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March 04, 2020 04:54 AM UTC

Wednesday Open Thread

  • 61 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

“The battlefield is a scene of constant chaos. The winner will be the one who controls that chaos, both his own and the enemies.”

–Napoleon Bonaparte

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61 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Thread”

  1. Funniest thing I saw last night was Kyle Clark on 9News interviewing Joe Salazar for the Dems and and Kristi Burton Brown for the Rs. Kristi in particular was hilarious in trying to convince Clark of all the great things Trump has done and all the campaign promises that Trump has kept. As for Joe, he needs a style coordinator as guys with guts shouldn't be wearing tight t-shirts, even if it was a Bernie tee.

    1. Well, there is that yet-to-be-built pipeline to Boone . . .

       . . . quite an high-level KAG accomplishment for a project that’s not a wall, I suppose??!

  3. Well, it looks like Mikey is now headed back to Billionaire-Take-Over-The-World school for awhile . . .

    . . . “Bond Villain 2024!,” perhaps? 

  4. Biden will sweep the rest of the primaries, 66/33 against Sanders. Trump seems to fear him the most; I think Trump the showman & reality TV star sees "something" about Joe's appeal.

    My favorite, Warren did worse than I hoped. I can't figure out why Bloomberg got any votes… name recognition and ad-spending? I was hoping Warren did better in order to play a stronger role as a Party broker, savior or even the VP and actual "woman behind the man" in restoring our government.

    Biden was being held back because people didn't believe he had what it takes to win the primary. Once he showed viability in South Carolina, the tactical-practical Dev voters swung hard to his side.

    Biden's big shortcoming is lack of enthusiasm for him from women and young people; maybe also hispanics. Of those three groups, women are by far the most dependable voters, so it behooves him to choose a VP who will get out the female vote in the swing states: Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Georgia, Florida and Texas.

    1. I too was surprised and disappointed that Warren didn't do better yesterday.

      As for your VP criteria, I'd say V's sweetheart, Amy, fits that description to a tee! 🙂

      4. Georgia has Stacey Abrams and her group registering people faster than the Republicans can push others off the rolls.

        Florida has additional people of color registered, ex-felons, Puerto Ricans, and a bunch of economy negatively impacted by Trump's tariffs and inhospitality to foreign visitors.

        Texas has increasing local Latinx activists (thanks, Bernie!) to drive turnout, plus lots of good people (including some Republicans, I guess) angered at Trump's wall, the inhumane policies at the border and cutting back on legal immigration for the tech sector that fuels the economy. 

        All 3 states have a chance of going for a Democratic Presidential ticket that isn't insulting to Cubans, Jews, and some with long history in the Democratic party itself.

    3. I like historian Jon Mecham's summary of last night:  The Biden victory was a vote for normalcy.  That is why Biden will win in November.  He'll bring the 2018 electorate back which won 40 House seats, including Jason Crow in CD6.  Depending on where we stand on the coronavirus in November, we'll expose the Trump incompetence that threatens all of us.  (Remember that we were just 10 minutes from a war with Iran a couple of months ago.  Imagine being in a war with Iran while we're dealing with a pandemic.)  Trump for some people was "funny" until it wasn't anymore.  And, since I firmly believe that a Sanders nomination would have handed Trump his reelection, I'll repeat what I said last night:  Jim Clyburn saved the country.  There is a space in Statuary Hall for Jim Clyburn.

        1. An article up the other day notes that most Presidential successors are counter-weights to their predecessors. No-drama black Obama to racist Trump, for example. Biden is Trump's counter more than Sanders or even Warren; low-key, seen as decent and willing to hear from everyone.

          I'll be the first to admit, Biden isn't what I truly desired going forward, but he's apparently appealing to a large share of the voter market. I can see where that comes from.

            1. Ukraine? isn’t that over?
              Obamcare? isn’t that decided?
              Also. he’s too old, right?
              Speech oddities and 40 years of insider experience – there is baggage.

              If he is the nominee, he wins because ABT.

  5. Needed to nominate..: 1,990

    awarded to date …..: 985

    Yet to be awarded ….: 2,994

    the numbers will adjust a bit – but here's what D's should do: 

    1. declare a winner today
    2. tell everyone else to drop out and endorse the winner
    3. condescend, bully and generally deride any eligible voter who doesn't agree

    Later, when the future becomes the past – start over (see 1)

     

    ABT

    1. So I guess I should pay up on our bet (I can't believe Bernie blew out all the competition here in Colorado given the major impact unaffiliated voters have).

