It's a real shame that Trump keeps skipping the GOP debates. What I would give to see him decimate these clowns in person, especially Ronnie-Boy.

I wouldn't vote for any Republican regardless, but hey, a guy needs his entertainment. 😏

This kind of thing was inevitable. She's pretty dumb to say that out loud, though. The down-ballot republican candidates will be willingly sacrificed so that trump's campaign can hoard as many resources as possible. The funny thing is that trump and his people will try to convince those neglected republican candidates that his "success" will trickle down at the ballot box.

Sandy Pensler Launches Second Campaign for Michigan Senate Seat

Renowned businessman Sandy Pensler has officially entered the race for the U.S. Senate in Michigan, joining a crowded field of Republican candidates aiming to flip the open seat held by Democrats for over twenty years.

Exploring the Most Electrifying Moments from the First GOP Debate

In the exhilarating arena of the 2023 Republican presidential debate, even the absence of the frontrunner Trump couldn't diminish the fireworks that ensued. Let's delve into the captivating highlights of this two-hour showdown that left no one in doubt about the passion and fervor of the candidates. Read More Here:

Republican albatross.

November 14, 2022

When Donald Trump plowed through a contingent of lightweight contenders to seize the GOP nomination back in 2016 and then went on to get elected president (thanks to Vlad Putin), the Republican base decided he was some sort of political mastermind. And that his candidate endorsements should be obeyed without question, no matter how unqualified, untested and unglued those candidates might be.

Trump's "complete and total" endorsement may be a valuable commodity during a primary contest when mostly MAGAs turn out to vote. But if the recent midterms have shown us anything, it's that Trump is a decided millstone around the necks of Republicans running in a general election. Nowhere was this fact more glaringly evident than in the races for governor that occurred last week.

In Pennsylvania, for example, Republicans put forward Trump imitator and state Senator Doug Mastriano, an election denier (he repeatedly claimed the Dems stole the 2020 election), insurrection participant (he was actually photographed near where the January 6 violence was taking place) and loud-mouthed Christian nationalist (he once supported a bill to mandate teaching the Bible in public schools). Fortunately for the Keystone State, this loony Trump-wannabe was soundly thumped by his Democratic opponent.

Meanwhile in Arizona, the Trump-backed nominee for governor, former TV news anchor Kari Lake, a crazed election conspiracist (she even claimed the primary she won was rigged), lost to former state secretary Katie Hobbs. And in New York, the GOP's gubernatorial nominee was US congressman Lee Zeldin, who voted to overturn the 2020 election results. Which naturally endeared him to the pathological ex-president. Wrote Trump, "He will be a GREAT Governor of New York." New York's voters decided otherwise.

Other loser candidates for governor — all endorsed by Trump — included Geoff Diehl (Massachusetts), Dan Cox (Maryland), Tudor Dixon (Michigan), Tim Michels (Wisconsin), Darren Bailey (Illinois), and Mark Ronchetti (New Mexico). Overall, Trump made more than 300 endorsements, mainly for candidates in safe Republican seats who were expected to win. But, as Susan Glasser observed in The New Yorker,

In seeking to play the role of Republican kingmaker this year, Trump succeeded in proving that the country did not want more outsider, extremist candidates in his own image. His tainted brand was magic to the Republican base, and proved to be toxic to everyone else.

Typically, Trump is reported to be "blaming everyone except himself" over last week's results, still insisting he's "a Stable Genius." But as one GOP insider told Faux News, “If it wasn’t clear before, it should be now: We have a Trump problem.”

J. D. Vance and the Collapse of Dignity - The Atlantic

What's Wrong With The Right?

What’s Wrong With The Right?

Most of the mid-term focus has centered on the Senate races, and with good reason.  The Senate is currently evenly divided at 50/50 and if Republicans can net just one new seat, they will take a majority and all bets for anything worthwhile coming out of Congress are off.  But we also shouldn’t ignore the House of Representatives, where all 435 seats are up for grabs and most predictions are that…

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Jeff Yass just bought Trump. Here’s what he stands to gain.

