Former President Donald J. Trump

[Lord Rother]

he's a place-marker, a stooge, a patsy. i'm not a conspiracy theory type, but it makes logical sense to assume that getting to the white house is the goal and trump himself is not necessarily on the priority list. he is the ticket to power.

i will say i am not so sure trump is easily replaceable to the MAGAts...

Well, yeah and yeah. Many of his enablers in positions of power clearly have seen him as a useful tool and an utter fool from the beginning. I'm sure most of those would happily swap him out for JD Vance, but do you see the Republican ticket being reinvigorated after the old guy steps down similar to what happened with the Democratic ticket? I don't. More traditional Republican voters will be relieved to see him go and Vance might have some youth appeal (if not much else), but that rabid MAGA base would probably by and large rapidly lose interest in the election.

I agree, when Trump is no longer the Republican leader (whenever that day comes) the MAGA nuts will lose all interest in the election(s).

But they will always follow the cult leader, and he will always lead them by the nose and drag them along by their wallet.

They desperately need each other.

After Harris beats him in November, no matter what direction they go in, it will be very difficult for the Republicans to motivate enough of their (Trump’s) support base to get off their arses and vote for a new leader for a decade or more.

They are fucked.

And then Thiel, Musk et al will build something else with a new identity, probably even more dangerous.

[Mike Boom]

Wow, Michelle Obama killed it last night at the DNC , while Trump was off mumbling and rambling about how he protects the suburbs in a very bizarre press conference/lie fest in Howell Michigan, historically prime KKK territory.

[Lord Rother]

Wow, Michelle Obama killed it last night at the DNC , while Trump was off mumbling and rambling about how he protects the suburbs in a very bizarre press conference/lie fest in Howell Michigan, historically prime KKK territory.

Where a bunch recently marched through the streets shouting "We love Hitler, we love Trump".

Everything he does contracts his base that little bit more and makes it a little less likely that any undecideds will lean his way.

Surely?

It was recently claimed that Reps had recruited 157,000 poll-watchers for November 5th.

What's the chances they'll be flashing their guns as voters walk in?

[Lord Rother]

Blimey Trump has continued to damage himself every day in the last couple of weeks since the last post here. There’s been too much to keep up with it all.

But Anderson Cooper’s rebuttal of Trump’s claims about E Jean Carroll is superb.

https://x.com/rpsagainsttrump/status/18 ... 9123177580

Clearly Trump is unable to grasp the concept that not all television happens in real time and that pre-recorded interviews are a thing... except for when Fox have to edit out his unintelligible ramblings of course.

I don’t suppose all that many people who might be undecideds will see that and decide they simply cannot vote for that whining putrid sack of shit, but there’ll be a few.

And every single time he opens his mouth a few more make the same decision.

It’s incredible how he is triggered to respond to everything and then just amplifies the very things he is trying to refute.

Did you see him say he’s not weird, Walz is weird in his latest Hannity session? Amplifying that hugely effective message created by Walz a few weeks ago by using the very word about 8 times in 30 seconds doesn’t seem like the best tactic to me.

Just keep talking Donny, just keep talking.

Christ, I hope Harris is on her game and actually makes an effort to answer the questions posed by the moderators in the upcoming debate. If she is, and does, the contrast to Trump (who is completely incapable of doing that and will only air grievances and lie continuously) could be a huge factor in the outcome of the election.

[Lord Rother]

And now the biggest of all holy craps, Dick frigging Cheney is voting for Harris.

I wonder how Fox News will cover that one (up).

Let alone the independents and undecideds, that’s going to make a lot of Republicans stop, think, and ultimately switch.

[Neil Jung]

Huge night tonight which could decide the election. Go Kamala!

[souphound]

Huge night tonight which could decide the election. Go Kamala!

Totally agree. But I fear that people will only see/hear what they want to see/hear. As usual.

Still, my fingers are duly crossed.

[Mike Boom]

She did a good job of taking the high road and getting at least some policy across whereas he of course came across as a raving lying lunatic raving about immigrants eating peoples cats !

Also the all important political endorsement of Taylor Swift !

[Lord Rother]

Excellent performance.

Exit poll shows 63% saying Harris won. Considering those votes will presumably have included rabid right wingers who would never ever admit their leader lost that’s a helluva margin.

