New Developments III

[Greg]

Just one other point, and maybe this is a stretch but I hope not. If you've been following the House Speaker drama going on right now, it's clear that the elected Democrats are very much united and the Republicans are in utter disarray.

Too bad Will Rogers didn't live a century longer to see this.

[Sabin]

re: your RFK Jr. point, I mean, we'll see. There's plenty of MAGA influencers freaking out right now, and any candidate leaving the one party that looks like the adults in the room is in effect joining the playpen. You could be right. I'm done making predictions.

Sonic Youth wrote
Just one other point, and maybe this is a stretch but I hope not. If you've been following the House Speaker drama going on right now, it's clear that the elected Democrats are very much united and the Republicans are in utter disarray. I'd like to think there'll be a spillover effect onto the voters, with a strong Democratic constituency and a fractured, demoralized GOP constituency. After all the havoc they wreaked these past several years, it's what they deserve.

Dems are more unified than I ever thought they'd be back in 2021. We're seeing things like AOC being sent out to make it clear to that Dems will absolutely not be voting to keep McCarthy.

Part of me thinks that Gaetz is playing some kind of long game where he knows he's probably going to be ousted when whatever that ethics committee report comes out, he wants to run for Florida governor, and by doing this "Heir to Trump" shit maybe he has a better chance if he just says "I tried to do term limits and stop funding to Ukraine and they kicked me out! Vote for me." The other part of me thinks that -- like the rest of the party -- he's just really stupid and crazy.

To this point, I have a question. If I were to say "Right now, The Republican Party is the craziest that any major party has been in our country since before the Civil War" would I be wrong?

[Sonic Youth]

Just one other point, and maybe this is a stretch but I hope not. If you've been following the House Speaker drama going on right now, it's clear that the elected Democrats are very much united and the Republicans are in utter disarray. I'd like to think there'll be a spillover effect onto the voters, with a strong Democratic constituency and a fractured, demoralized GOP constituency. After all the havoc they wreaked these past several years, it's what they deserve.

[Big Magilla]

In addition to crazy and boring, I would add that the Kennedy family is embarrassed by him, but there are shockingly more anti-vaxxers out there than people realize although that is not the main issue.

More concerning is that there are a growing number of dyed-in-the-wool Democrats and Democrat leaning independents including seniors who feel that Biden is too old, not because of his age, but because of his "doddering". Still, they would all vote for Biden over Trump but if Trump were not the candidate, Biden might not be such an easy winner over whichever generic Republican he would then be up against.

[Sonic Youth]

Everyone says pay no attention to polls this far out from Election Day, and that should apply to all polls. Kennedy's not getting close to 15% of the Democratic vote once Election Day comes around. It's a bubble that won't sustain. Notice how interest in him deflated after his first emergence? It's going to happen again. He's both crazy AND boring. It might be a bit different if he actually had some backing from disgruntled Democrats, but that doesn't seem to be the case. And there are far more anti-vax Republicans and Trump-leaning independents than there are Democrats who are more disappointed with Biden than they are terrified of Trump and are willing to risk a protest vote. Every election cycle people over-react whenever a third-party candidate emerges and it's happening again.

I disagree with, well, all of you I guess. I will maintain for the next 13 months that he poses an extremely marginal threat at best to Biden, and then time will tell. I'm not saying he'll be enough of a spoiler to derail Trump's chances either. But I'm very confident he poses no threat to Biden.

[OscarGuy]

There's a difference between Kanye West and Robert Kennedy Jr. West had no interest in actually running and didn't make much of an effort to get on ballots and do the other things candidates do. Kennedy has interest and is doing the things candidates usually do. That said, what is this Mediaite site? I've seen little or no discussion in the traditional media, nor at the politics website I watch, talking about a third-party run. Is this wishful thinking? Scuttlebut that no one is taking seriously?

[taki15]

He'll have about the same impact as Kanye West who four years ago was supposedly going to siphon black votes away from Biden and throw the election to Trump.

[Big Magilla]

Kennedy has no chance of winning. He can only be a spoiler and he will siphon votes away from Biden, not Trump. Trump's supporters will not budge.

