Monday Open Thread [1.4.2016]
People pay a lot of attention to the right track wrong direction number. They shouldn’t. It no longer has any meaning. If it did, President Obama would not have been reelected, for you see 58% of the respondents saying the country was going in the wrong direction at the same time 53% of the voters reelected the President.
No, what that number means now is 100% opposition from all members of the President’s opposition party, coupled with those liberals, left leaning independents, progressives, and Democrats who are upset with Republican obstruction and growing income inequality and the power of corporations and billionaires, and Donald Trump.
For example, I personally approve of the President’s job performance, and will vote for the Democrat in the fall, but I think things in the country are going in the wrong direction. So the value of this statistic as a predictor for the presidential election is nil. It is more instructive to look at how everyone says they are doing personally. An end-of-year Economist/YouGov poll found that 63% of Americans surveyed said it was a pretty good year for themselves and their families. Those numbers suggest that the Democrat is still well positioned to win.
Boston Globe: “Conversations with a range of scholars, and some rummaging through historical sources, suggest that the most riveting figure in American politics today can perhaps be parsed as one part populist (recalling … William Jennings Bryan, three-time presidential candidate and secretary of state); one part brilliant exploiter of public fears (Joseph McCarthy, senator and red-baiter); one part mesmerizing but inflammatory preacher (Father Charles Coughlin, supporter of Franklin Roosevelt and then bitter opponent of the New Deal), one part showboat (Jesse Ventura, gaudy professional wrestler, and governor of Minnesota), and one part crusading antielitist (Huey Long, governor of Louisiana, senator, and possible presidential candidate).”
Throw in some George Wallace or Strom Thurmond for the racism and some Mussolini for the facism and you’re set.
“If Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination for president, he will likely have to do it by storming across the South,” the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.
“The brash billionaire’s support has softened in Iowa, and a skirmish in New Hampshire with an influential conservative newspaper could scramble the race. But in South Carolina, Trump remains rock solid — signaling a strength that would serve him well when voters in Southern states begin to vote in less than two months.”
“He’s championing a strategy that melds a blend of economic populism with blunt rhetoric that resonates with voters across the region. Polls show him maintaining commanding leads in South Carolina, where Republicans will cast ballots on Feb. 20, as well as Georgia and other states that vote in the so-called ‘SEC primary’ on March 1.”
E.J. Dionne Jr. at The Washington Post gives the GOP candidates some free advice:
The value of free advice is measured by what you pay for it, and Republicans don’t usually ask me for mine. Nonetheless, the GOP’s presidential race is one of the most fascinating political brawls in years. It’s about to hit full stride, and I can’t resist kibitzing. I know the leading candidates will take my guidance for what it’s worth.
Marco Rubio: […] You need to show some conviction, perhaps by taking at least one inconvenient stand. In primaries especially, winning requires you to decide whose votes you’ll write off. You won’t make it by remaining everyone’s second or third choice. Somebody’s got to trust you deeply.
Jeb Bush: […] The paradox: The only way you’ll have a chance of winning is to forget about winning. Relax. Run as the guy you said you’d be, the upbeat candidate of inclusion. Marry your attacks on Trump to a positive vision of a welcoming GOP. Be the candidate whom Republicans horrified by Trump and Ted Cruz can repair to with pride. It may not work. But it’s the only thing that can, and you might at least start enjoying the campaign.
John Kasich: […] [Y]ou sound best when you talk like a compassionate conservative because that’s the person you want to be. Why not go for it? If Jeb follows the strategy I just outlined for him, you guys might collide. But you have said your main worry is how St. Peter will judge you at the end. Run a campaign for him.
Ted Cruz and Chris Christie: […] Ted, you have the focus Marco doesn’t. You’re trying to pull together all the right-wing groups in the party, and they happen to constitute a huge part of it. Chris, you’re betting it all on New Hampshire. The right move. You’re campaigning up there as if you were running for governor. Also exactly right.
Ben Carson: Please go back to neurosurgery or inspirational speaking. You’re gifted at both.
Rand Paul: Stay in for a few more debates to make your libertarian case on foreign policy. You’re sparking a necessary discussion. But you know perfectly well you have to go back to Kentucky soon to protect your Senate seat.
Donald Trump: I have nothing useful to say, and you’d pay no attention anyway.
The Guardian on Bill Clinton returning to the comeback trail today: “Twenty-four years later, ‘the comeback kid’ will return to the stump in New Hampshire on Monday. He will be hoping to administer another Lazarus-like political resuscitation. After the sting of rejection in 2008, when his wife was bested by a young upstart named Barack Obama, he will make the case for Hillary Clinton’s second shot at becoming the first woman in the White House.”
“This time the former secretary of state appears to be on course, with a comfortable lead in Democratic polls after debate performances that apparently neutralised the socialist insurgency of Bernie Sanders. Her campaign says it raised $37m in the past three months, a record for a non-incumbent, and more than $112m in all of 2015. The Republican field, meanwhile, remains overcrowded and chaotic.”
The New York Times says only old people watch cable news. The “median age for CNN viewers this year was 61, while it was 63 for MSNBC and 67 for Fox News.” The only time I watch it, as a 39 year old GenX-er, is when there is a presidential event / press conference, breaking news, an occasional Rachel Maddow Show here and there, and…. when my mother or father are over. LOL.
Former Gov. Sarah Palin (R) “keeps raising questions about whether she plans on running against Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK),” according to the Midnight Sun. “First she said it was a possibility in a radio interview, then she put her Arizona home on the market, now we’re hearing murmurs from Washington D.C. that she is seriously considering the possibility.”
I am tired of all our liberal fever dreams coming true.
National Journal on Chris Christie’s path to victory: “The case for Christie relies on him being the feisty underdog, surpassing expectations at every turn. To little fanfare, he’s campaigning this week in Iowa even as he’s bet his campaign’s future on doing well in New Hampshire. Christie knows that a surprisingly good finish in Iowa could bring him momentum going into New Hampshire, and he has little to lose even if he struggles in the caucuses. Rubio, by contrast, has spent more time in Iowa and a disappointing showing could stunt his candidacy. Meanwhile, the emerging Rubio-Jeb tit-for-tat in Iowa is a welcome development for Christie.”
“Christie would still need to do well in his must-win state of New Hampshire, where polls show him in a crowded pileup for second place behind Donald Trump. Christie would then focus on performing respectably in South Carolina, and more importantly, on making a major play for two Super Tuesday states that aren’t getting much attention now but would be an essential part of the Christie map: Virginia and Massachusetts.”
“With the voting for his successor getting underway in less than a month, President Obama is moving up his State of the Union address a couple of weeks in hopes of laying out his closing agenda while the country is still paying attention. And in the process, he hopes to defy expectations,” the New York Times reports.
Byron York on why the GOP Moneymen won’t attack Trump: “First, creating an organization and spending millions of dollars to carpet-bomb Trump with negative ads in key states isn’t easy; there aren’t many people who could pull it off. Second, some donors think an anti-Trump offensive not only would not work but would backfire on an already unpopular GOP establishment. Third, some who do believe it could work think it should not be attempted until Trump’s critics have agreed on an alternative candidate — which they haven’t. Fourth, the anti-Trump opposition can’t decide who should lead such an effort. And fifth, most GOP strategists and money movers continue to believe Trump will ultimately fail on his own, that in the end he will not be the Republican nominee.”
Trump’s first campaign ad.
If the fascist ran TV ads, they would have looked like that. He is what he is….what scares me is that people are OK with what he is.