US Gen. Election Thread V: The Hunt for Red October Surprise

[AiliailiA]

What the map would look like if children voted.

You mean, what the map would look like if ONLY children voted. Remember that they'd only be a minority of voters, they'd be combined with all other voters.

What the hell happened in DC? The District has a higher percentage of African Americans than any State, and (adults) in DC vote Democratic more heavily than any state (even Hawaii).

But even in the source their choice isn't named. It's not Trump or Clinton, it's just Other.

Other/None-of-the-above 2040!

[AiliailiA]

I spy with my little eye... an actual policy from the Trump campaign?

Term limits and anti-corruption laws. Of course, how it's done is even more important than what is done, probably, but I *do* like those lobbying limits.

Not that I would elect a narcissistic child to get them, of course.

I wouldn't trust ANY candidate for President to get that.

The President is in a uniquely weak position to pressure Congress that way. A one-term House member has more moral authority:

"hey guys ... and gals ... I'm new here, but I've got this great idea, let's kick out the old fucks, right? It's just not fair, they get elected and re-elected with 60%, 70%, no-one can touch them. Incumbency advantage, it sucks right?
*boos*
Let's have term limits, so more fresh people with new ideas ... like me ... can get elected!"
*boos*

It sounds ridiculous, and it is. It's a dumb idea, even coming from someone with a stake in it. Coming from the President it would be beyond ridiculous, it would be insulting and paternalistic as well. That a high handed President "pressed for" Congress to weaken itself by law or by constitutional amendment, would actually set the cause of Congressional term limits back by decades.

If you're for Congressional term limits (I think you Galloism are not, but abstractly), anyone for such limits wants it to come from Congress ... and the President should butt out. It's ultimately a restriction on Congress (and a restriction on the rights of the People to elect who they want in Congress) and none of the President's business.

Frankly I think Trump picked up some old Republican policy which Congressional Republicans didn't support unanimously then and certainly don't support now, something which as President he would have no influence over, and is just trying to embarass them.

So, the bit you like?

Trump's proposal comes a day after he offered a five-point package of ethics reforms:

1. Instituting a five-year ban on all executive branch officials from lobbying the government after they leave government service. (Currently officials are barred from lobbying the agency they leave for one or two years, depending on their seniority.)
   
2. Calling on Congress to impose its own five-year ban on former members and their staffs from lobbying. (Currently the prohibition is one year for House members and two years for senators.)
   
3. Expanding the definition of a lobbyist to close the loopholes that Trump says allow former government officials to label themselves consultants and advisers "when we all know they are lobbyists."
   
4. Issuing a lifetime ban on senior executive branch officials from lobbying on behalf of a foreign government.
   
5. Asking Congress to pass campaign finance reform that would prevent registered foreign lobbyists from raising money in American elections.

1 and 4 are maybe within the scope of Presidential authority. Not sure how, exactly, but maybe Cabinet and other senior official appointments could be required to sign a contract with such provisions and financial penalties for violating them.

The others are "ask Congress to go fuck itself" and as with term limits, unlikely to be met with anything but scorn and revulsion by Congress, and actually less likely to ever happen if the President "presses" them to do it.

[AiliailiA]

Please prove to me and everyone here that those remarks specifically caused any shift towards Trump within the African American community. Please. If you can't, then your argument is bullshit.

I DO have access to the poll, and I will calculate the correlation coefficient between the poll and the average amount of airtime that the Trump tape received - I"ll do it after I get home so I can properly Excel. ETA 2 hours, I'll TG it to you.

I'd like to know how this turned out.

Soldati Senza Confini apparently stumped up $20 to get the racial cross-tabs from Rasmussen, and posted a lot of stuff indicating that the bump in African-American vote was from 9% to 17% (not 25% as you claimed).

Well, The Confederacy of Nationalism, you can still claim that you're honoring the terms of service of Rasmussen by not posting the full results. You can back out of the claims you made previously, because providing a source would violate terms you (later discovered you) had entered into when you accessed the Rasmussen site.

But you promised something in the post I'm quoting, and it's clearly within the terms of fair use.

Lancaster of Wessex, did you get that TG?

