What happens to the Republican Party now? (1 Viewer)

[MT15]

This election nonsense by Trump may end up splitting up the Republican Party. I just don’t see how the one third (?) who are principled conservatives can stay in the same party with Trump sycophants who are willing to sign onto the TX Supreme Court case.

We also saw the alt right types chanting “destroy the GOP” in Washington today because they didn’t keep Trump in power. I think the Q types will also hold the same ill will toward the traditional Republican Party. In fact its quite possible that all the voters who are really in a Trump personality cult will also blame the GOP for his loss. It’s only a matter of time IMO before Trump himself gets around to blaming the GOP.

There is some discussion of this on Twitter. What do you all think?

 

[Optimus Prime]

The moment absolutely nobody had been waiting for has finally arrived: The Right Stuff has launched.

What fresh hell is this, you ask.

It’s a new conservative dating app that promises to let you “view profiles without pronouns” and “connect with people who aren’t offended by everything”.

Despite this all being very predictable stuff, the app has been getting a lot of attention for three reasons:

1) the ads are unintentionally hilarious,

2) it was co-founded by former Trump administration officials and Ryann McEnany, the sister of former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, is the app’s spokesperson;

3) creepy Trump-loving billionaire Peter Thiel, who has been called “the most important person in Silicon Valley”, has invested $1.5m into the project.

It’s that last bit that I find fascinating. The money isn’t much for a guy like Thiel, but it’s still an investment; I’d love to know what he sees in the app. He certainly doesn’t see an opportunity to use it himself: Thiel is gay and The Right Stuff currently only caters for heterosexuals.

It’s also hard to imagine he sees a robust business model spearheaded by tech-savvy geniuses.

While The Right Stuff has only just launched, it has, in the grand tradition of anything remotely connected to Trump, immediately run into legal problems.

Turns out there is already another dating service, set up a long time ago, called The Right Stuff(targeted at graduates of elite universities) which is reportedly planning to send a cease-and-desist letter to the new iteration.

“There are a lot of other really good rightwing names that they could choose,” the founder of the original Right Stuff, Dawne Touchings, complained to the Daily Beast. “They are very smart; I am sure they could come up with something!”

They could certainly come up with something sounding a little less Nazi-like. As well as being attached to another dating service, The Right Stuff is the name of a notorious neo-Nazi, Holocaust-denying blog – a detail that you’d expect the founders of a new dating service – or someone investing £1.5m in an app – would make it their business to find out…….

Want to date a hot rightwinger? Sick of all that woke nonsense? I’ve just the app for you!

Founded by Trump advisers, backed by billionaire Trumpite Peter Thiel, The Right Stuff is a safe zone for anyone allergic to pronouns and liberals. Will it do better than all its predecessors?

www.theguardian.com

 

[SaulGoodmanEsq]

Yep. That's why I see JBE likely being able to take down Cassidy if he decides to seek reelection.

I haven't seen anything that indicates JBE is considering a Senate run. I'd figure he'd have done so against Kennedy if he wanted it.

 

[MT15]

I’m still waiting for an honest R talking point. Take this one for example:

 

[Bigdaddysaints]

maybe it's because oil companies love reaping the benefits of record breaking profits?

 

[coldseat]

maybe it's because oil companies love reaping the benefits of record breaking profits?

I think it's more than that. OPEC's move seem to be motived by the effect it will have on US midterm elections. OPEC nations have more favorable US relations when Republicans are in charge of Congress and the presidency. Given all the corruption between the Trumps and Saudi Arabia, I would bet ARAMCO that there were plenty of backroom discussions between the two about US midterm elections. It is very plausible that this is meant to weaken Biden and Democrats. With all of the ways foreign actors try to influence our elections (always favoring Republicans, funny how that works out), why would economic manipulation be any different? With a fickle, already manipulated and reactionary US electorate, it's a very effective tool.

 

[MT15]

And no one in Republican leadership will say a single word about this:

 

[Optimus Prime]

Guess this can go here, too political for the EE marijuana thread
==============

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has rebuffed a request from President Joe Biden to consider state pardons for low-level marijuana possession.

In a statement issued earlier this week, Mr Abbott’s spokeswoman Renae Eze said: “Texas is not in the habit of taking criminal justice advice from the leader of the defund police party and someone who has overseen a criminal justice system run amuck with cashless bail and a revolving door for violent criminals.”

