People that you've never heard of, people that are in the dark shadows -- US Politics September 2020

heheh, yeah that sounds about right.

harris v pence may be interesting, just because it will be an opportunity for harris to point out the trillions of terrible things the trump administration has done, without trump himself being there to interrupt and distract.

The only VP debate I remember is 2004 because John Edwards's sliminess oozed through the screen.

i remember joe biden vs paul ryan, 2012, because biden kicked his ass and it felt good

The only time Biden's rancid Insta-Guffaw worked spectacularly as a weapon.

https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbrbetWRy01rg2rf7o1_500.gif

That is, I don't doubt, the first time anyone had laughed at Mr. Serious Budget Guy, privately or public, in his life.

Never discount the likelihood of a sexual humiliation fetish.

I think was Bentsen-Quayle that put the veep debates on the map. Since then we've come to expect "I knew Jack Kennedy" zingers, though we rarely get them.

Cheney's "I'm the President of the Senate and I've never even met you before tonight" to Edwards was an attempt at that--a lie, but an attempt.

Don't forget the 1984 Veep debate though:

Geraldine A. Ferraro's campaign manager said today that off- color remarks by Vice President Bush and others in his campaign ''have gone beyond decency.'' The aide asked for an immediate apology.

The remarks by the campaign manager, John Sasso, were the sharpest reaction thus far from Mrs. Ferraro's campaign staff to the Vice President's use of a locker-room vulgarity in a private conversation with a longshoreman while campaigning Friday in Elizabeth, N.J.

Mr. Bush's remark, which was picked up by a television microphone, was that ''we tried to kick a little ass last night'' in the Vice-Presidential debate Thursday. Mr. Bush has sought to pass the comment off as an ''old Texas football'' expression.

1984. god, that quote reads like something out of the gilded age now.

a locker-room vulgarity in a private conversation with a longshoreman

Never discount the likelihood of a sexual humiliation fetish.

would be a good thread title honestly

Small President Humiliation

Lol at the idea of apologizing for that quote

whoa https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/02/biden-staggering-monthly-cash-haul-407712

On the day of the debate, for example, Bush’s press secretary said Ferraro was “too bitchy,” for voters, while Bush’s wife, Barbara, also got in the mix.

From the New York Times:

Mrs. Bush, while bantering with reporters on Monday, characterized Mrs. Ferraro as a ”four-million-dollar - I can’t say it, but it rhymes with rich.” Mrs. Bush later apologized and said she had not meant to suggest Mrs. Ferraro was ”a witch.”

As much as it pains me to say it, well played Mrs. Bush.

Clinton outspent Trump too, don't seek comfort there imo xps

don't seek comfort there imo xps

I would rather Biden raised more money than trump

ok

Political types know that when a voter gives even a few dollars to a campaign that voter starts to feel much more invested in the success of the candidate and is almost 100% certain to cast their vote for them, too. It'd be nice to read he got 70 million $2 donations, but reality doesn't work like that.

hmm, a debate moderated by a woman of color. if Trumps actually makes it to the third debate, I definitely predict that's the one where he admonishes the mod for asking such a nasty question and then storms off stage.

cool

BREAKING: The Trump administration has put Fatou #Bensouda, Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (@IntlCrimCourt) and one of her top aids, on the sanctions list historically reserved for war criminals and international terrorists.https://t.co/iUaeH4Hxmm pic.twitter.com/PXdguvRq5L

— Michel Paradis (@MDParadis) September 2, 2020

...? wtf

i don't recall hearing anything about trump and the icc - is this just an early shot fired by trump because he assumes he'll be pursued by the ICC after his administration ends?

the guy’s foreign policy chops are just outstanding, just bold move after bold move, it’s just like Scott Adams was telling us all along

but trump talking about low-flow toilets or tweeting "covfefe" gets lots more attention

Don't forget the soup cans. Probably a closet Warhol fan.

she's investigating possible war crimes in afghanistan

you might say they're gonna go down with the ship

they won't put their hands up and surrender
there will be no white flag above their door

part of the reason i posted that biden donations thing (forgot to finish the thought because brain is mush) is to point out that he has more money than he needs, and if anyone on this thread is looking for someone to donate to then:

1. it's probably too close to the election for a donation to jessica scarane (delaware primary for us senate vs. a melt) to make a difference, but

2. if you can afford it, send a few dollars to this https://www.futurenow.org/givesmart/. these are vetted candidates running against republicans (no primaries of democratic incumbents) running in races where the campaign budget is low (so $10 helps) and the state context is such that an extra vote in the statehouse is worth a lot. basically there is no better place to donate right now imo.

also i donated last night and 1/8 of the candidates has already phoned me to say thanks so it's very sweet.