The right-wing billionaire and TikTok investor is about to help the former president add billions of dollars to his net worth. This is what oligarchy looks like.

March 25, 2024, 4:42 PM EDT

By Ja'han Jones

Billionaire investor Jeff Yass is playing his Trump card.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Friday that the right-wing megadonor and major TikTok investor is a part owner of the company that merged with Donald Trump’s media company, which owns Truth Social, the former president’s struggling social media platform. The head-scratching deal stands to add billions of dollars to Trump’s net worth.

Yass’ name recently started popping up in news reports after Trump denounced legislation in Congress that could ban TikTok unless the social media outlet is sold from its China-based parent company. This was a major reversal of Trump’s previous opposition to TikTok and came after Yass met with Trump in Florida, with the backdrop of the former president’s mounting legal fees only adding to suspicion that Yass essentially could be purchasing a presidential candidate.

Trump claimed afterward that he hadn’t spoken with Yass about TikTok, and Yass is a major backer of efforts to promote school privatization, so I guess it’s possible that the right-wing billionaire didn’t say a thing about one of his most prominent investments. (Yass recently declined a request for comment from NBC News.)

But it certainly looks like Trump is under Yass’ thumb now.

It also looks like TikTok — or at minimum, one of its key investors — has just tried to one-up other social media companies in Big Tech’s ongoing battles over influence in Washington. Two years ago, The Washington Post revealed that Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, had waged a behind-the-scenes pressure campaign that involved trying to get media outlets and lawmakers to scrutinize TikTok more heavily. And although Meta can’t take total credit, that effort does seem to have helped get us to the present-day scenario, with a possible TikTok ban under consideration at the federal level and several other bans enacted at the state level.

With Trump, Yass appears to be employing the oligarchic approach to protecting an investment: transfer heaps of cash to a desperate presidential candidate and hope they do your bidding.

☝️😡🤬

Hey, yanno how Climate Change is a real thing that is tangibly, at this moment, affecting our world?

Well it turns out, the wealthy and their investment firms have been seeing the mounting evidence that oil companies have had for decades and are slowly starting to think more long-term about their portfolios in the face of rising sea levels, more extreme weather, and the myriad of ways climate crises are affecting...well. Everything. Maybe this means they invest more into sustainability, green energy, building more resilient infrastructure, or carbon offsets. Some of it, of course, is simple corporate greenwashing, but there are those that are taking this trend and packaging it into something called ESG (Environmental, Social, and corporate Governance).

Now some people would say this is predictable, even sensible. Just the good ol’ Free Market(tm) rationally responding to market forces and a changing world.

But those people would be fools! Insidious fools! For conservative sorcerers have come out with a new cursed phrase to explain this new market trend: Woke Investing.

What makes this investing “woke?” Well, much like how conservatives normally flounder when trying to define a word they stole from black people, “Woke Investing” essentially just means any kind of capital investment that they, the fossil fuel billionaire class and their sycophants, don’t personally profit from.

One of these aforementioned sycophants is Andy Puzder, conservative commentator, fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and former fast-food CEO. He calls this kind of so-called woke investing “socialism in sheep’s clothing,” further explaining in leaked audio of a closed-door meeting:

“My father's generation's challenge was the Nazis, who, by the way, were, of course, very proud socialists[citation fucking needed]. The challenge of my generation was the communists, who were, of course, very committed socialists. The challenge of your generation is ESG investing, and it's more insidious than communism or the Nazis.”(source)

You heard it here first, folks. Not investing as much in fossil fuels is more insidious than the Third Fucking Reich.

As usual, the Heritage Foundation is putting their petro-chemical donor’s money where their mouth is. Bills are being proposed to blacklist banks that don’t invest in key state industries, such as West Virginia coal or Texas oil. Fourteen states have already passed bills to restrict ESG-type investing, with Florida Governor Ron “Bullies Kids for Wearing Masks” Desantis leading the charge.

