ever seen, well today at least.

see this is why it's good to have Harris in because Trump said that same exact shit the last time but nobody noticed because Biden sounded like he was dying

I watched the MSNBC, Fox News and then the CNN after debate coverage. MSNBC was live with Tim Walz (only appearance last night) when the Swift endorsement dropped. Rachel Maddow read the whole thing to the US audience (no other network read out the full thing). Fox was interesting to say the least, all spin no substance. They all were saying the moderation was loop sided. When T come into the spin room, they all just bent the knee. CNN tried to do too many things all at once but had the most professional cast with like 25 guests. I did this all last night too because I was amped and was up way too late. It was past 2AM when I finally went to bed, work today was interesting,,,

lol @ whining about the mods fact checking you, if you don't like it then stop making shit up

loop sided

Good description of Fox, actually, but you forgot the 'y'.

I've seen some people ask "does Trump really think he won the debate?" and it seems pretty obvious that he does not, if he did he wouldn't be hanging out in the spin room talking about how great he did, that whole thing was him venting. I mean there were some points during the second half where I've never seen him look that shook before.

funny thing is he's only hurting himself doing shit like walking into the spin room and insisting 90% of people who watched thought he won. I know his voting base is crazy but most of them aren't Trump crazy. they know he's losing his mind but will vote for him anyway because the alternative, to them, is worse. same way we felt about Sleepy Joe. but he's demonstrating not only that he's actually terrible at getting shit done he's also really obnoxious and makes the entire Republican party look like idiots, how many of these folks just say fuck it, not taking an hour of my day to vote for him?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez6phBoRvpc

Trump said that same exact shit the last time but nobody noticed because Biden sounded like he was dying

He may have said the same stuff but he said it different (obviously because of the higher caliber opponent, which rattled him). It wasn't just that Harris was better than Biden, Trump was worse than he was at the last debate. When he's winning, he's enjoying it, and when he's enjoying it he can be lighter and funnier and that can make some of the dumb stuff be "oh he's not being serious" to some people.

It doesn't work the same way when he's angrier and there's no levity at all to wash the medicine down with. The delivery is more important than the words for most people, who fill in their own words to at least some degree, which is why its easier to tell who won any kind of debate if you turn the sound off

the lack of enthusiasm for Trump among his voters was already very evident before this debate, but they'll get out and vote for him again anyway. that stubborn loyalty to him played out back in the primaries when they gave the cold shoulder to Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis. the main reason that tepid levels of excitement in his base will matter going forward is the same old weirdness of the electoral college and thin margins in swing states we've been dragged through every four years since 2000. minimal shifts in voter sentiment and random noise will rule the day. it sucks, but its what we have until something changes that we can't yet foresee.

the lack of enthusiasm for Trump among his voters was already very evident before this debate, but they'll get out and vote for him again anyway. that stubborn loyalty to him played out back in the primaries when they gave the cold shoulder to Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis.

Except for the 20% of them that voted for Haley. Do you think if Trump loses 20% of his base in the general election he can still squeak out an Electoral College victory? I don't.

I think he still doesn't know the difference between political asylum and a mental asylum - and that's one of the big reasons he keeps saying it

the numbers would indicate that those Haley voters are telling pollsters they will stick with Trump. the only way to know for sure is to hold the election and count the votes.

but they'll get out and vote for him again anyway

I don't think this is necessarily true. There will be people who voted for him twice before that won't vote for him this time (although there will also be people who voted different in the previous two elections that switch to Trump this time around as well). The difference is in the margins, but the margins do matter

Just saw a perfectly reasonable seeming guy from Pennsylvania being asked about Trump's performance in the debate, "Well, he's a lunatic, you have to factor that in when you vote for him". He's voting for him.

Aimless vmic being loudly, authoritatively and condescendingly wrong ITT while being obtuse about how elections work.

tbf lots of general elections feature candidates who did not even get 80% of the votes in their primaries.

I think undecided voters are largely a myth, and to the extent they do exist it's not really worth deciphering their politics. I do think however you have a lot of people who are mostly unplugged leaning one way or the other, who don't really care to take the time now to request a mail-in, who might show up on election day but they might not. They know along with the rest of us that their individual vote isn't really worth much. In order to vote you're taking an hour out of your day most likely, also it's a work day, people have kids and soccer practices and all sorts of shit to do, so when it comes down to it if one side is very motivated and the other is saying stuff like "well, granted he is a lunatic...", I do think that makes a difference, and hopefully a difference that isn't accurately captured in the polls

I think there are plenty of Haley voters who will vote for Trump bc at the end of the day they are Republicans and voted for her not out of some principled Never Trump stand but simply because they preferred her to him (while preferring both of them to a Democrat).

As far as I know (because we don't discuss it anymore) my parents despise Trump but will vote for him because he's not a Communist.

otoh, Alberto Gonzales (!) just endorsed Kamala: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/09/12/alberto-gonzales-kamala-harris-endorsement-00178746

We spend a lot of time on this thread speculating about what most voters in particular groups will do when elections are decided at the margins rather than by most voters. A handful of states matter and to win them you either turn out more of your base, flip people who aren’t strongly committed, or both. That’s it. It makes zero difference if die hard Trump supporters will ever change, because there aren’t enough die hard Trump supporters to win swing states alone.

Yes, but as polarization continues, the uncommitted voters become fewer and fewer and turning out your base becomes the whole ball of wax.

a sticky problem

One reason for optimism beyond the polls: trump is relying on people who don’t usually vote and their field office situation seems like a shambles.