Gov Greg Abbott says no to pardons for marijuana offenders in Texas

A spokeswoman for the Texas governor says they will not be taking advice on criminal justice from the White House

www.independent.co.uk

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[MT15]

Doug, that’s not really a dog whistle, is it? A dog whistle is at least a little bit subtle.

 

[Optimus Prime]

well this is a sobering article
=======================
Imagine it’s Jan. 20, 2025. Inauguration Day. The president-elect raises his right hand and begins to recite the oath: I, Donald John Trump, do solemnly swear …

It’s an anti-Trumper’s nightmare, but it could happen: 47 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents want Trump to be the nominee in 2024, according to a recent Washington Post-ABC News poll. And if Trump and Joe Biden are the contenders, Trump narrowly edges Biden, 48 to 46 percent, among registered voters (albeit within the poll’s margin of error).

The twice-impeached president’s tenure in office was a festival of democratic norm-breaking, culminating in the “big lie” about the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 insurrection. A second term would likely bring more of the same — only this time Trump would have four years of practice under his belt.

To help game out the consequences of another Trump administration, I turned to 21 experts in the presidency, political science, public administration, the military, intelligence, foreign affairs, economics and civil rights. They sketched chillingly plausible chains of potential actions and reactions that could unravel the nation.

“I think it would be the end of the republic,” says Princeton University professor Sean Wilentz, one of the historians President Biden consulted in August about America’s teetering democracy. “It would be a kind of overthrow from within. … It would be a coup of the way we’ve always understood America.”

Based on what these experts described, here’s a portrait of a democratic crackup in three phases.

Phase 1: Trump seizes control of the government …​

… And installs super loyalists.​

“Among the first things he would do, in the initial hours of his presidency, would be to fire [FBI Director] Christopher Wray and purge the FBI,” says Larry Diamond, senior fellow in global democracy at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. Diamond’s research has focused on the plight of democracy in other countries, but lately he’s been thinking and writing about its ailments in America. Trump “would then set about trying to politicize the FBI, the intelligence agencies and as much of the government as possible,” Diamond continues.

“He has complete authority to appoint the senior ranks of the National Security Council. So you could see [retired Lt. Gen.] Michael Flynn” — who was pardoned by Trump after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI — “as the national security adviser again, or somebody else who would not represent any of the prudence and restraints and efforts to rein in Trump’s more authoritarian and impulsive instincts.”...........

He creates a MAGA civil service.​

Installing loyalists at the top of government won’t be enough. As for populating the rank and file with those who echo the former president’s slogan of Make America Great Again, Trump tipped his hand near the end of his term, when he signed an executive order designed to strip as many as tens of thousands of federal employees of their civil service protections.

The order created a new category of employees, dubbed Schedule F, targeting those whose jobs arguably include a degree of policymaking. Top officials would be able to fire them almost at will. President Biden rescinded the order shortly after he was inaugurated. If Trump were reelected, he’d reinstate the policy, Axios reported in July.

“They are using the language of good government to justify this, saying that this is the only way that you can discipline poorly performing workers,” Fukuyama says. “But obviously their real intention is to basically politicize the whole civil service. … Because Trump personalizes everything to such an extent, he’s going to be super looking out for revenge and therefore going after, for example, anybody that denied that he won the 2020 election. And this is going to go down to a really low, granular level of American government.”.............

Phase 2: Trump deploys the military aggressively at home, while retreating abroad.​

Once Trump has centralized power through cadres of vetted loyalists across government, what will he do with it? As The Post has previously chronicled, he’s already told us, in speeches over the past several months, some of his proposals if he decides to run: Execute drug dealers. Move homeless people to tent cities. Eliminate the Education Department. Restrict voting to one day using paper ballots. But there could be much more — including profound shifts in military and foreign policy.

He uses the military to promote his own political power.​

After Trump led Secretary of Defense Esper, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley and other officials across Lafayette Square for a photo op in June 2020 amid racial justice protests, Milley apologized to the public for participating in a staged politicized event, enraging Trump. In a second term, such cautionary voices will be fewer, says Peter Feaver, a professor of political science at Duke University and a leading expert on civilian-military relations................

The chances of civil war increase.​

That’s when the potential for violent conflict is real. For those studying the implications of these trends, “there’s no scenario that worries us more than that the wheels just come off completely from the restraints against violence in the United States,” says Diamond, of Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute. “My biggest concern is what citizens would do to citizens, and what citizens might do to legitimately constituted government authority.”