You could also donate it to people who actually need it unlike some politician who will fuck you over to stay in office for a few more years.

https://www.nationalbailout.org/

i missed this scumbag move from steve scalise:

I speak with a computerized voice — think Stephen Hawking. It’s a result of ALS, the neurological disease I’ve had since 2016. And of all the painful parts of this entire ordeal, which has now almost completely paralyzed me, one of the worst is the way the disease has robbed me of my natural voice.

Last week, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise tried to use my computer-assisted voice to rob me of my agency, too. In a video aimed at Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana, shared his team’s manipulated footage of an interview I conducted with Biden to make it appear I had said words that I never uttered, in an effort to distort Biden’s views and harm his electoral prospects.

Scalise eventually scrubbed the video from his Twitter feed after being criticized for the manipulation, but the ominous lessons of the episode remain: the ability to use technology not only for good but to mislead and manipulate; the willingness of those with political agendas to resort to such disinformation and propaganda; and the way in which America has cleaved into two separate information universes, with a conservative media ecosystem amplifying falsehoods that then take root.

The entirety of the Scalise video painted a bleak picture of the country, with cleverly spliced scenes designed to make major cities look like places of anarchy and violent chaos. That’s already disingenuous; protesters demanding an end to centuries of racial violence have largely been peaceful. But what made it so remarkable wasn’t just that Scalise twisted the truth about Black Lives Matter. His video went a step further, altering a question I had asked Biden about law enforcement to make it sound as though Biden had agreed to defund the police. I’m in favor of defunding the police, so I wish that were the case. But Biden has been clear that isn’t his position.

Now, I am of course grateful I can still speak, even if very slowly, using eye-gaze technology: A camera tracks the movements of my eyes on a screen-based keyboard, and then the resulting text is converted into speech by a synthetic voice generator. But because of my Hawking-esque voice, it’s particularly easy for others to manipulate what I say. Scalise’s team just went the extra mile in seeming to find the exact voice generator I use when they whipped up the extra words meant to damn Biden. (Scalise’s team denies this.)

Scalise has since conceded the video “shouldn’t have been edited” in an interview on Fox News — even as he attempted to claim there was an underlying truthfulness to the message. That isn’t the same as an apology to me, or, more important, the more than 2 million people in this country who communicate using assistive technology like I do.

stuff like this barely even registers right now. i think one hallmark of this era is that there is no accountability. whatever remained of it is fucking GONE

I heard somebody talking about it on something from last night. I think it was chris Hayes definitely sounded like a creepy thing to try to get away with.

xxp

the word "also" in your own post so i assume you concede the obvious response.

i've donated far more to https://www.givedirectly.org/covid-19/us/ than i've ever donated to any politician), but how's the view up there?

yeah I've been donating to both civilian-specific funds/friends or family directly/vetted charities at about the same clip as politicians. politicians usually get like...$20 from me tops (though Jaime Harrison I did set up a monthly contrib)

the three major polls that dropped today (according to RCP) moving in an encouraging direction - +8, +8, +11. Fox News poll also shows him maintaining in battleground states. 538 bumped him up slightly to 70 in 100 odds.

So you're saying we're doomed?

Axios, not exactly the most Dem friendly site, said the numbers were unchanged.

lol actblue is down

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/trump-encourages-north-carolina-residents-vote-twice-test-mail-system-n1239140

If it means their ballots get thrown out, cool.

"President Trump encourages supporters to vote absentee-by-mail early, and then show up in person at the polls or the local registrar to verify that their vote has already been counted," Trump campaign official Tim Murtaugh said. "It’s amazing that the media can go from insisting that voter fraud doesn’t exist to screaming about it when President Trump points out the giant holes in the Democrats’ voting schemes.”

*bloodcurdling scream*

yes

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/02/joe-biden-post-dnc-polls-408087

via hoos

Brilliant work by @wallacetim & @k3blu3 using satellite imagery to map the colours of US neighbourhoods (from grey city centres to green rural expanses) onto voting patterns https://t.co/ZAkJHS1oWs pic.twitter.com/FPZTN20EBk

— John Burn-Murdoch (@jburnmurdoch) September 2, 2020

not seeing the remarkable insight there besides some cool mosaics

Biden is up *8* points in a *Fox News* poll of *Wisconsin* conducted *immediately after the RNC* and prediction markets have the race as a toss-up. https://t.co/ChRiIfdYtH

— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) September 2, 2020

I realize Republicans for Biden probably won’t move any voters, because most Republicans are pure-Trumpists, but some of these are surprising to me. Snyder and Trott are not RINOs. They are conservative Republicans. https://t.co/faZnCeWT9S

— Ben Yelin (@byelin) September 3, 2020