At the risk of stating the obvious, the July 2019 US Politics Thread is horse-sh*t

Empirical reality has long vanished. It's just a mythological battle of archetypes at this point, the neolithic age is back.

I can't tell if I hate him more every day or if the hate has maxed out and it just manifests differently from day to day. But in any case, the guy who swears at rallies and is on tape saying "I moved on her like a bitch" and "grab em by the pussy" can get way the fuck out of here with his pearl-clutching wrt foul language.

Trump doesn't think women should poop or swear.

I feel increasingly like the core of the problem is that, because the current context is sui generis in so many ways and was just suddenly plopped into this central position in our lives, we just don't have any pre-existing experience from which we can draw an effectual response and it's made everyone varying degrees of crazy. On every side you have people who can't wrap their heads around the behavior of this figure who's been imposed on everyone's life, and on one side they try to pretend that the worst stuff isn't happening or try to twist it into something they can still support, while on the other side people are just staring aghast with no idea of what to do. It's like the time my roommate walked into my bedroom at 4 AM and started pissing on my floor. I had no immediate means of understanding or responding to the acceptable parameters of reality being so rudely shattered.

Good luck winning while talking about “the issues.”

I think you misunderstand me: don’t say he said something racist, say he is racist. Don’t say he knew a pedophile, say existing evidence points to him being a pedophile. Don’t say these things once or twice: they should be the core of the strategy. Repetition is how Trump beats his phrases into the media’s and public’s heads and controls the narrative - Dems must use the same strategy or they will lose (and maybe will anyway).

The American public is too dumb and uninformed to care about issues.

We really need to cut it with that talking point already. The extent to which it's true is largely systemic and intentional and potentially-reversible if we refrain from treating the mass of the American public like a bunch of subhuman rubes.

Like, yeah, without some effort to counter the effects, the kids currently being educated under the DeVos regime are likely to develop into incurious drudges. It's not like it's inherent to their character.

cf one of Hillary's many errors was the deplorables thing, which succeeded in doing nothing except rallying the right wing.

Right. Dems need to cut it with the snoot. No one who's on the fence wants to join a team that's looking at them like a bunch of unwashed dipshits.

So what doesn't count as an error when faced with this monstrosity?

she was too low on her deplorable %

The extent to which it's true is largely systemic and intentional

Ok

and potentially-reversible

Nah. Convincing them Will. Never. Happen. Best Hope is not to let them take over and drown us all with them.

Wasn’t the foul language he accused the congresswomen of using just Trump’s words quoted back?

maybe in some cases, but i'm sure he's thinking of Rashida Tlaib's "impeach the motherfucker" comment, among others

Trump thrives when he's being attacked and since he'll go lower and his base will eat it up no mud-slinging will ever work, and maybe the single tactic that might work for the candidate facing him would be to take his policies seriously and treat him with respect and a gentle firmness and shit like "look i just think it's not working, and we need a change", be the intelligent one in the room because we know he can't compete at that level. and when people aren't attacking him and being calm with him, respectful to him, he wilts and lowers his guard.

I am ok with them using 'squad.' I am ok with people refusing to equate younger feminine terms with weakness/flightiness/any otherness.

Trump thrives when he's being attacked and since he'll go lower and his base will eat it up no mud-slinging will ever work, and maybe the single tactic that might work for the candidate facing him would be to take his policies seriously and treat him with respect and a gentle firmness and shit like "look i just think it's not working, and we need a change", be the intelligent one in the room because we know he can't compete at that level. and when people aren't attacking him and being calm with him, respectful to him, he wilts and lowers his guard.

This always works with bullies.

That was Obama’s strategy with Republicans for 8 years.

If i just explain this Republican-sourced healthcare plan clearly and calmly, the Republicans and American people will come around.

Warren should walk out for their first debate and fake a punch followed by two for flinching. Maybe save the atomic wedgie for the second debate?