Some of the preconditions for civil war — a weakening democracy with hindrances to popular participation and divisions along identity lines — are brewing in the United States, says Barbara Walter, a political science professor at the University of California at San Diego and the author of “How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them.”

Those dynamics could intensify with Trump or a similar figure in the White House, she says.

It wouldn’t be an 1860s-style civil war of states vs. states; if it did come to pass, she says, “the type of war we’re going to see is an insurgency. … [Participants] are going to fight a type of guerrilla war, a siege of terror that’s going to be targeted very specifically at certain individuals and certain groups of people, all civilians.”..........

MSN

www.msn.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

This article doesn't say, but I wonder if they are counting blaming gerrymandering and voter suppression laws as the same thing as blaming it on voter fraud
======================================================================================================

Thirty-nine percent of Republicans will blame election fraud if the GOP doesn’t win control of Congress in the November midterm elections, while 26 percent of Democrats will say the same if their party doesn’t win, according to a new Axios-Ipsos poll.........

Nearly 40 percent of Republicans will blame election fraud if GOP doesn’t win Congress: poll

 

[Optimus Prime]

Remember when everyone thought Hillary Clinton would win the 2016 election? No, I don't just mean win the popular vote: Win it all and win big. FiveThirtyEight, Nate Silver's political projection site, had Clinton's chances of winning at 71.4 percent. Frank Luntz tweeted on Nov. 8, 2016, "Hillary Clinton will be the next President of the United States."

One GOP insider declared that for Trump to win, "it would take video evidence of a smiling Hillary drowning a litter of puppies while terrorists surrounded her with chants of 'Death to America.'" Pundit after pundit, on the left and the right, joined the chorus of mainstream news outlets to declare that the election was Clinton's.

There was, however, one lone voice of dissent: Michael Moore. In July 2016, Moore wrote "Five Reasons Trump Will Be President." That article mostly went unnoticed by mainstream media after the election, when everyone finally realized Moore was right but it was way too late to make a difference.

Fast forward to the 2022 midterms and we find ourselves in a similar scenario, but turned upside down. Now the media is basically repeating again and again that Democrats will lose in November, while Moore is suggesting the opposite. Moore isn't just echoing the widespread notion that Democrats could hold the Senate while losing the House.

He is suggesting that voters "are going to descend upon the polls en masse — a literal overwhelming, unprecedented tsunami of voters — and nonviolently, legally, and without mercy remove every last stinking traitor to our Democracy."

That prediction is likely to cause hyperventilation at all points of the political spectrum. Could he really be right?

To make his point, Moore is going beyond armchair punditry and sending out what he is calling a "tsunami of truth," where each day leading up to the election he offers one specific factual reason why he is right and why it makes sense to be optimistic.

If an 18-year-old high school student can beat a Republican incumbent in Boise, Idaho, Moore argues, something is happening that the media can't see.

In his second installment, he covered the story of the recent election for the Boise Board of Education, in which Republican Steve Schmidt, an incumbent, was up for re-election. Considering that Trump won Idaho's capital city with 73 percent of the vote, it made sense to assume Schmidt would win again.

But as Moore explains, Schmidt had been endorsed by a far-right extremist group, the Idaho Liberty Dogs, that led a campaign against the local library, calling their LGBTQ+ and sex ed materials "smut-filled pornography." According to Moore, they even showed up at local Extinction Rebellion climate strikes brandishing AR-15 assault rifles.

So in a surprising turn of events, the Idaho Statesman, Boise's daily news paper, chose not to endorse Schmidt because he refused to denounce the Idaho Liberty Dogs. Instead, the paper endorsed his opponent, an 18-year-old high school senior and progressive activist, Shiva Rajbhandari, who was also co-founder of the Boise chapter of Extinction Rebellion.

Rajbhandari won. A teenager beat a Republican incumbent in a traditionally red city in one of the reddest states.

Moore's point is that if these kinds of seismic shifts are happening at the polls in Boise, there's reason to think that this election won't follow traditional patterns. Voters, he believes, have had enough of the power of right-wing extremists and the threat they pose to democratic values.............

Michael Moore predicts Democrats will win big in the midterms. Could he be right again?

 

[SaulGoodmanEsq]

Just a small bone to pick whenever people evoke Nate Silver's numbers. He merely aggregates polls and runs statistical analysis. Saying Clinton had a 71.4% chance of winning meant that Trump had a 28.6% chance of winning. Not inconsequential.

