Buttload of Faith: the 2016 Presidential Primary Thread (Pt 2)

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His father answered on the 17th ring. Jeb upset their usual exchange of patrician greetings with a long, tearful monologue about the campaign that wasn’t. Dad listened compassionately before sharing an anecdote from his earliest campaigns that calmed Jeb’s rum-soaked nerves, putting him at ease.

“Thanks, Dad,” Jeb gasped. “That story really placed things into perspective for me. This race is far from over. Thanks for listening, for lending your ear.”

“Anytime, Junior,” Dad chuckled. “And never, ever forget that you’re my favorite son, and I don’t give a damn what anyone says: you were a fantastic president, and you’ll make an even finer chair of the Crawford Arts Council. Give Laura and the girls our love.”

There were voicemails waiting. Danny had a line on a secret War Room. Reince offered a pathetic joke about “the 1 percent,” pealing into maniacal laughter before hanging up. Columba told him she loved him, that she was praying for the campaign. Drudge apologetically withdrew a longstanding interview offer; he’d be breaking bread with Santorum instead. A rookie Politico blogger wondered, earnestly, “What’s it like to be lower than a flaming sack of dogshit?” Jeb fought and overcame the urge to hurl his iPhone into morning traffic. The rabid Doberman he’d have sworn was trailing him for blocks was actually his stomach.

One person shows up to O'Malley event in Iowa, remains uncommitted

lol that was the headline on drudge report today, great photo

saw my first hillary ad tonight (and bernie)

Pataki out

this was the lede on NPR hourly news

kennedy shot
challenger
9/11
pataki out

Was he a democrat or a republican

he's a pro-abortion, climate change-believing Republican

hence 0% in the polls

Some conspiracy theories posit that he just really wanted to make it onto NPR news, one more time

saw my first Trump bumpersticker in LA yesterday. It looked homemade.

Trump is not into spending money on that shit. Same with opening campaign offices in every state and hiring staffers for them to help run his campaign.

right? It looked like it came out of a laser printer - plain san serif blue text on a white background that just said TRUMP in large type and "make America great again" in smaller type beneath it.

TURMP
"Descent is the highest form of patriotic"

TRUMP
"we've seen him on television"

MSNBC had a thing on about Rubio yesterday questioning whether he's really campaigning very hard. Like, apparently hasn't really spent that much time in Iowa or New Hampshire?

Yeah, http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2015/12/the-rubio-perplex / quoting gawker

"...it’s more or less what a political scientist and a veteran campaign strategist would collaboratively design as a hypothetical worst-practices presidential campaign strategy."

he's a lazy fuckwit and always was. I never understood the GOP's Obama comparisons a few years ago unless they meant, "Now we have someone who's as ignorant, indifferent to work, and mealymouthed as we think Obama is."

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/larison/rubios-weirdly-lazy-campaign-for-president/

TRUMP
"outta my way loser!"

I like that in addition to being lazy at campaigning he's using the aforementioned shitty campaign as an excuse to not vote in the senate.

I get that there isn't necessarily a one-to-one relationship between the two, but I have to wonder what supporters think a candidate's putative presidency is going to be like if the campaign for the nomination is half-assed and perfunctory.

There are different flavors of laziness. There's "I don't actually give a shit about this, and anyways I don't know what I'm doing" laziness.

There's "I sincerely want to be president and believe I can govern well, but this dirty sordid business of campaigning, especially retail politics, is beneath me" laziness.

Maybe I'm giving him too much credit, but Rubio's laziness may have been a stratagem, more like "I'll just tread water over here while the front-runners hog the spotlight and themselves out."

That is, let Trump, Cruz, and Carson destroy one another with dick-measuring antics now, when nothing's real. Then when the dust settles from all that, disgusted voters will be looking around for an unsullied fresh face, and I'll be there smilingly saying "Hi guys, remember me?"

