Donald Trump

[pipbarber]

I don't have any actual statistics but i would suspect that a large number of maga people would be willing to die for Trump, and truly mean it. But for every one person willing to die for a charismatic leader there or at least two or more who'd be willing to kill for him. This shooting event has hurled Trump into the mythological. He is absolute king, crown pending.

What will happen if he loses the election? That prospect is almost as alarming as him winning (almost but not really, though still alarming). Has there ever been an election like this?

Edit: I was concerned in 2016 when he won, but 'the adults in the room' theory was on regular rotation and it largely proved correct. Clearly the orange buffoon has kicked the adults out this time around. There is reason to be fearful.

[stylofone]

Musk gets his billionaire buddies to help finance the Trump campaign. It will provide hundreds of millions of dollars.

They say when you vote for someone like Trump, it's the last free election you have. It sounds melodramatic, but thinking about Jan 6, the big lie, the stacked Supreme Court, the long history of Republican gerrymandering, and the ambitions of Project 2025, it really looks like this is on the cards. With Trump V2 and his SCOTUS droogs doing his bidding, I wonder what the mid-terms would look like, as emboldened red states shut the gate on non-white voters, for example.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/15/us/p ... r-pac.html

[stevebrooks]

It appears Trump is talking to independent Dem candidate JFK Junior to get his endorsement for the election? It's bizarre, I'm not sure JFK Junior should even be on a Dem ticket not, can't they take that away from him, he's obviously not a democrat in ideology even if he is in name. He spoke to Trump about many things, including vaccinations because he us a big anti-vaxxer! Trump's take on childhood vaccination came out clearly and if eh gets in well I can see the rise of many childhood diseases that were once thought to be defeated.

“When you feed a baby, Bobby, a vaccination that is like 38 different vaccines, and it looks like it’s meant for a horse, not a, you know, 10lb or 20lb baby, it looks like you’re giving, you should be giving a horse this thing, and do you ever see the size of it? It’s massive and then you see the baby all of a sudden starting to change radically. I’ve seen it too many times. And then you hear that it doesn’t have an impact, right? But you and I talked about that a long time ago.”

So they've talked previously, it's starting to look like this JFK Junior thing to oppose Biden was planned out long ago by Trump and Junior as another strategy to beat Biden!

Trump then appears to suggest the two men work together.

“Anyway, I would love you to do something and I think it would be so good for you, and so big for you.”

Of course he is all in for imprisoning people without trial or evidence, seems to make a good fit for a Trump partnership;

In posting the recording, Bobby Kennedy III also suggested Anthony Fauci, formerly Biden’s chief medical adviser, should be in prison; appeared to suggest his father should have been Trump’s running mate on a “unity ticket” rather than “JD ‘fire all the unvaccinated nurses’ Vance”, the Ohio senator named on Monday; and implied Republicans and Democrats were subordinate to Pfizer, a multinational vaccine producer.

So that's how things are swinging with JFK Junior, hopefully the release of this call will pull some of his supporters away when they realise that voting for him is just a vote for Trump.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/art ... -recording

[stevebrooks]

This video, starting at 3:58 in case you don't want to watch the long run up to the interesting part. It seems the RNC keep a database of gun owners as targeting tool for marketing and....well, who knows what else. It seems the shooters parents were on this database as Republicans strongly in favour of guns and gun ownership....oops.

In fact the family was profiled as being a strong Republican gun owner and hunter family, being in the top 20 in the city.

[pipbarber]

https://www.theguardian.com/world/artic ... convention

Conservatives in australia and the UK might want to cool their jets on Trump. I mean, it seems to me that he's pretty much going to change sides, and that constitutes a significant global power reordering. NATO is in all kinds of trouble and is he really going to give a shit about Aukus? He clearly admires Putin, which must be a tad embarrassing for many liberals and now Taiwan?

[stylofone]

Stranger than fiction



almost....

[pipbarber]

Surrealism indicator approaches maximum.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/art ... on-attempt

Or perhaps it's the grift indicator that's threatening an imminent meltdown.

[stylofone]

My optimistic take:
Biden can withdraw from the race and suck all the oxygen out of Trump's convention fire. It would be seen as noble, and Biden would then command huge respect and affection. Then as the replacement is confirmed, every criticism of Biden can be deflected back at Trump. Not just the age, but also the toxicity and the division. Biden had the decency to step aside, Trump just wants to prolong the violence and hate. Trump can even be blamed for causing his own assassination attempt. It would be completely fair. Kamala Harris has the skills, I think she she could win, although she has baggage too. Most of the baggage is entrenched sexism IMO. Racism too, but my perception is that the sexism is more prominent.

James Carville proposed a sort of condensed rerun of the primary process in the form of 4 town hall type events to ensure the choice is an open process and not a fix by party elites. A less well known candidate than Harris could be an instant drover's dog.

[pipbarber]

Rumours are that obama has withdrawn his support for Biden, which apparently is hugely significant within the democratic party machinery.

Kamala Harris, or anybody else, may still lose to Trump, but to run with Biden at this is pitiful. Nothing he says is breaking through, and the trepidation contingent to his every public appearance and the potential fuck up is unsustainable and pointless.

[pipbarber]

What kind of madness is this?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/art ... y-migrants

Notable is 'the act first ask questions later concept of 'justice.' Also notable is Trump's reliance on scotus to clear away the legal hurdles. Which i just find infuriating. How in the fucking hell did the democrats spend 4 years in power without doing something about the supreme court? Like appoint 3 extra judges to balance out the madness. I know....it's not as simple as that but i do honestly believe the Dems walked into office under the delusion that maga was dead, fools.

There is a remote possibility that the Gop win both houses, the executive and the judiciary (already won). The fourth estate? Fox news and Rupert have that sorted. That's a politics without a power balance. That's not a democracy.