 

[Optimus Prime]

Very good article about fundraising emails/texts differences between both parties
==============

…….So what does all this linguistic fiddling say about the parties behind it? With just a few weeks before voting begins, the Guardian sorted through some of the most memorable messages of the 2022 campaign to shed light on the question.

Republicans​

For the GOP, it’s all about unswerving loyalty to the party – and to the great overlord, the chosen one, he who alone can fix it. He is not running for office this year, but his party seems unaware.

Text messages from the Republican National Committee dangle a wide range of perks: donate and you can be a part of the Trump Gold Club, the Trump Advisory Board (he undoubtedly takes direct calls from members), the Trump Free Speech Committee (I was flattered to receive an “EXECUTIVE INVITE” to this one), the 1 Million Trump Social Club, or the America First 100 Club.

Failing that, you can become a Trump Social Media Founding Supporter or get on the Trump Life Membership List (the messages do not specify what it would mean to be a lifetime member of Trump). Gifs of the ex-president often adorn the bottom of emails.

And if none of these clubs are for you, beware the RNC’s wrath. “Don’t you care?” asked a message on 30 June. “Our records show your Trump Advisory Board membership status is STILL PENDING ACTIVATION!”

This was just one of many similar messages that arrived after a failure to donate. In February, I was threatened with “possible suspension” – from what, I’m not sure – if I didn’t provide my “$45 payment”. Then in April: “Patriot! YOU NEVER ANSWERED!” (Capitals theirs.)

Later, things got passive-aggressive. “Do we need to talk, friend?” the party wondered. A few weeks after that, in May: “We’re not mad, we’re just asking. Why haven’t you pledged to follow Pres. Trump on Truth Social [his social media platform]?”……..

Clearly, the party’s marketing team believes donors are motivated by accusations of insufficient loyalty. In a March email describing the invasion of Ukraine, the party said a poll had found most Democrats would flee the country if the US found itself in a similar position.

“So we must ask: Would you fight for your country if it was under attack? Researchers need your response by midnight tonight. If you do not respond in time, we will assume you side with the Democrats who wouldn’t fight for America.”……

Democrats​

The opposing party is equally inclined to hyperbole, though it often takes a very different tone – one of vulnerability and occasional self-flagellation. “We’re downright BEGGING you,” wailed the subject line from a late September Democratic email. “Election day is 64 days away and we’re getting nervous,” warned a text early last month.

It’s really upsetting to have to send multiple texts and emails every day: “This isn’t easy for me,” wrote Joe Biden in April. A few months later: “I hate to ask.” (If Republicans’ word choice was occasionally odd, Democrats made mistakes of their own – this particular message suggested I “take a moment to read this email, and then chip in $0 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee”, which I did.)….

When they’re not PLEADING, Democrats, in classic Democratic fashion, struggle to get their message out. While Republicans spit out brief, simple messages, Democrats offer subject lines like this from April: “I hope you’ll read this long email about how the DNC is bringing advanced data infrastructure to thousands of midterm campaigns this year, and then consider chipping in to support that work.” What red-blooded American could resist?……

If Republican messaging aligns with Lakoff’s “strict father” worldview, Democrats’ touchy-feely messaging fits his description of the progressive mindset, which he calls “nurturant parent”. That’s the empathetic figure who “isn’t imposing on the child but rather wants to find out what you need”, Lakoff says. “For the Democratic party, democracy is based on empathy. Why would you have a democracy, you know? In order to help other people, to make sure everybody gets treated equally, that everybody gets what they need from the government.”

The “begging” and “pleading”, then, seem to be based on the assumption recipients wish to do good; describing nervousness and sinking hearts appeals to empathy. And Barbra, John and Martin are all just part of the family.

And what would a nurturing family be without guilt trips? Of course, Democratic guilting is more “have you forgotten the parents who worked so hard to raise you?” than the Republicans’ “if you don’t cough up now, you’re dead to me”…….

‘We’re positively BEGGING you’: how Republicans and Democrats demand money differently

Meticulously crafted campaign emails and text messages, with a heavy dose of guilt-tripping, reveal their parties’ worldviews

www.theguardian.com

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[superchuck500]

"This is MAGA" - week of 10/2 - 10/9

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

OK, the Nancy one made me spit out my drink.

