US Politics, December 2022: "They're now the working class party, man."

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xpost ^ A man who has studied many pictures of smiles and spent many hours practicing in the mirror. He's getting there. Baby steps.

And finally, Trump was, you gotta hand it to him, funny. DeSantis is a humorless fanatic.

The best line Trump ever came up with: during the primary, after Jeb! babbles about how Barbara is the kindest, sweetest mother he could've had, Trump hurls back, "Well, she should've run for president then."

A man who has studied many pictures of smiles and spent many hours practicing in the mirror. He's getting there. Baby steps.

In other words, what they call "Ted Cruz Energy".

you have to salute the effort. not easy for a man whose face is a grafted-on 1950s catcher's mitt

badly CGI de-aged Ewan McGregor, based on that last photo

um that's ET

lmao

And finally, Trump was, you gotta hand it to him, funny. DeSantis is a humorless fanatic.

― Lord Pickles (Boring, Maryland), Wednesday, December 14, 2022 7:43 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

ya I think this is kind of a big deal too, the entire GOP is full of dumb assholes which is a broadly unappealing shtick unless you're at least kinda funny. that said man if you watch those 2015 GOP debates and compare them to Trump NOW holy hell has he fallen off

having lived through it I don't think Jesse Ventura's campaign for Minnesota governor is studied enough, there was just a certain weird energy about it (not that is was like Trump politically) but a certain "fuck it i hate all these stuffed shirts" energy that I felt during the first Trump campaign. Jesse wore out his welcome pretty quick as well.

he's not a fascist like Trump but I think his campaign in important in what became the Trump phenomenon. In fact, there's a clip of MN Attorney General Keith Ellison on a Sunday political chat show where he says "I don't know, there's something to this, I lived through Jesse and I think Trump is real" (I'm paraphrasing from memory)...then all the smug talking heads laugh out loud at him.

yeah classic tv moment

theres def something to being an iconoclastic non politician who is good at tv, not too many of those guys out there tho, like dr oz famous tv guy ended up just being a very bad at politics oblivious rich guy

imagine if the pittsburg big boy were good at tv they would elect him president right now

lol I read that too fast as pillsbury dough boy

like dr oz famous tv guy ended up just being a very bad at politics oblivious rich guy

'oblivious rich guy' was also Trump's shtick but he pulled it off because he was so aloof and irreverent in ways you can't be when you call yourself a doctor on TV. Oz mocking Fetterman's health landed with such a thud because he presented himself as a guy who was better than that. as a lot of people have noted the key to understanding all this lies in the world of professional wrestling. hence ums's post. I guess I could see Vince McMahon pulling it off.

Desantis/Sta-Puf Marshmallow Man 2024 xp

'oblivious rich guy' was also Trump's shtick

― frogbs, Wednesday, December 14, 2022 12:19 PM (twenty-three seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

gotta disagree trump is very tuned into the psychotic loser unconscious of the nation and studiously crafted his messaging to appeal to it, its been often observed that he used his rallies as focus groups

another way of reading Trump's media appeal is that he had the brash, punchy, obnoxious loudmouth style of an old-school New York City public figure, without really reading as a "New Yorker" to most Americans. plus he said "you're fired" on TV a lot. so he was well prepared to read as the KIND of "political outsider" people think they want --- someone who cuts through the bullshit, tells it like it is, etc. --- while delivering the ideology of white America's dumbass racist uncle from Florida.

he was famous and good at tv and he roasted the other gop candidates to their faces, then the dems ran a candidate who sucked and everyone hated

after that some other stuff happened lol

it was her turn

that time trump hooped up his throws of paper towels to hurricane victims is how i perceive all of his humor to like, every extent. xp

She didn't suck, she didn't stand a chance for what Trump pulled off thst night, which may not have even happened a day earlier or later and if Comey hadn't helped Trump.

Under those circumstances I don't think FDR would've beaten Trump.

it was her turn

more than that, HRC cannily used every angle to build a facade of inevitability and scare off prospective candidates very early in the race when her competitors should have been laying the groundwork for a national campaign. by the time Bernie exposed her weakness it was too late for a less-hated establishment candidate to get in.