[PaNTuXIa]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

[Thermodolia]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

When has it ever been biased towards Clinton? Trump is so bad at debating that he could and possibly would lose to an actual five year old child

[European Guilds]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

When has it ever been biased towards Clinton? Trump is so bad at debating that he could and possibly would lose to an actual five year old child

It was biased towards Hillary because she was allowed to speak as well.

Plunging the future of the 2016 Presidential debates into doubt, Donald J. Trump said on Tuesday morning that he would not participate in the remaining two debates if Hillary Clinton is there.

Trump blasted the format of Monday night’s debate by claiming that the presence of Clinton was “specifically designed” to distract him from delivering his message to the American people.

“Every time I said something, she would say something back,” he said. “It was rigged.”

He also lambasted the “underhanded tactics” his opponent used during the debate. “She kept on bringing up things I said or did,” he added. “She is a very nasty person.”

Turning to CNN, Trump criticized the network’s use of a split screen showing both him and Clinton throughout the telecast. “It should have been just me,” he said. “That way people could have seen how really good my temperament is.”

The billionaire said that debate organizers had not yet responded to his ultimatum, but he warned that if he does not get assurances in writing that future debates will be “un-rigged, Hillary-wise,” he will not participate.

“I have said time and time again that I would only do these debates if I am treated fairly,” he added. “The only way I can be guaranteed of being treated fairly is if Hillary Clinton is not there.”

[Thermodolia]

When has it ever been biased towards Clinton? Trump is so bad at debating that he could and possibly would lose to an actual five year old child

It was biased towards Hillary because she was allowed to speak as well.

Plunging the future of the 2016 Presidential debates into doubt, Donald J. Trump said on Tuesday morning that he would not participate in the remaining two debates if Hillary Clinton is there.

Trump blasted the format of Monday night’s debate by claiming that the presence of Clinton was “specifically designed” to distract him from delivering his message to the American people.

“Every time I said something, she would say something back,” he said. “It was rigged.”

He also lambasted the “underhanded tactics” his opponent used during the debate. “She kept on bringing up things I said or did,” he added. “She is a very nasty person.”

Turning to CNN, Trump criticized the network’s use of a split screen showing both him and Clinton throughout the telecast. “It should have been just me,” he said. “That way people could have seen how really good my temperament is.”

The billionaire said that debate organizers had not yet responded to his ultimatum, but he warned that if he does not get assurances in writing that future debates will be “un-rigged, Hillary-wise,” he will not participate.

“I have said time and time again that I would only do these debates if I am treated fairly,” he added. “The only way I can be guaranteed of being treated fairly is if Hillary Clinton is not there.”

While I don't like Trump at all, you do realize that this is satire? It's from the New Yorker and was written by Andy Borowitz!

[European Guilds]

It was biased towards Hillary because she was allowed to speak as well.

While I don't like Trump at all, you do realize that this is satire? It's from the New Yorker and was written by Andy Borowitz!

[New Chalcedon]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

None of them were. In fact, the bars the candidates had to clear to "win" the debate were so absurdly disparate that the general response was derision. All Trump had to do - all he had to do to have the chattering classes proclaim him the winner - was to do this for 90 minutes straight:

1. Appear "Presidential" (whatever that means, although "dignified", "stoic" and "relatable" all enter into it);
2. Not be seen attempting to physically intimidate his opponent;
3. Be semi-coherent in his answers to the questions - truthfulness was notably not being assessed by the moderators, who had decided not to spend 90 minutes arguing with Trump over their...divergent views of reality.

This should have been a breeze for Trump - he's spent decades chasing cameras, hosting shows, generally speaking to yuuuge audiences. Insofar as he has a career, it's "TV personality", given how crap a businessmen he is. And, much as I despise him, he's shown that he's good at the TV star skillset - good enough to keep his own T.V. show making him tons of money for fourteen years. But he just couldn't get himself over the absurdly-low bar that was set for him. Instead, he flubbed, flailed and ultimately failed. Utterly, completely and without mitigating circumstance.

1. He appeared - and, to some extent, acted - like a coke addict unsure where his next fix is coming from. He couldn't stop sniffling, sniffing, coughing and generally Making His Presence Known, even when he was supposed to let the other person have their turn. Even if he was in ill-health which explains much of it, it was an embarrassingly-timed illness - he's only spent the past several months flat-out claiming his opponent's about to drop dead any minute, so for her to have been visibly refreshed and energized while he coughed, wheezed and sniffled was not going to go over well.

