Donald Trump: Classic or Dud?

Did Paul Ryan kill Fox News?

Who are we to speak of apophasis?

His screeds are so unintelligible, his appeal must be getting more "selective" by this point, surely?

meatball

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FpWCG2UXwAE4SXO?format=jpg&name=small

hes going to war god bless

disasters ALL

it's gonna be a Trump-DeSantis ticket

Spaghetti (brain) & Meatball

Club for NO Growth, good one

"Ron DeSanctimonious"

I'll give that Christgau's stoic emoji (which I don't think I can cut-and-paste here): "may impress once or twice with consistent craft or an arresting track or two. Then it won't."

To the tune of Transformers

DeSantis
RINO in disguise
DeSantis
Less than meets the eyes

a dissenting opinion

i’m telling y’all, desanctimonious is a kill shot for republican primary voters. trump is taking the “me or it all burns” approach. https://t.co/xO99XSHYHb

— depressed knick fan/sami zayn lookalike (@will_crist) February 19, 2023

It all burns regardless

title for the eventual primary thread

If Trump doesn’t get the nomination I expect an insurrection at the GOP convention

that would be cool (if no one dies) but if he doesn't get the nomination i expect that will be because he completely fucks up somehow or everyone is just exhausted with him.

at this point, partly due to the winner takes all form of the gop primaries, he still seems like the frontrunner because he can "win" individual states by picking up the 30-35% of his zombie horde and then let all the other people he's making fun of split the rest of the vote

He’s only in trouble if it’s him and Ron, one on one, maga a maga

and even then, as many people in FL have pointed out, ron desantis is just a massively unlikable dickhead. so is trump, but he's more performatively cruel. desantis' cruelty comes in the forms of policies and stunts that he only tepidly brags about. trump is just a massive loud cruel asshole - gop primary voters eat that shit up.

i think the big battle is whether the white evangelical leaders will throw their weight behind desantis or trump. if they somehow go for desantis, maybe trump is in trouble. but white evangelical leaders are the most heartless cruel fuckers of the century, so i expect they'll side with trump again

i think desantis would actually be "better" for white evangelicals overall, in terms of suppressing and even punishing non-christians. but trump is more liable to just pay the leaders off by channeling money to them in various ways. it's gonna be a battle

the party elites backing desantis in order to get rid of trump obviously just plays into his hands, tho not as much as supporting him would, tough times for the party elites

i do think it's funny how trump is taking this opportunity, right after all the post-SOTU fuss with republicans pretending they don't want to cut the safety net, that ron desantis wants to cut the safety net

Another vote here for an insurrection at the GOP convention. With maybe a bit of light hostage taking just to show they're serious about it. This would help sharpen the contradictions as the saying goes.

This would be especially helpful for all the down ballot GOP candidates who'd have to publicly declare whose side they're on before the general election in November, thereby ensuring their abandonment by a large chunk of GOP voters who vehemently disagree with their choice. Win-win!

I e joy a good dumpster fire as much as, uh, the next dumpster fire fan. (With the eternal caveat that I also enjoyed 2016, thinking it would go exactly that badly for GOPenises, except that it kinda didn't.)

Also I want to create a music called Dumpster Fyre Festival but I know I'd never be able to do that because it's a trademark

When it comes down to it Trump v. DeSantis is a replay of Trump v. Cruz. Cruz was much more palatable with religious leaders and was popular with tea party types, but he was unlikable and the voters went with the big dog.

maga a maga
*polite applause*

also, if i had to watch a victim of intra-faction violence burn (and painfully), trump or cruz, i'd actually enjoy cruz more. i can think of at least one reason. but who and what reasons are yours, lol? fwiw i'm not sure i'd even care about desantis. should i change that position? should i really enjoy his imagined destruction more?

Yeah maga a maga is very good

I don't want a goddamn dumpster fire. Stop it.

I want them both to die.

Don't make me choose

Any kind of "horserace" encouragement is evil and I'm gonna call it out. Whoever wins the nomination will have earned it for being more hateful, malevolent, and fascist than any candidate in a putative democracy.

Kids will die because of this nominee

da ghost of morbs

y'all, i regret that self-satifying last post of mine. actually sorry. i try to be better, and at the very least, i try to stfu if that's impossible. failed there. stay well and remember soto's post, it's real.

No apologies necessary. The horse race is addictive. But Neanderthal and I live in Florida, and this shit's real.

name a potential republican candidate who won't lead to dead kids

that's my point

i just remembered john huntsman

he liked Yes!

wait - i don't know this reference. remind me please!

xxxp, yes; i'm agreeing with you.

Point taken, Alfred, I will govern myself accordingly

I want them both to die.

all three, surely?

tbc I'm not gonna police the thread, and as 2024 approaches it's inevitable that we/I turn our/my attention to the horse race; but when we turn to who's-up/who's-down in the Chuck Todd manner, devoid of morality, my stomach turns.

I think, at this point, we’re worrying about which of these chuds we will be up against in 2024. It’s telling that the press is largely giving DeSantis a pass on his horrible actions mainly because they don’t want Trump as the nominee again.

I am not exactly breaking new ground here, but he is clearly mentally ill, possibly as a result of, or made worse by, extended drug use.

xp Are they though? From my vantage point in Minnesota, Florida is the state whose politics I’ve seen the most coverage of in the last few years. Way beyond the former champ, Texas.

And, to be fair to Florida journalism, our local papers have extensively covered -- editorialized about -- DeSantis' horrors

I feel like the coverage I see is a lot about political positioning

centrist dem pundit class not really caring about book banning is i guess not surprising but upsetting none the less particularly considering their enthusiastic coverage of the politics of higher education

Ron DeSantis Is Not Scott Walker

His support among Republicans at this early stage of the primary cycle puts him in rare company.

By Nate Cohn
Published Feb. 13, 2023
Updated Feb. 15, 2023