The Democratic political class cannot believe they might lose again to Donald Trump. "How could anyone vote for that man?" they complain. "He is just so gauche!" In a way, they have a point. Trump is gauche. His recent perambulations about Arnold Palmer are the latest in a long line of baffling utterances and improvisations. But mixed in with the weirdness is some smart campaigning. Trump's McDonald's stunt was a very sharp move (not genius, but pretty good for a standard political stunt). And of course, it sent Democrats on tilt at how undignified and cheap Trump was (again). The Democratic elites are so appalled by Trump they cannot bring themselves to give him any credit for anything. But the fact is, the former president has good instincts at self-promotion, unlike Kamala Harris or Joe Biden. Trump's delay, delay, delay legal strategy worked. Trump has the issue environment on his side. And Trump is currently the favorite to win.
@#2 ... The one part of this op ed that rang true to me is that Democrats aren't focused on issues that are most important to voters, they are focused on issues that are important to themselves. ...
I'm not yet convinced of that.
For starters, I think there is a distinction between national and state elections.
Nationally, yeah, I'd tend to agree with your comment at this point. The Democrats (a.k.a. the Harris campaign) seems to have blown it. But, how badly have they blown it? Nov 5 will tell. ...
But in state elections?
I'm not convinced of that opinion yet.
The issues are too local for me to understand each and every one of them.
I mean, my preference is just listening to music and occasionally reading news articles.
e.g.
Meat Puppets - Backwater (1994)
www.youtube.com
Cool vid, but it sounds different than the version I have in my music pool.
But to the point of your comment...
This Is Why You Don't Recognize Your State Government
www.bloomberg.com
... The impact on policy has been asymmetrical. For the past quarter-century, the public has become more progressive on many social issues, according to Gallup.
Blue trifecta states have moved with it, namely on abortion, gender identity, climate change, guns, immigration and voting rights.
Red trifectas, meanwhile, have hewed to their base and to policies that receive majority support only half the time -- rejecting Medicaid expansion, relaxing gun laws and cutting unemployment insurance. To many voters in the 23 Republican trifecta states, representative government is not representing them. ...
So the governing politicians in the Red trifecta states seem to dictate what they want to see in the behavior of their supporters, even when a majority of those supporters disagree with their enactments.
While the governing politicians in the Blue trifecta states seem to enact what their supporters want to see.
4 Non Blondes - What's Up (1992)
www.youtube.com
Lyrics excerpt...
...
25 years and my life is still
Tryin' to get up that great big hill of hope
For a destination
I realized quickly when I knew I should
That the world was made up of this brotherhood of man
For whatever that means
[Pre-Chorus]
And so I cry sometimes when I'm lying in bed
Just to get it all out what's in my head
And I, I am feeling a little peculiar
And so I wake in the morning and I step outside
And I take a deep breath and I get real high
And I scream from the top of my lungs
"What's going on?"
[Chorus]
And I say, hey-ey-ey
Hey-ey-ey
I said "Hey, a-what's going on?"
And I say, hey-ey-ey
Hey-ey-ey
I said "Hey, a-what's going on?"
...
LMAO No rape occurred. Even E Jean admitted that. What were you saying about lies again?
#13 | Posted by lfthndthrds
Donald Trump raped E. Jean Carroll even though he was found liable only for 'sexual abuse,' judge rules
In an opinion issued on Wednesday, US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who presided over the trial, wrote that the trial evidence demonstrated Trump "raped" Carroll in the plain sense of the word.
"The finding that Ms. Carroll failed to prove that she was 'raped' within the meaning of the New York Penal Law does not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump 'raped' her as many people commonly understand the word 'rape,'" Kaplan wrote. "Indeed, as the evidence at trial recounted below makes clear, the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that."
www.businessinsider.com
lfthndthrds = moron
GOP Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell rebukes RNC, calls Jan. 6 violent insurrection'Need any more?
"It was a violent insurrection for the purpose of trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power after a legitimately certified election from one administration to the next."
There's no question - none - that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of the day. No question about it," he said then, calling it "a disgraceful, disgraceful dereliction of duty."
Top Trump Campaign Official Shared Tweets Calling Jan. 6 An Insurrection' Stoked By Election Lies
Nine different federal judges have blamed Trump for January 6th
In fifteen cases overseen by nine different judges appointed by Republican and Democratic presidents, courts have not minced words in declaring that Trump was the central cause of the January 6, 2021 insurrection, echoing the findings of the bipartisan January 6th Select Committee. Time and again judges have found that Trump inflamed his supporters with the lie of a "stolen" election, urged them to "fight" to take back their country, and sent them to the Capitol to "stop the steal." Trump used violent rhetoric to whip his supporters into a frenzy and do illegally what he had tried and failed to do legally: stop certification of the election for Joe Biden.