2. He loomed over Clinton. All debate. It was excruciating to watch - he was playing very physical dominance/pissing contests with his body language all debate long, and just couldn't back down, even a little bit. Somehow, I doubt that America wants a feral junkyard dog as its next President.

3. Not only could Trump not tell the truth during the debate (he averaged one flat-out lie every 2 1/2 minutes of speaking, plus many more misleading, exaggerated or overblown statements), he couldn't even make up his mind over what lies he was going to tell. He was unable to stick to the topic presented, instead rambling off into his preferred areas of politics and attempting to set up crowd-applause lines, then looking utterly stumped when he didn't get any.

Basically, he was faced with a simple, easy task and flubbed it. Badly. Awfully. Bigly. And the debates were really, really not biased against him - the moderator for the first debate was Lester Holt, a registered Republican. The co-moderators for the second were Anderson Cooper (who's so dedicated to nonpartisanship that he refuses to vote for fear that it will make him go easier on the side he ends up voting for - really!) and Martha Raddatz (who has a long history of asking both Dems and Reps the tough questions, from bluntly accusing Joe Biden of "a massive intelligence failure" over Benghazi to asking Dick Cheney if it mattered that 70% of Americans wanted to pull out of Iraq).

The, of course, you had the bias of the different expectations set upon the two candidates - particularly egregious in the disastrous Matt Lauer interview, but still pretty nasty. With that in mind, note that this was legit a pundit's reaction to the debate:

#debatenight exposed Trump's lack of preparation, but Clinton seemed over-prepared at times.

Seriously. The verdict on Clinton from pundits was that she was "over-prepared". Because, of course, the last person you want in the Oval Office would be someone who actually believes in doing the legwork, right?

Now, of course, the moderator for the third debate is a freakin' Fox "News" anchor, which should hopefully mean no more howls of "pro-Clinton!" from Trump or his more addled supporters. I know, I'm living in a dream world, but let me hope a little.

[Thermodolia]

While I don't like Trump at all, you do realize that this is satire? It's from the New Yorker and was written by Andy Borowitz!

Hey, in my defense I've seen way to many people fall for that shit.

[Vassenor]

Marco Rubio calls out the GOP for jumping on the WikiLeaks stuff.

Nice to see some actual integrity from the big names.

[New Chalcedon]

Hey, in my defense I've seen way to many people fall for that shit.

The mark of excellent satire is that people who should know better end up taking it seriously.

Well done, Andy Borowitz.

[Thermodolia]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

None of them were. In fact, the bars the candidates had to clear to "win" the debate were so absurdly disparate that the general response was derision. All Trump had to do - all he had to do to have the chattering classes proclaim him the winner - was to do this for 90 minutes straight:

1. Appear "Presidential" (whatever that means, although "dignified", "stoic" and "relatable" all enter into it);
2. Not be seen attempting to physically intimidate his opponent;
3. Be semi-coherent in his answers to the questions - truthfulness was notably not being assessed by the moderators, who had decided not to spend 90 minutes arguing with Trump over their...divergent views of reality.

This should have been a breeze for Trump - he's spent decades chasing cameras, hosting shows, generally speaking to yuuuge audiences. Insofar as he has a career, it's "TV personality", given how crap a businessmen he is. And, much as I despise him, he's shown that he's good at the TV star skillset - good enough to keep his own T.V. show making him tons of money for fourteen years. But he just couldn't get himself over the absurdly-low bar that was set for him. Instead, he flubbed, flailed and ultimately failed. Utterly, completely and without mitigating circumstance.

1. He appeared - and, to some extent, acted - like a coke addict unsure where his next fix is coming from. He couldn't stop sniffling, sniffing, coughing and generally Making His Presence Known, even when he was supposed to let the other person have their turn. Even if he was in ill-health which explains much of it, it was an embarrassingly-timed illness - he's only spent the past several months flat-out claiming his opponent's about to drop dead any minute, so for her to have been visibly refreshed and energized while he coughed, wheezed and sniffled was not going to go over well.

2. He loomed over Clinton. All debate. It was excruciating to watch - he was playing very physical dominance/pissing contests with his body language all debate long, and just couldn't back down, even a little bit. Somehow, I doubt that America wants a feral junkyard dog as its next President.