Winning a debate is not the same as winning an election but it’s a big step along the way.

And yes, not exactly unexpected, but perfect timing from Taylor Swift.

[Lord Rother]

On Swift, there is a misconception that her fans are already pretty much locked in to Harris so her endorsement won't make much difference.

Well I did a little digging.... A survey conducted earlier this year showed that 6% of all Americans are big fans of hers.

10% of all Dem voters are big Swift fans.

But here's the kicker - 6% of all Rep voters are big fans of hers. If Trump had circa 74 million votes in 2020 - that means 4.5 million are big fans of Swift.

Yes, Swift had endorsed Biden in 2020 and still a good number voted for Trump, but there must be a million or 2 1st time voter fans who, some of whom would be swayed by her endorsement this time around.

In a race of small margins, I'd suggest Swift's strong endorsement could produce another significant little swing to Harris.

[Lord Rother]

Trump said if Fox News were to moderate a debate, he “wouldn’t want” Martha MacCallum and Bret Baier as moderators because he didn’t think they “were good last night,” as he apparently referenced their on-air reactions to his and Harris’ debate.

Trump had previously agreed to participate in a debate hosted by Fox News with MacCallum and Baier moderating. Harris had not accepted that invitation from Fox.

“I wouldn’t want to have Martha and Bret. I’d love to have somebody else other than Martha and Bret. I’d love to have, frankly, Sean [Hannity] or Jesse [Watters] or Laura [Ingraham], you know, somebody else. Let’s give other people a shot,” he said.

Trump baselessly suggested Harris was provided the questions in advance of the ABC presidential debate as he claimed the debate was “rigged.”

“They had a rigged show with somebody that maybe even had the answers, I mean, I’ll be honest, I watched her talk, and I said, you know, she seems awfully familiar with the questions,” Trump said.

Well how predictable in every way....! Christ, he's such a toddler.

The fact he wants his arse munching best mates to moderate a debate, rather than other Fox presenters who (presumably) didn't get their tongues all the way up last night is so weak it deserves to be laughed at by every news outlet.

And Harris knew the answers to give because she had prepped and would have had a pretty good idea what was going to come up. Hardly rocket science. Again, claims it was rigged in her favour should be laughed at mercilessly by all and sundry.

[Neil Jung]

Just watching the debate. Trump is largely rambling and incoherent. And a constant liar. He’s a disgrace.

[Mike Boom]

General consensus seems to be she destroyed him with the baiting and split screen responses to his blathering, looking at again this morning he really fell for it

[Neil Jung]

She did very well I thought despite them allowing Trump too
many extra false statements which should have been challenged.

[Neil Jung]

How many times did he say something was “horrible” ?

[Mike Boom]

How many times did he say something was “horrible” ?

And how many records must he hold for "the greatest" or "the best" or "the biggest" this or that "in the history of our country".

Its like he's just on a continuous annoying loop of bullshit

[kath]

She did very well I thought despite them allowing Trump too
many extra false statements which should have been challenged.

she was fantastic.

the mods definitely gave him too much mic time, too... although to be fair, operation let-him-yap is working beautifully.

and he has dropped another level of not handling it all well. he is rotting in front of our eyes.

[Mike Boom]

“They’re eating the dawgs” !

[Lord Rother]

Some really interesting post debate poll data here. (Some great questions in there.)

https://www.dataforprogress.org/blog/20 ... than-trump

Very positive overall for Harris and, as if it wasn’t already apparent, it certainly highlights the areas she needs to focus on in the next few weeks.

And this is going to send Trump into absolute apoplexy.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/harris ... poll-shows

[mudshark]

Still a long way to go. It's going to be all about AZ, NV, PA, WI, NC and perhaps even OH and MI.
He's a complete doofus and got soundly beaten in the debate, but the election is still 7 weeks away, and his rhetoric about immigration and inflation is influencing people. I'm so naive to think that 'naturally' a big majority of young people vote Democrate, but nothing could be further from the truth. This current New Silent Generation is a lot more conservative than the Millennials, and that's a worrying trend, for me. If Harris wins it will be because of the female and non-white voters. Among white men from any generation, Trump would win hands down. And don't forget all the pet lovers who are leaving Springfield OH in droves, leaving the Haitians with nothing to eat but their children