In other words, Climate Denial has reached such a point that so-called Free Market Conservatives who claim to hate big government are trying to make it illegal for banks, investment firms, and financial institutions to make any financial decisions that acknowledges Climate Change is real.

The Headline Horizon: Latest News in GOP Primary Debate Poll

Get the scoop on the latest poll results from the GOP primary debate, featuring notable shifts in support for Republican candidates. Dive into the analysis and speculation surrounding the candidates' performance and the implications for the upcoming election.

Which President, in your opinion, was the most reluctant to seek the position? Which wound up hating it the most by the end of his term?

I am a strong believer that nobody truly becomes President of the United States "reluctantly". That's not exactly the kind of job that seeks you, especially the modern Presidency.

For a significant slice of American history, many of the people nominated for President acted as if they were being called upon to run when, behind-the-scenes, they were very active in building their campaigns and corralling supporters. Until the 20th Century it was frowned upon to openly run for the Presidency, but almost all of the Presidents wanted the gig.

I'd say that George Washington was probably more reluctant than most of his successors and likely would have preferred retiring to Mount Vernon after the Revolution, but I think he also recognized that he was the guy who needed to be the President that set the precedents. I think Ulysses S. Grant would have been perfectly happy to not be President, but once he was elected in 1868 he also wanted to keep the job. He even tried to run for a third term in 1880.

That 1880 election might have been the one case where the winner -- James Garfield -- genuinely wasn't interested in the Presidency at that point. He had gone to the Republican National Convention to support fellow Ohioan John Sherman (and defeat Grant's hopes for a third term) and gained some major attention after giving a well-received speech placing Sherman's name in nomination. When the candidacies of Sherman and James G. Blaine -- another anti-Grant candidate -- stalled, Garfield became a compromise choice and was eventually nominated on the 36th ballot. Garfield was apparently legitimately shocked by the events leading to him leaving Chicago as the GOP nominee.

By most accounts, William Howard Taft was far more interested in a potential seat on the Supreme Court than becoming President. At heart he was a judge and believed himself to be better suited for the judiciary than the Executive Branch. But Taft turned down three offers by Theodore Roosevelt to be appointed to the Supreme Court (in 1902, 1903, and 1906) because he felt obligated to complete his work as Governor-General of the Philippines and then Secretary of War. But Taft's wife desperately wanted him to become President and by the time of President Roosevelt's third offer of a seat on the Court, Taft was already being talked about as Roosevelt's hand-picked successor in the White House. And, as with all other Presidents, once he had a taste for the job, he didn't want to give it up, running for re-election in 1912 against his former friend, Roosevelt.

Gerald Ford is the only other President who hadn't spent a significant portion of his political career with his eyes on the White House. Ford spent nearly a quarter-century in the House of Representatives and his main ambition was to be Speaker of the House, but Republicans weren't able to win control of the House when Ford was in Congressional leadership positions. But even with Ford being a creature of Congress, he did attempt to put himself forward as a nominee for the Vice Presidency, first in 1960 and then in 1968, and Nixon kicked the tires on picking him as his running mate in 1960. No one wants to be Vice President without seeing it as a potential stepping stone to the Presidency, particularly at that point in history before Vice Presidents were empowered with some real influence within the Administrations they served in.

As for who wound up hating it by the end of their time in office, I think it's safe to say that John Quincy Adams didn't shed too many tears when he was defeated for re-election in 1828. And I'm sure he wouldn't use the word "hate", but nobody can convince me that George W. Bush wasn't thoroughly ready to escape Washington by late-2007. There were times in 2008 when he seemed like he just wanted to hold a snap election like they have in parliamentary systems and go home to Texas. If some Presidential insider published a book that said that Bush asked if he could just give the keys to the White House to Barack Obama in July 2008, I wouldn't be the least bit shocked.

On the other hand, if there were no term limits, Bill Clinton would have been running for President in every election since 1992 (and the crazy thing is that he's still younger than both of the presumptive 2024 nominees). I'm kind of surprised that he didn't make an effort to repeal the 22nd Amendment in the past 20 years. Clinton loved being President and was trying to find something Presidential to do until minutes before his successor was inaugurated in 2001.

too much birthday / honeymoon states

A party full of wannabes.