Here we go again

Woo!

2016 was as much of a watershed election as 1980, which was picked over endlessly, too

Also similarly shitty outcome.

HRC could have won with a better campaign that understood Trump's appeal. Whether it's her fault or her peoples' fault — almost certainly both — it's not true that she couldn't have won, she obviously could have. They underestimated and misunderstood Trump. But to be fair so did lots of people, including people who get paid a lot of money to understand politics.

Anyway. Trump in 2015-16 was pretty entertaining, and definitely his experience as a loudmouth TV celebrity was a big part of it. He's not nearly as entertaining any more in all sorts of ways, and neither are any of the other likely GOP contenders. Lightning in a bottle is a hard to come by.

I sometimes daydream about going back in time and assassinating Reagan

hillary sucked in the way only a legacy hire can, she never wouldve made it to the primary if she wasnt a clinton, truly one of the absolute worst at politics people weve ever seen, if you need proof she did lose an election to donald trump

xp - Squeaky Fromme chose the wrong target.

that time trump hooped up his throws of paper towels to hurricane victims is how i perceive all of his humor to like, every extent. xp

― normal AI yankovic (Hunt3r), Wednesday, December 14, 2022 11:51 AM (five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

imo the funniest moment was when he had to do that trick or treating White House event and there was some kid in a Minion costume who had his basket tucked out of view or something. Trump just doesn't know what to do so he just puts the candy on his head. IMO that's kind of what made Trump's whole shtick work - the entire GOP platform is based around this idea that everything is simple and easily solved and you can only pull that off with a candidate who never makes an effort to do anything and instead just constantly falls upward

democrats just accepting the clinton dynasty as cool and normal is yet another data point in a vast constellation of terrible worthlessness

the fever is breaking we all love Fetterman now

btw as long as we're relitigating 2016 I still wanna point out that Hillary "won" by 3,000,000 votes and almost certainly would have won the election if not for Comey putting his thumb on the scale. I agree she was a garbage candidate but it's not like Trump was some unstoppable force. I mean at one point he was down so far in the polls that his own party was urging him to pull out.

Remember when the takeaway for five minutes post-2016 election was "Dems need to start to listen to these very real concerns voters in the Rust Belt have before everyone conceded that many of these voters were also very racist

Trump was never President we all died the night before the election

imo the funniest moment was when he had to do that trick or treating White House event and there was some kid in a Minion costume who had his basket tucked out of view or something. Trump just doesn't know what to do so he just puts the candy on his head.

If it had been a Big Mac, the kid and his head wouldn't have stood a chance

btw as long as we're relitigating 2016 I still wanna point out that Hillary "won" by 3,000,000 votes and almost certainly would have won the election if not for Comey putting his thumb on the scale. I agree she was a garbage candidate but it's not like Trump was some unstoppable force. I mean at one point he was down so far in the polls that his own party was urging him to pull out.

― frogbs, Wednesday, December 14, 2022 1:04 PM (three seconds ago) bookmarkflaglink

trump was a historically unpopular candidate, and just a gross dude, and hillary still found a way to lose to him

Trump was a historically unpopular candidate, and just a gross dude, and Comey still found a way to stan for him.

Remember when the takeaway for five minutes post-2016 election was "Dems need to start to listen to these very real concerns voters in the Rust Belt have before everyone conceded that many of these voters were also very racist

comey was very bad for her for sure but shit happens you know

Alfred, do you want to do a coup in Honduras or something?

Like I think you’re great but the Hillary stanning is just NOT it.

Now? I have a Zoom in 30 mins. Ask me later.

coup brainstorming sesh no doubt

I'm not stanning, I'm repeating what tips and frobgs said.

Plus, it's Wednesday, and I'm passing the time till my critics group settles on Brendan Fraser playing a fat gay man in The Whale.

ask not for what the comey stans. it's not you.