3. Not only could Trump not tell the truth during the debate (he averaged one flat-out lie every 2 1/2 minutes of speaking, plus many more misleading, exaggerated or overblown statements), he couldn't even make up his mind over what lies he was going to tell. He was unable to stick to the topic presented, instead rambling off into his preferred areas of politics and attempting to set up crowd-applause lines, then looking utterly stumped when he didn't get any.

Basically, he was faced with a simple, easy task and flubbed it. Badly. Awfully. Bigly. And the debates were really, really not biased against him - the moderator for the first debate was Lester Holt, a registered Republican. The co-moderators for the second were Anderson Cooper (who's so dedicated to nonpartisanship that he refuses to vote for fear that it will make him go easier on the side he ends up voting for - really!) and Martha Raddatz (who has a long history of asking both Dems and Reps the tough questions, from bluntly accusing Joe Biden of "a massive intelligence failure" over Benghazi to asking Dick Cheney if it mattered that 70% of Americans wanted to pull out of Iraq).

The, of course, you had the bias of the different expectations set upon the two candidates - particularly egregious in the disastrous Matt Lauer interview, but still pretty nasty. With that in mind, note that this was legit a pundit's reaction to the debate:

#debatenight exposed Trump's lack of preparation, but Clinton seemed over-prepared at times.

Seriously. The verdict on Clinton from pundits was that she was "over-prepared". Because, of course, the last person you want in the Oval Office would be someone who actually believes in doing the legwork, right?

Now, of course, the moderator for the third debate is a freakin' Fox "News" anchor, which should hopefully mean no more howls of "pro-Clinton!" from Trump or his more addled supporters. I know, I'm living in a dream world, but let me hope a little.

The two moderators, Shep Smith is said to be helping Chris Wallace tonight. Two openly gay men help host a presidential debate what are the odds of that happening!

[Thermodolia]

Marco Rubio calls out the GOP for jumping on the WikiLeaks stuff.

Nice to see some actual integrity from the big names.

Yet he still endorses Trump

[Khadgar]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

None of them were. In fact, the bars the candidates had to clear to "win" the debate were so absurdly disparate that the general response was derision. All Trump had to do - all he had to do to have the chattering classes proclaim him the winner - was to do this for 90 minutes straight:

1. Appear "Presidential" (whatever that means, although "dignified", "stoic" and "relatable" all enter into it);
2. Not be seen attempting to physically intimidate his opponent;
3. Be semi-coherent in his answers to the questions - truthfulness was notably not being assessed by the moderators, who had decided not to spend 90 minutes arguing with Trump over their...divergent views of reality.

This should have been a breeze for Trump - he's spent decades chasing cameras, hosting shows, generally speaking to yuuuge audiences. Insofar as he has a career, it's "TV personality", given how crap a businessmen he is. And, much as I despise him, he's shown that he's good at the TV star skillset - good enough to keep his own T.V. show making him tons of money for fourteen years. But he just couldn't get himself over the absurdly-low bar that was set for him. Instead, he flubbed, flailed and ultimately failed. Utterly, completely and without mitigating circumstance.

1. He appeared - and, to some extent, acted - like a coke addict unsure where his next fix is coming from. He couldn't stop sniffling, sniffing, coughing and generally Making His Presence Known, even when he was supposed to let the other person have their turn. Even if he was in ill-health which explains much of it, it was an embarrassingly-timed illness - he's only spent the past several months flat-out claiming his opponent's about to drop dead any minute, so for her to have been visibly refreshed and energized while he coughed, wheezed and sniffled was not going to go over well.

2. He loomed over Clinton. All debate. It was excruciating to watch - he was playing very physical dominance/pissing contests with his body language all debate long, and just couldn't back down, even a little bit. Somehow, I doubt that America wants a feral junkyard dog as its next President.

3. Not only could Trump not tell the truth during the debate (he averaged one flat-out lie every 2 1/2 minutes of speaking, plus many more misleading, exaggerated or overblown statements), he couldn't even make up his mind over what lies he was going to tell. He was unable to stick to the topic presented, instead rambling off into his preferred areas of politics and attempting to set up crowd-applause lines, then looking utterly stumped when he didn't get any.