August 11, 2022

If there's any doubt about the malevolent impact Donald Trump has had on the Republican Party, look no further than the flock of repugnant Trump imitators his influence has generated. But try as they might to embody the full range of the twice-impeached, one-term loser's awfulness, most of these GOP pols are often capable of displaying only some of his disgusting qualities.

Take, for example, Pennsylvania's Republican nominee for US Senate, Mehmet Oz. Like Trump, Oz is a TV-manufactured celebrity. And like Trump, Oz is a shameless huckster. On his afternoon TV show, he hawked armloads of useless health products, including diet pills, supplements and nutrition aids (he also advocated putting hot rice in your socks to cure insomnia). Of course, in typical Trumpish fashion, Oz also made sure to profit off his promotions by secretly holding financial stakes in the products he endorsed.

One of the most popular ways of emulating Trump is to engage in nonstop, barefaced lying. One obvious case in point is Georgia's Trump-endorsed Senate candidate, Herschel Walker. Like Trump, Walker is especially fond of embellishing his business success. As The Daily Beast reports, those bogus claims include running the largest minority-owned food company in the United States, owning multiple chicken plants, and founding a (non-existent) upholstery business which was also, as he tells it, the country’s largest minority-owned apparel company.

Then there are the authoritarians of the Trump "I alone can fix it" mold. These would-be dictators are best exemplified by Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who apparently thinks running a purple state like an old-time soviet socialist republic is somehow going to make him more viable as a presidential candidate. Poor Ron doesn't understand that the fascist approach to governing is what caused Trump to lose a national election by seven million votes.

And speaking of voting, we come now to election denying, which is absolutely mandatory for Trump copycats. Chief among these is Arizona's GOP nominee for governor, Kari Lake (pictured above insisting that even the primary election she won was fraudulent). In fact, Lake built her entire campaign around the myth that the last presidential election was stolen. Other Arizona election-denying candidates include Blake Masters (for US Senate) and Oath Keeper Mark Finchem (for secretary of state), who as a state legislator sponsored a bill to undo the 2020 election results.

Sadly, becoming an elected Republican nowadays requires a commitment to replicating as many appalling characteristics as possible of the one person the Party venerates as its political paragon. And, no, it's not Ronald Reagan.

Why are you telling people to vote for the guy committing genocide :/

because voting is not an endorsement it's harm reduction.

Trump is going to be at best doing the same as Biden and likely much worse for Palestinians and all the countries suffering from American Imperialism than Biden is.

Republicans want to bring back child labor and get rid of social security, medicare, Medicaid. As someone who is surviving on Medicaid and social security I don't want those taken away. The Republican majority house already put a lot of limits on food stamps in this past term and I don't think we'll still have food stamps if we get a republican Congress and a Republican president.

They've made it pretty clear that if they get a republican Congress and a Republican president they're going to enact project 2025 and call a conference of states and try and take our rights back to the days when only wealthy white men had any rights when women and racial minorities had no rights, they want to make it illegal for LGBT+ folks to safely exist in public and get lifesaving healthcare.

In short

Do I support every single thing Biden has done as president?

No.

Do I like him?

Not particularly. But I'm still voting for him because apathy is not a choice.

Do I think that Joe Biden having another term means that we can actually make more progress for labor rights, trans healthcare, abortion access, advancement of the rights and protections for disabled people and so much more?

Yes absolutely.

Do I think that the genocide in Gaza needs to end and the United States needs to stop sending weapons to israel?

Yes, I think that un restricted flow of humanitarian aid into Palestine needs to happen, the siege needs to stop, and the country of Israel and the United States need to be held accountable at an international level. I think that the soldiers of the IDF/IOF need to be held accountable for their war crimes and pillaging that they continuously post evidence of on social medias. I'm trying to put a read more here so ce I've put a few linked articles and quotes from them.