Why are the Democrats losing?
I wonder if we can find examples of this from the early voting returns.
Marshall: Early Hints of Roevember?But it's the Dems showing hubris in the face of reality? Might wanna recalculate that if the above numbers hold close for the entire electorate.
Something I noticed in the first days of early voting was that most of the swing states that surfaced gender breakdowns for early voting showed around a ten point spread between men (~45) and woman (~55). There are more women than men and women vote more than men. But we're also seeing a lot more Republican early voting. All things being equal that high rate of Republican early voting should be compressing that gender divide. But it's not.
There are two other swing states releasing gender breakdown data for the early votes. And the numbers are comparable and actually larger. In Georgia it's 11.2 percentage points and in Michigan it's 13.1 percentage points.
#23 | Posted by lfthndthrds (NSFW)
It wasn't rape, it was sexual assaultYeah.
That's a winning argument.
"...why do you ... keep calling J6 an insurrection?" -
#26 | Posted by lfthndthrds
The people spending years - and decades - in prison certainly appreciate your sophistry.
No doubt.
Even the jurors said she wasn't raped.But somehow the judge found that she was raped. In the very quote from the judicial opinion that I copy/pasted. As the article notes "US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who presided over the trial, wrote that the trial evidence demonstrated Trump "raped" Carroll in the plain sense of the word."
#23 | Posted by lfthndthrds
But I guess we can rely upon Trump's testimony in court to refute that. Oh, what's that? He refused to testify at that trial, like he always refuses to testify at his trials? That's weird. I heard something about people who do that, but I can't remember ...
Donald Trump Pleads the Fifth After Saying Only Guilty People DoIf you don't think what Trump did to E. Jean Carroll was rape, that's fine. Would be terrible if you or someone you care about is ever "not raped" the same way.
www.newsweek.com
Oh lookie what just turned up.
Trumpy gets caught lying again. Yawn, ... it is a day ending in Y, right?
Even the jurors said she wasn't raped.
#23 | Posted by lfthndthrds
But somehow the judge found that she was raped. In the very quote from the judicial opinion that I copy/pasted. As the article notes "US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who presided over the trial, wrote that the trial evidence demonstrated Trump "raped" Carroll in the plain sense of the word."
But I guess we can rely upon Trump's testimony in court to refute that. Oh, what's that? He refused to testify at that trial, like he always refuses to testify at his trials? That's weird. I heard something about people who do that, but I can't remember ...
If you don't think what Trump did to E. Jean Carroll was rape, that's fine. Would be terrible if you or someone you care about is ever "not raped" the same way.
#32 | Posted by censored
Let's clear this up once and for all. The reason the jurors didn't find that Trump raped her is because at the time of Trump's trial rape was defined as being sexual intercourse. That law in NY state has since been changed partly as a result of Trump's case:
New York expands the legal definition of rape to include many forms of nonconsensual sexual contactwww.pbs.org
Jan 30, 2024
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) New York will expand its legal definition of rape to include various forms of nonconsensual sexual contact, under a bill signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul on Tuesday.
The state's current limited definition was a factor in writer E. Jean Carroll's sexual abuse and defamation case against former President Donald Trump. The jury in the federal civil trial rejected the writer's claim last May that Trump had raped her in the 1990s, instead finding the former president responsible for a lesser degree of sexual abuse.
The current law defines rape as ------- penetration by a penis. The new law broadens the definition to include nonconsensual ----, oral, and ------- sexual contact. Highlighting Carroll's case at a bill signing ceremony in Albany, the Democratic governor said the new definition will make it easier for rape victims to bring cases forward to prosecute perpetrators. The law will apply to sexual assaults committed on or after Sept. 1.
"The problem is, rape is very difficult to prosecute," Hochul said. "Physical technicalities confuse jurors and humiliate survivors and create a legal gray area that defendants exploit."
In Carroll's case against Trump, which stemmed from an encounter at a Manhattan luxury department store, the judge later said that the jury's decision was based on "the narrow, technical meaning" of rape in New York penal law and that, in his ----ysis, the verdict did not mean that Carroll "failed to prove that Mr. Trump raped' her as many people commonly understand the word rape.'"
While various states define rape in different ways, every state criminalizes oral, ----, and ------- sexual contact that is nonconsensual, according to Sandi Johnson, a senior legislative policy counsel at Rape, Abuse, & ------ National Network. Prior to its new law, New York defined penetration of the vagina or other bodily orifices with anything other than a penis as "sexual abuse" rather than "rape."
Many other states continue to place unwanted oral or ---- sexual contact in a category other than rape.
I hope that clears up the issue.
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