I do think there's some appeal in at least trying to pin him down to some specifics, especially considering his interlocutors never do. like when he tries to say he's going to replace Obamacare with something really great, just keep hammering him to give you some actual fucking details about what that means. of course he's going to try and just say "you'll see, you'll see, we're working on something that people are going to be very happy with" but you can't let him off the hook like that. even something as basic as "how are you going to strip away everything else in the ACA and yet still ensure that people with pre-existing conditions can obtain affordable coverage?" because he obviously he has zero fucking clue.

you go at his policies, debate him on policy, you don't attack him as if you need to highlight the fact that he's a piece of shit. everyone knows this. you highlight his politics, engage him at that level. good luck attacking him for being "deplorable". no one is going to suddenly say "hey wow you're right this Trump guy is bad news." the way to make him look bad is to try to get him to be a politician, not a personality. if he tries to change it, bring it back to policies every single time. don't take the bait.

Feel like yesterday's press conference with the Squad is a masterclass in how to respond/not respond to that dumb oaf.

The suggestions above assume a level playing field that doesn't exist. Democrats committing similar sins to Republicans are punished more harshly because we self-regulate, but also because we're supposed to be the goody-goody party so any slipup is a bigger deal because we're supposed to be above it.

You know how many times I have read the opinion, in a situation where a Democrat shared actual "fake news" or exaggerated, that this is the type of thing that will put voters off and send them to Trump? A guy who knowingly makes shit up on a daily basis! We get penalized, he doesn't.

It's because the anti-liberal attack methods worked. As terrible and uncreative a word it is, "libtard" is well embedded in the political lexicon. Mainstream America associates liberalism with weakness and Clinton fumbles.

"Deplorables" galvanized his base, but Republican Congressmen were still fronting like they couldn't vote for Trump and acting as if the race was lost less than a month prior to the election.

We have to take the gloves off. Only the Squad has bothered to try.

ideally I'd like to see a policy emphasis but delivered in a tone of sheer contempt and disbelief that someone so brazenly idiotic is our commander in chief. in a perfect world an opponent would quickly transcribe Trump's jello-brained response to a policy question and then read it back to him and say "what the actual fuck does any of that even mean?"

"Thank you moderator. I would like to start out by stating I have would love to have Socialism in US"
*crowd gasps*
"Oh wait...I meant to say I would NOT love to have Socialism in US." *winks at Trump*

I mean, Clinton did expose him on policy already. He basically rambled and used little other than Breitbart-esque appeals in his debates. Voters conceded he lost all three of them in polls.

He's losing major ground with independents, many of whom may have voted for him the last time around. Some of whom probably thought his rhetoric was just a ploy to get elected. Republican friends of mine have left the party. The shit is working, just not at the rate we want.

the debates don't matter. smart people have already made up their mind, dumb people can't follow them.

"Feel like yesterday's press conference with the Squad is a masterclass in how to respond/not respond to that dumb oaf."

Pressley and Tliab were excellent; Omar and AOC were a little less focused. Pressley is really the badass of this bunch...steady, to the point, and she sounds incredibly authoritative when she talks.

It's July 16, 2019, but if the midterm elections were any indication he's lost and is losing the margin of independents and suburbanites by which he eked out a 70,000 vote victory in '16. He's the incumbent, with history on his side; the race will be the most brutal of our lifetimes; but it's possible he'll lose.

Like we act incredulous that nothing impacts his polls but the data is there. Republican voters will never leave him because they hate gays, Muslims and abortion so much that they'd never vote against a guy who hits all three, even if there was a 100% chance he would get us all killed.

These aren't the people we have to win. We can pick handfuls off.

Xxxpost

I posted this on a different thread last week but there have been no responses since, and it probably fits here better now anyway

Ive been watching a few prison channel youtubes this year (after prison show, big herc, lockdown 23and1), and a few recurring themes stood out, but one in particular stuck with me from guests and hosts

The relatively high levels of Non-partisan support for Trump.

