Sound The TRUMPets! A Thread for Presidential Pondering 2016-2020(?)

[JBS]

Donnelly was leading in the polls until he started on the anti-immigration bend last week. He likely could have won by keeping his head down and being a "generic Democrat"; this seems almost like a conscious decision to blow it.

The only good thing I'm hearing out of Florida is that you passed an amendment to restore voting rights to ex-convicts, which will re-enfranchise something like one and a half million people because of Florida's ridiculously draconian carceral system and/or large for-profit prison industry (not sure which). Everything else seems like typical bad news, Cubans apparently coming out strongly against Gillum because anything to the left of Hillary Clinton reminds them too much of that time Castro took away their slave plantations.

I might have been too pessimistic about Nelson and Gillum The unreported votes are in fact from metro areas so they have at least a slim chance to catch up. Just looked at the NYT which now predicts Nelson will win by a hair, no prediction re Gillum.

[JBS]

BTW, those Cubans you complained about just picked Donna Shalala to succeed Ileana RosLehtinen and dumped GOP Trump critic Curbelo in favor of his Democratic opponent.

[amw]

Have heard pundits and internet people predicting a South Florida red wave, but I guess Miami-Dade always eventually goes blue these days, even if usually by pretty narrow margins. And Palm Beach is usually still counting ballots well into December.

[Zeus]

The GOP is receiving a pretty solid beating, as far as I can tell.  The Dems look set to pick up 34 seats and the majority in the House, and though the GOP will hold the Senate overall because of the number of Republicans not having to run for re-election this election cycle, if you look at the contested races, the Dems look likely to win about 25 versus the Republicans just 10.

The GOP pain is only going to get progressively worse between now and 2020.  Time is not on the side of a delusional narcissist like Trump.  Eventually his incessant lies and general incompetence will catch up with him and any GOPers dumb enough to continue believing his lies.  The next two years are gonna be a lot of fun to watch.

Step by step, we're gonna make America decent again.  With Trump in the White House, that's saying a lot.

[Sydney Nova Scotia]

Hey, its not looking so good for olde Trumpo now 

[amw]

Claire McCaskill also out in Missouri after her own late-campaign hard right veer on immigration. Seems like a pattern here. >_> And Heitkamp out in ND, but close enough that the voter suppression of Native Americans probably made the difference. I expect a lot of lawsuits. (Same in the Georgia governor's race—I don't expect Stacey Abrams to concede there, but the incredibly blatant voter suppression campaign by her opponent made the difference. America: a democracy, allegedly.)

I honestly don't have the energy to look at more granular House, state legislative, attorneys general (etc) races but suspect the real D gains will be at the down-ballot level (e.g. Beto didn't win in Texas, but at least two House seats there already seem to have flipped).

[Daverz]

Hey, its not looking so good for olde Trumpo now 

Someone forgot to tell Trump about the House.

[Ghost of Baron Scarpia]

Hey, its not looking so good for olde Trumpo now 

Looking fine for Trump. His path to cancel the Mueller probe is clear, since he can fire the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General without worrying about a Democrat Senate obstructing confirmation of their replacements. He can put a sycophant in place to dismiss Mueller and conceal the report.

At least a Democrat House of Representatives will make any further legislative action by Trump DOA.

[BasilValentine]

Looking fine for Trump. His path to cancel the Mueller probe is clear, since he can fire the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General without worrying about a Democrat Senate obstructing confirmation of their replacements. He can put a sycophant in place to dismiss Mueller and conceal the report.

At least a Democrat House of Representatives will make any further legislative action by Trump DOA.

The new incarnation of the House Intelligence Committee will quickly subpoena all of the clowns that were let off the hook by Nunes et alia. In the coming months we should begin to see a number of malefactors squirming in public hearings, and see stuff to which only Mueller and crew have yet been privy.

[Ghost of Baron Scarpia]

The new incarnation of the House Intelligence Committee will quickly subpoena all of the clowns that were let off the hook by Nunes et alia. In the coming months we should begin to see a number of malefactors squirming in public hearings, and see stuff to which only Mueller and crew have yet been privy.

That's a plus.

[Sydney Nova Scotia]

So the question is now will Trump last his full term ...................

[Ghost of Baron Scarpia]

So the question is now will Trump last his full term ...................

There is nothing to prevent him except high triglycerides.

[BasilValentine]

There is nothing to prevent him except high triglycerides.

Correction: There is nothing we know about. The Mueller investigation is a powerful wild card. We have no idea what that will yield.

[Sydney Nova Scotia]

Someone forgot to tell Trump about the House.

Would he say the same thing no matter what the outcome.

Is Trump really an AI bot with bad hair and defective I

[amw]

Probably the most consequential result of the night is Alabama's Amendment 2, which effectively bans abortion throughout the state, and passed without much difficulty. This is likely to be the vehicle through which the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade.

[Karl Henning]

So the question is now will Trump last his full term ...................

A disgraced President Toadstoal who limps to the end of his term, is preferable to a President Pence.

[zamyrabyrd]

A disgraced President Toadstoal who limps to the end of his term, is preferable to a President Pence.

I can understand somewhat your objection to "Toadstoal" but a thoroughly decent person like Mark Pence? Integrity is in short supply these days in particular among politicians, so when someone comes along like Brett Kavanaugh, they are viewed as freaks.

[milk]

I can understand somewhat your objection to "Toadstoal"

Mark this day folks, we may be seeing some progress here!

[amw]

Pence is an inept fool who failed horribly at governing Indiana, being likely to lose to his Democratic opponent (and in a Trump/Todd Young red wave year) before he retired to join the Trump team, but he skates by because he's a "good guy" and acts confident and the media buys it. He's also bought & sold by Charles and David Koch but to be fair so are most politicians these days. This is worth reading.

[milk]

Pence is an inept fool who failed horribly at governing Indiana, being likely to lose to his Democratic opponent (and in a Trump/Todd Young red wave year) before he retired to join the Trump team, but he skates by because he's a "good guy" and acts confident and the media buys it. He's also bought & sold by Charles and David Koch but to be fair so are most politicians these days. This is worth reading.

America has been electing guys like that for years and I find it as easy to understand Pence's view of life as the Ayatollah. To me, he's just weird, as well as so distant from "normal" and "reality" as to be almost mysterious, if he weren't so insipid. I think I understand Tump even a little better: He's a TV guy and part of the entertainment on Howard Stern that I enjoyed for so many years (never expecting him to have any SAY over anything serious). Guys like Pence though, they have some weird theocratic agenda that makes them righteous liars with an insincere veneer of sincerity.