 

[Taurus]

Very good article about fundraising emails/texts differences between both parties
==============

…….So what does all this linguistic fiddling say about the parties behind it? With just a few weeks before voting begins, the Guardian sorted through some of the most memorable messages of the 2022 campaign to shed light on the question.

Republicans​

For the GOP, it’s all about unswerving loyalty to the party – and to the great overlord, the chosen one, he who alone can fix it. He is not running for office this year, but his party seems unaware.

Text messages from the Republican National Committee dangle a wide range of perks: donate and you can be a part of the Trump Gold Club, the Trump Advisory Board (he undoubtedly takes direct calls from members), the Trump Free Speech Committee (I was flattered to receive an “EXECUTIVE INVITE” to this one), the 1 Million Trump Social Club, or the America First 100 Club.

Failing that, you can become a Trump Social Media Founding Supporter or get on the Trump Life Membership List (the messages do not specify what it would mean to be a lifetime member of Trump). Gifs of the ex-president often adorn the bottom of emails.

And if none of these clubs are for you, beware the RNC’s wrath. “Don’t you care?” asked a message on 30 June. “Our records show your Trump Advisory Board membership status is STILL PENDING ACTIVATION!”

This was just one of many similar messages that arrived after a failure to donate. In February, I was threatened with “possible suspension” – from what, I’m not sure – if I didn’t provide my “$45 payment”. Then in April: “Patriot! YOU NEVER ANSWERED!” (Capitals theirs.)

Later, things got passive-aggressive. “Do we need to talk, friend?” the party wondered. A few weeks after that, in May: “We’re not mad, we’re just asking. Why haven’t you pledged to follow Pres. Trump on Truth Social [his social media platform]?”……..

Clearly, the party’s marketing team believes donors are motivated by accusations of insufficient loyalty. In a March email describing the invasion of Ukraine, the party said a poll had found most Democrats would flee the country if the US found itself in a similar position.

“So we must ask: Would you fight for your country if it was under attack? Researchers need your response by midnight tonight. If you do not respond in time, we will assume you side with the Democrats who wouldn’t fight for America.”……

Democrats​

The opposing party is equally inclined to hyperbole, though it often takes a very different tone – one of vulnerability and occasional self-flagellation. “We’re downright BEGGING you,” wailed the subject line from a late September Democratic email. “Election day is 64 days away and we’re getting nervous,” warned a text early last month.

It’s really upsetting to have to send multiple texts and emails every day: “This isn’t easy for me,” wrote Joe Biden in April. A few months later: “I hate to ask.” (If Republicans’ word choice was occasionally odd, Democrats made mistakes of their own – this particular message suggested I “take a moment to read this email, and then chip in $0 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee”, which I did.)….

When they’re not PLEADING, Democrats, in classic Democratic fashion, struggle to get their message out. While Republicans spit out brief, simple messages, Democrats offer subject lines like this from April: “I hope you’ll read this long email about how the DNC is bringing advanced data infrastructure to thousands of midterm campaigns this year, and then consider chipping in to support that work.” What red-blooded American could resist?……

If Republican messaging aligns with Lakoff’s “strict father” worldview, Democrats’ touchy-feely messaging fits his description of the progressive mindset, which he calls “nurturant parent”. That’s the empathetic figure who “isn’t imposing on the child but rather wants to find out what you need”, Lakoff says. “For the Democratic party, democracy is based on empathy. Why would you have a democracy, you know? In order to help other people, to make sure everybody gets treated equally, that everybody gets what they need from the government.”

The “begging” and “pleading”, then, seem to be based on the assumption recipients wish to do good; describing nervousness and sinking hearts appeals to empathy. And Barbra, John and Martin are all just part of the family.

And what would a nurturing family be without guilt trips? Of course, Democratic guilting is more “have you forgotten the parents who worked so hard to raise you?” than the Republicans’ “if you don’t cough up now, you’re dead to me”…….

‘We’re positively BEGGING you’: how Republicans and Democrats demand money differently

Meticulously crafted campaign emails and text messages, with a heavy dose of guilt-tripping, reveal their parties’ worldviews

www.theguardian.com

It's tragic how everyone but the DNC can see it.
From the rambling plea for data infrastructure, of all things, to using Nancy "CHA is my dump stat" Pelosi as a pitchwoman.
Jeebus Christ, you guys. Are there NO salesmen among you?