At this point in the cycle we're all "well people have made their minds up now, anyone still supporting him is unreachable, how can they be ok with whats happening", but I felt like the people here supported Trump in an almost apolitical way. I could easily imagine some of these people saying exactly the same thing about Obama (or Bernie!), a kind of accepting, "well he's the boss, its a hard job, people make mistakes"

I've always believed its better to go on the offensive with positives/policies than on the negatives with attacks on Trump (or anyone else), but really felt the futility of attacking Trump, "why you got to attack the man, he's just trying to do his job" instead of selling them something different

Also there's a big lag in polling, people take years to change their minds, years for events to even register or sink in

Trump lost Minnesota in 2016 by only 44 k votes. His 2020 Minnesota strategy is to make the election a referendum on Ilhan Omar and by extension the 5th congressional district.

Like we act incredulous that nothing impacts his polls but the data is there.

He started historically low (low 40s) and has been in the 35-45% window ever since. Nothing gets him below 35. Maybe an economic crash.

I've always believed its better to go on the offensive with positives/policies than on the negatives with attacks on Trump (or anyone else)

This is why I believe Warren has such a good chance. She says, in effect, "Yeah, he's a piece of shit, but we've got other real problems. Here's how I'd fix them." And she doesn't allow herself to be distracted from that mission - pointing out problems and explaining her solutions.

except for that part where she was distracted by the Pocahantas jibe

I've always believed its better to go on the offensive with positives/policies than on the negatives with attacks on Trump (or anyone else),

Lol, there are studies that have found otherwise.

When were these studies from? Negatives have worked historically when attempting to expose, Trump (and those like him) have changed all that

Negatives on Biden would work because the public perception and the reality differ. But Trump?

pointing out problems and explaining her solutions

Part of the problem is that many of these problems aren't deemed such. Official economic figures, a businessman in the White House, low unemployment rates, etc. are enough to make most of the hesitant 'forget' the rest.

what personal negatives about Trump can be highlighted that are going to make people change their minds? it's all out there, which is why it's a losing proposition. all of Trump's shit was out there well in advance of the '16 election and remains out there, and anything new is going to have no effect ("he raped someone? ok whatever more fake news...."), which meant that any minor bump in the road for Hillary was going to have a worse effect on her than anything would have on Trump. which is why Comey's "hang on we're just checking something in her emails again, oh never mind it's nothing" maybe cost her the election.

Trump lost Minnesota in 2016 by only 44 k votes. His 2020 Minnesota strategy is to make the election a referendum on Ilhan Omar and by extension the 5th congressional district.

Facebook Grampas like to point out the Omar's district is THE Al Qaeda hot bed in the whole USA.

sorry that was garbled but i think any minor personal issue with any of these candidates is going to have a markedly worse effect than anything they try to sling at Trump even if it's twenty times worse. or one hundred times worse.

He started historically low (low 40s) and has been in the 35-45% window ever since. Nothing gets him below 35. Maybe an economic crash.

― Karl Malone, Tuesday, July 16, 2019 1:25 PM bookmarkflaglink

Around inauguration, he was close to 50%. The drop to low 40s happened shortly after that.

He was also in the upper 30s prior to the tax reform. That seemed to get him a permanent boost into the 40s.

But he stays there for no reason other than 90+% of Republican voters say they approve of him. They're the sole reason.

Warren "scamming" her way into college by lying about NA ancestry is somehow a bigger deal than Trump scamming thousands of people with a fake university. Nothing matters, this country is full of dumbfucks.

Maybe the Dem candidate should send dem voters a note saying ignore the campaign and say nothing but hateful shit and get elected and be all like just kidding

In any case our best outcome is Trump dropping the fuck dead. Heart attack, stroke, i don't care. I no longer care if he gets "held accountable"

I think the Epstein thing has legs because it involves children (cf. Roy Moore). Trump views it as a problem, which is why he started acting out as soon as the Epstein story started dominating the cycle.