      Name when and where 😉

      1. Bernie did well in all the Western states, even Utah.

        Something about the Sanders coalition: Youth and Hispanics. He does will with college educated White people, but also with some segment of the WWC.

            1. Either works for me.  Which ever is quieter to allow conversation, unless you just want to power down as many shots as quickly as possible 😉

  6. WOTD from Rachel Bitecofer via TN: "Hate is on the Ballot"

    Bitecofer as we all know, pegged the 2018 Democratic successes based on recognizing the extent to which anger against Trump would turn out Democrats.

    Now, just three years into the Trump era, and a whole new brand of negative partisan division, my survey finds that these indexes have skyrocketed. Seventy-one percent of Republicans and 55 percent of Democrats now regard the opposition party as a force that stokes baleful national decline. In a study of what they call “lethal mass partisanship,” political scientists Nathan P. Kalmoe and Lilliana Mason found that 15 percent of Republicans and 20 percent of Democrats agree that the country would be better off if a large number of opposing partisans in the public today “just died.” 

    While I think Biden is a comfortable elder uncle figure with an appeal to older voters, I worry that he doesn't have the spark of anger that would motivate women being screwed by the Republican takeover of the judicial system, and the younger people being screwed by the economy.

    The millennial generation became fully enfranchised for the first time with the 2016 presidential cycle. And the front end of Gen Z reached voting age at the same time. Together, millennials and Gen Z voters are poised to make up as much as 37 percentof the electorate in 2020. 

    And both generational cohorts are still recovering from the economic body blows of the 2008 meltdown. Front-end millennials are nearing their forties—they have mortgages, kids, and crushing student loan debt. As people mature and their responsibilities increase, so does their propensity to vote—as we can plainly see in the cases of the boomers and Gen Xers.

    1. According to this demographic breakout of the Super Tuesday results, the only age group Biden *didn't* dominate was the 18-29 year olds at 30%.  But Bernie only had 46%.  Bloomberg surprisingly got 12%, which Biden should mostly inherit.

      In all other factors (education, ideology, sex, race, priority issue, independents, etc), Biden had a substantial lead over everyone else.

      I find that very encouraging that we will have our unity candidate soon.

       

      1. What sort of outreach is the Biden campaign doing to Bernie and his followers? What progressive policies is he championing?

        I don't think this over, by a long shot. The Democratic party is ready to anoint Joe Biden, but he will need constant propping up by the DNC. And he had better quickly figure out how to win over Bernie supporters. 

        I am looking for leadership from Joe Biden. I have seen nothing.

         

        1. Perhaps the Biden campaign needs more than a week to get over the rumors of his death? 

          And it is hard to get inspired to "reach out" at the same time you are being accused of having an establishment plot that is the same opposition as the Republican establishment.

          One really good reason for Elizabeth Warren to stay in the contest is to act as a mediator between wings of the party AND as an example of how to turn to an attack on Trump instead of each other.

        2. I agree with you that the DNC/ Party establishment puts its fingers on the scale. That is what Party leadership does, right? I don't like that this has resulted in 40 years of triangulating against the DFH's, but whatevs.

          I would point out that when Biden is getting 50% of the vote and Bernie is getting 25%, the voters are speaking pretty loudly. Biden is getting the moderate wing, not just the establishment wing. I call them practical-tacticalists.

          Bernie's claim was to expand the electorate. I buy that it should be possible, but I'm not seeing his base actually expanding.

          In 4 or 8 years, the Old White Guys who lived through the cold war will be mostly dead, along with the Republican Party. Wall Street Dems and Billionaires won't be dead. The demographics is on our side, even if time might not be.

        3. Duke, Duke, the outreach has begun!

          I mean they could have offered a sticker with a poop emoji with Bernie’s face or just a middle finger, right?

  7. Paging Congressman Lamborn….

    Texas closes hundreds of polling sites, making it harder for minorities to vote

    "The analysis finds that the 50 counties that gained the most Black and Latinx residents between 2012 and 2018 closed 542 polling sites, compared to just 34 closures in the 50 counties that have gained the fewest black and Latinx residents. This is despite the fact that the population in the former group of counties has risen by 2.5 million people, whereas in the latter category the total population has fallen by over 13,000."