Basically, he was faced with a simple, easy task and flubbed it. Badly. Awfully. Bigly. And the debates were really, really not biased against him - the moderator for the first debate was Lester Holt, a registered Republican. The co-moderators for the second were Anderson Cooper (who's so dedicated to nonpartisanship that he refuses to vote for fear that it will make him go easier on the side he ends up voting for - really!) and Martha Raddatz (who has a long history of asking both Dems and Reps the tough questions, from bluntly accusing Joe Biden of "a massive intelligence failure" over Benghazi to asking Dick Cheney if it mattered that 70% of Americans wanted to pull out of Iraq).

The, of course, you had the bias of the different expectations set upon the two candidates - particularly egregious in the disastrous Matt Lauer interview, but still pretty nasty. With that in mind, note that this was legit a pundit's reaction to the debate:

#debatenight exposed Trump's lack of preparation, but Clinton seemed over-prepared at times.

Seriously. The verdict on Clinton from pundits was that she was "over-prepared". Because, of course, the last person you want in the Oval Office would be someone who actually believes in doing the legwork, right?

Now, of course, the moderator for the third debate is a freakin' Fox "News" anchor, which should hopefully mean no more howls of "pro-Clinton!" from Trump or his more addled supporters. I know, I'm living in a dream world, but let me hope a little.

Bet you after Trump implodes further tonight he'll no longer deign appear even on Hannity.

Marco Rubio calls out the GOP for jumping on the WikiLeaks stuff.

Nice to see some actual integrity from the big names.

Less integrity and more "If we ignore this the other team will ignore it for us too".

[Occupied Deutschland]

Marco Rubio calls out the GOP for jumping on the WikiLeaks stuff.

Nice to see some actual integrity from the big names.

'I will not discuss information from third parties which reveals to the American people information about their politicians honesty and character because Omergerd Russia!'

'Integrity' seems to have gained a new definition while I was away. This isn't integrity, it's self-interest. Self-interest that directly contradicts the interest of the American people and the American political system.

[Ifreann]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

When has it ever been biased towards Clinton? Trump is so bad at debating that he could and possibly would lose to an actual five year old child

Everything is biased towards Clinton, otherwise Trump would be winning. Also Trump is winning, because the polls are biased towards Clinton.

[The Emerald Dawn]

When has it ever been biased towards Clinton? Trump is so bad at debating that he could and possibly would lose to an actual five year old child

Everything is biased towards Clinton, otherwise Trump would be winning. Also Trump is winning, because the polls are biased towards Clinton.

The Faux Noise moderator is going to have an interesting job in the debate.

[Zurkerx]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

Chris Wallace won't be bad, I do respect him. However, I am not sure if he will be able to control both of them especially Trump to stay on the issues.

Also to note, I think this is the night Clinton goes for the death blow on Trump. If he acts like has been doing so on the campaign trail for the last 2 weeks, he's fucked.

[The Emerald Dawn]

Holy shit, this debate is gonna be good.

Plus, it isn't too biased towards Clinton.

Chris Wallace won't be bad, I do respect him. However, I am not sure if he will be able to control both of them especially Trump to stay on the issues.

Also to note, I think this is the night Clinton goes for the death blow on Trump. If he acts like has been doing so on the campaign trail for the last 2 weeks, he's fucked.

Does he get to stalk her across the stage again?

The PA guy better be ready with that score.

[AiliailiA]

While I don't like Trump at all, you do realize that this is satire? It's from the New Yorker and was written by Andy Borowitz!

A joke you should leave to Galloism.

You spoiled it from the start with "It was biased towards Hillary because she was allowed to speak as well."

I notice something else. It's [client=safari] from the URL of the newyorker.com link.

Surely there aren't TWO Safari users on NSG?

[Gauthier]

Marco Rubio calls out the GOP for jumping on the WikiLeaks stuff.

Nice to see some actual integrity from the big names.

Like I've said, rational and reasonable which means the GOP leadership will completely ignore it.

[The Emerald Dawn]

Rasmussen has Clinton +1.

FREAKING RASMUSSEN.

[The Romulan Republic]

Rasmussen has Clinton +1.

FREAKING RASMUSSEN.

Slowly acknowledging reality, are they?

[The Emerald Dawn]

Rasmussen has Clinton +1.

FREAKING RASMUSSEN.

Slowly acknowledging reality, are they?

THE END TIMES ARE UPON US ALL!

REPENT!

REPENT, YE SINNERS!