A quote from the article below:

"While our map focuses solely on high school aged youth (age 13-17), some states, such as Oklahoma, Texas, and South Carolina, have considered banning care for transgender people up to 26 years of age. "

I've seen lawmakers in some states try to make it felony punishable by life in prison to get your trans child healthcare to keep them alive because they want to make it illegal for us to exist and a legal for anyone who helps us exist.

some quotes from the article above:

"Led by the long-established Heritage Foundation think tank and fueled by former Trump administration officials, the far-reaching effort is essentially a government-in-waiting for the former president’s second term — or any candidate who aligns with their ideals and can defeat President Joe Biden in 2024. With a nearly 1,000-page “Project 2025” handbook and an “army” of Americans, the idea is to have the civic infrastructure in place on Day One to commandeer, reshape and do away with what Republicans deride as the “deep state” bureaucracy, in part by firing as many as 50,000 federal workers. “We need to flood the zone with conservatives,” said Paul Dans, director of the 2025 Presidential Transition Project and a former Trump administration official who speaks with historical flourish about the undertaking. “This is a clarion call to come to Washington,” he said. “People need to lay down their tools, and step aside from their professional life and say, ‘This is my lifetime moment to serve.’” The unprecedented effort is being orchestrated with dozens of right-flank organizations, many new to Washington, and represents a changed approach from conservatives, who traditionally have sought to limit the federal government by cutting federal taxes and slashing federal spending. Instead, Trump-era conservatives want to gut the “administrative state” from within, by ousting federal employees they believe are standing in the way of the president’s agenda and replacing them with like-minded officials more eager to fulfill a new executive’s approach to governing. The goal is to avoid the pitfalls of Trump’s first years in office, when the Republican president’s team was ill-prepared, his Cabinet nominees had trouble winning Senate confirmation and policies were met with resistance — by lawmakers, government workers and even Trump’s own appointees who refused to bend or break protocol, or in some cases violate laws, to achieve his goals. While many of the Project 2025 proposals are inspired by Trump, they are being echoed by GOP rivals Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy and are gaining prominence among other Republicans. And if Trump wins a second term, the work from the Heritage coalition ensures the president will have the personnel to carry forward his unfinished White House business. “The president Day One will be a wrecking ball for the administrative state,” said Russ Vought, a former Trump administration official involved in the effort who is now president at the conservative Center for Renewing America. Much of the new president’s agenda would be accomplished by reinstating what’s called Schedule F — a Trump-era executive order that would reclassify tens of thousands of the 2 million federal employees as essentially at-will workers who could more easily be fired. Biden had rescinded the executive order upon taking office in 2021, but Trump — and other presidential hopefuls — now vow to reinstate it."

"There’s a “top to bottom overhaul” of the Department of Justice, particularly curbing its independence and ending FBI efforts to combat the spread of misinformation. It calls for stepped-up prosecution of anyone providing or distributing abortion pills by mail."

Personally I think that voting for Joe Biden is better than someone who wants to enact this stuff on day one. It's like they read handmaid's tale and want to make that the reality of this country.

"Chapter by chapter, the pages offer a how-to manual for the next president, similar to one Heritage produced 50 years ago, ahead of the Ronald Reagan administration. Authored by some of today’s most prominent thinkers in the conservative movement, it’s often sprinkled with apocalyptic language." Ronald Reagan is a big reason we have a lot of problems we have today with our economy and with a lot more things. The people that supported Ronald Reagan do not need another term in office.

A quote from the article linked below:

"Trump has given no indication that he would be more sympathetic to Palestinian claims, nor that he would place more pressure on Israel to agree to a ceasefire. “The approach of the United States would be that Israel needs to win this war, it was attacked brutally,” Trump’s ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, describing how Trump would act. Friedman is now a campaign surrogate for Trump."

Personally I think Trump telling Israel to finish the job is indicators that another Trump presidency doesn't mean that weapons would stop being sent to Israel from United States

I fail to see how another term of Donald trump will be any better for the victims of the ongoing genocide in Palestine than President Joe Biden.

i think our system is absolutely messed up and broken but I don't think abstaining from voting is going to actually help.