All that said, he cannot get the votes of the torches-and-pitchforks brigade because he is an apostate on immigration, which is the new abortion.

it worked well for President Giuliani.

his campaign laziness seems consistent with his prior laziness

oh rubiopaws: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/how-marco-rubio-helped-his-ex-con-relative-get-a-real-estate-license/2015/12/30/a1d96816-ae7f-11e5-9ab0-884d1cc4b33e_story.html

didn't have my phone w/ me to take a pic but ladies and gentlemen i saw a lindsey graham for president bumper sticker today

which can only mean of course that lindsey graham was in my neighborhood today

I have seen one possibly two Carson decals in Portland.

It felt akin to seeing a lone Fred Thompson yard sign 8 years ago.

i wonder if the coming Cosby trial will knock the election to the #2 story on Facebook next year

i've seen several carson stickers, more and more cruz, and a few trump. i've seen one rubio. none of these i've seen w/ the frequency of bernie stickers (which is largely a result of where i live) or hillary stickers (which isn't). the hillary arrows i've seen have been college students pretty much (obv a lot of the bernie stickers as well). it may just be the binary nature of that race though that's fostering those commitments so to speak, if you view that race as largely a referendum on hillary clinton, whereas a person w/ a cruz sticker isn't necessarily communicating 'fuuuuuck trump'. that that race is still relatively wide open mean ppl might be taking a wait and see before letting their freak flag fly (maybe learning from past experience, a coworker of mine had a cain bumper sticker only to remove it when he flamed out, replacing it w/ a perry sticker only to remove that as well when perry flamed out; he waited til romney had the nomination pretty safely in the bag before he committed himself again). i'm sure if say cruz wins the nomination i'll see those freedom fire stickers out in force.

I've seen a lot of Trump interviews this year. I think a lot of people have it backwards about what makes him scary. It's not when he rants or fulminates or drops beyond-the-pale comments. If he did that full-time, I think he'd guarantee that Republican voters who are hedging would eventually back away--maybe he'd even wear out his welcome (eventually) with some of his core supporters. It's more when he quiets down in interviews. He knows how to pull back. I know this sounds bizarre, but he can even come across as self-effacing--he can very artfully drop that in for a few seconds when he chooses to. He does crazy-man stuff during the week to keep the networks 100% focused on him, then he calls in on the weekend, the Red Sea parts, and does a much more affable "Wow, my people tell me we're doing really well--this is all new and exciting to me" routine.

A couple years ago I saw someone with a McCain/Palin sticker that they'd modified to remove the Mc.

Cain/Abel

Cain/Abel: Right for 4000 BC, Right for 2016.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/12/can-trump-clinton-scandal-revival-hurt-hillary.html

a writer in slate said, and i agree, that sure it's "fair game" but who exactly is going to be convinced not to vote for hillary based on bill's extramarital relationships?

How is she supposed to control a country when she couldn't even control her man?!?!

If she becomes president, The U.S. might sleep with Canada when she's out of town.

And also sneak a back-alley BJ from Mexico during Cabinet meetings.

my parents, who are about hilary's age, are convinced she'll only serve one term, intentionally. think that would be an interesting precedent to set. does this seem like something that might happen? i hadn't seen the idea bandied about anywhere else. i think they're partially projecting what they'd do in the situation but in any case...

Polk also promised to serve one term. Hayes too iirc.

Well, you can't run again after you've been convicted of a felony </CRUZ2020>

maybe she wouldn't pledge it around her inaugural. they could just vet the hell out of her VP and set them up advantageously for the race via her announcement. a 12 year hilary administration in other words

i dunno i don't really know what i'm talking about but it's fun to speculate on

i think they're partially projecting what they'd do in the situation

it's this, sorry :-/

yeah

no way in hell a good politician would pledge to one term before election -- what leverage would this person have?

But HRC has never been a good politician though.

Opposition congress / senate would paint an executive claiming they'd only serve one term as a lame duck from the get-go and start running against her vp for 2020 on day one, it's a non-starter of an idea

also lol at the idea that clinton wouldn't hold power as long as legally possible

Unless...Chelsea Clinton for VP???