Kennedy is a one-trick pony whose support comes from his antivax stance, but, yes, there are ill-informed voters who will think he's the shining light his father and uncles were and vote for him because of his name. It might be enough to give Pennsylvania to Trump.

[Sabin]

Sonic Youth wrote
But... isn't this good? It would siphon votes away from Trump.

danfrank wrote
I fear it would siphon even more votes away from Biden. In polls of Democrats, almost none of whom would be inclined to vote for Trump, about 15% have been saying they would vote for Kennedy over Biden. Of course a lot of these are going on name, and many don’t yet realize how batsh*t crazy Kennedy is, but it’s still scary.

Exactly. So much of politics comes down to vibes not policy, hence the Ron Paul->Bernie Sanders voters. We now live in a country where Democrats basically needs to overperform the Republican by 7-8mil to win, and Biden needs every independent he can swing. There’s absolutely a world where RFK Jr. takes away from only Trump but I wouldn’t bet on it because some of RFK Jr.’s appeal is left wing.

A side note: Election Day is ages away but if it comes down to Biden-Kennedy-Trump, I expect Kennedy to do pretty well, clearing 5% for one major reason. Even though the dude’s weird and I think a pretty boring speaker, he has a confidence that a lot of third party candidates don’t have. Most of the time, they all just seem like dorks. Anyone who would run under the banner of GP or LP has to be small enough to fit under said banner. I really think that the whole polling thing where third party candidates over-perform around summer and then fall to earth is due to that. Most of them are uncharismatic dorks. That’s not RFK Jr. He’s more crazy in the same mold of Ross Perot. I don’t know if he’ll get Perot numbers but I think it’s on the table.

[danfrank]

Sigh... here we go.

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/exclu ... ndent-run/

But... isn't this good? It would siphon votes away from Trump.

Yes, it's bad for the state of the country, but we're kinda there anyway.

I fear it would siphon even more votes away from Biden. In polls of Democrats, almost none of whom would be inclined to vote for Trump, about 15% have been saying they would vote for Kennedy over Biden. Of course a lot of these are going on name, and many don’t yet realize how batsh*t crazy Kennedy is, but it’s still scary.

[Sonic Youth]

Sigh... here we go.

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/exclu ... ndent-run/

But... isn't this good? It would siphon votes away from Trump.

Yes, it's bad for the state of the country, but we're kinda there anyway.

[Sabin]

Sigh... here we go.

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/exclu ... ndent-run/

[OscarGuy]

Speaking as a Missourian, the reason Akin lost is because of what he said, not for his apology. McCaskill was also a statewide election winner in the past and had pretty high name recognition. Since then, the nuts have taken over the asylum and even a good Democrat can't combat a shitty Republican here...We have too many entitled white people to be a bellwether anymore.

[Sabin]

Big Magilla
I was going to school and working in 1960, the year I turned 17, but I did watch at least one of the Kennedy-Nixon debates, the first one in which cool, calm, self-assured Kennedy all but wiped the floor with sweaty, browbeaten Nixon. But there's a world of difference between
the gentlemanly Nixon and the spoiled brat Ramaswamy. Nixon probably meant most of what he said. Ramaswamy, like most of today's Republicans, just says what he thinks people want to hear.

I didn't do a good job of making it clear that I was talking about the "She's pink right down to her underwear" Nixon.

[Big Magilla]

criddic3 wrote
Ramaswamy is way worse than Nixon. I'm not of that generation; one removed (barely a 1977 baby), but at least Nixon had an actual interest in doing things for the country. The favorite seems to be his creation of the EPA, but he was also the guy who essentially said "okay so Kennedy might have stolen some votes in Chicago and cost me a close election but I'm gonna let it go and maybe I can come back someday." For all his personal flaws, he wasn't interested in being a dictator and believed in democracy. I'm not sure Ramaswamy does.

I was going to school and working in 1960, the year I turned 17, but I did watch at least one of the Kennedy-Nixon debates, the first one in which cool, calm, self-assured Kennedy all but wiped the floor with sweaty, browbeaten Nixon. But there's a world of difference between
the gentlemanly Nixon and the spoiled brat Ramaswamy. Nixon probably meant most of what he said. Ramaswamy, like most of today's Republicans, just says what he thinks people want to hear.