  8. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III isn’t feeling the Drump love this morning. Perhaps he should have just quietly retired to his Alabama plantation and let the sleeping dog lie? I know Mother Sessions encouraged him to do this to restore his honor but this isn’t turning out well for the little guy. At least he got more votes than the honorable Judge Roy Moore. So he has that.

    Trump tears into Jeff Sessions after former AG forced into runoff for old Senate seat

    “This is what happens to someone who loyally gets appointed Attorney General of the United States & then doesn’t have the wisdom or courage to stare down & end the phony Russia Witch Hunt,” Trump tweeted, and included a link to a story about Sessions’ runoff against former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville. He added: “Recuses himself on FIRST DAY in office, and the Mueller Scam begins!”

    1. Amidst the entertainment value of that race (Trump's disdain for Sessions, the drastic fall of Roy Moore who polled in the single digits, and – I'm sorry, this is petty – the rise of a guy whose name sounds like he should be on a Mr. Potato-head TV show), the sad news is that we'll almost certainly lose Sen. Doug Jones to whoever wins the runoff.

    2. Lulzy stuff. Jeff finished second, and Rapin' Roy didn't even crack 7%.

      We need to do everything possible to see that the last Dem elderly white guy standing ascends to the White House. Hopefully he'll have the sense to nominate Doug Jones as Attorney General.

    3. The controversy couldn't happen to nicer guys than Trump and Sessions. 

      I'm hoping for an on-going feud to increase chances of a Democratic Senator Jones winning again.

      1. Like you, I wouldn’t count Jones out yet. I’ve spent a lot of time in Alabama this past year and I think the Clyburn ‘butterfly’ effect is going to last into November, buoyed by the great work Stacy Abraham’s is doing. All this *plus* a food fight between Drumpf and Beauregard and some moderate AL Republicans rebuking the incompetency of the current Administration may be just the ticket to giving Jones another term. 

  9. John Judis has an interesting take at TPM: "A Cautionary Look at Biden’s Wins and Sanders’ Losses"

    So what I would say to my fellow Democrats about Super Tuesday is this: be optimistic that you may have a candidate who can beat Donald Trump in November, and that is super-important. But be worried that if the Democrats can’t hold onto the Bernie generation of voters, Biden, if elected, will become the placeholder for a Republican majority led by the likes of Josh Hawley or Marco Rubio — younger politicians who are trying to take what is positive in Trump’s economics — in particular, the economic nationalism that Sanders also promoted — while ditching his bigoted social policies and adolescent behavior. I am hopeful that the young Democratic activists who have come to life over the last five years won’t let that happen, but I fear the dead hand of the K Street and Wall Street Democrats who have had much too much influence on the party over the last forty years.

    1. Still time to rebalance your stock/bond investments.  The fallout from a potential country-wide pandemic/quarantine has not been reflected in the market, IMHO.

      1. Thanks for the tip, itlduso. But I rebalanced the retirement swag late last summer. Went from about 96% stocks down to 68%, and 32% bonds or equivalent. I also pulled out most of my draw-down, for the calendar year, around end of January.

    2. While that is nice, I believe the market won’t reach the highs of just 2 weeks ago before the end of the year, if then, because the economy will have very little growth for the next 6 months as the supply chain gets rebooted, and the travel and hospitality industry recovers.  It’s encouraging that the epidemic in China seems to be cresting and hopefully on the decline, but the ripples spreading throughout the rest of the world have yet to be stilled, which at best could be several months.

      Note:  we have yet another inverted yield curve (10 year below 1%!)  So we may even see a mild recession just in time for voters to judge Trump’s job performance.  Look for attempts to jam another “Christmas in the Fall” tax cut bill through before November as a result.  And if poor, starving Billionaires don’t get their tax cut, it’ll be all the mean old Dem’s fault, of course.

    1. Shit happens…

      – Biden becomes medically disabled
      – the race is back on
      except
      – Everyone but Bernie , Warren and Tulsi have suspended or dropped

      Same message from Kos?

      ABT

    1. Most American workers have no realistic choice.

      Living paycheck to pay check, they work to get paid, to pay rent and bills.

      No work – no  check no payments

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