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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Kamala Harris has picked up two endorsements from the Congressional Black Caucus in the past 24 hours.
NPR mentioned this, and were kind of perplexed that Harris was the one to pick up endorsements when Booker was the one who went all out on Biden. They chalked it up to Harris being much higher in the polls than Booker.
They also noted that in South Carolina at least, Biden's black primary supporters didn't seem overly concerned about what he said.
Warren's bounce is really interesting when, according to people close to Sanders, he got back into the race because Warren's bad roll out made him afraid that she couldn't win the nomination and nobody would carry the progressive movement forward. Now he's having to genuinely compete with her for those voters, while trying to expand his own base. I believe that's what his socialism speech was aiming to do last week, bring in people who were concerned about his democratic socialism by tying it to the progressive heyday of the New Deal.
Pod Save America talked about how surprised they were that Bernie - or more likely a staffer - took a shot at Warren like that on Twitter, but determined that the intent was more to attack those centrists "establishment" types that Bernie has always picked fights with. The "Anyone But Bernie" people, essentially, but it was sloppily handled.
They did feel it spoke to an issue with Bernie's campaign that attacking the establishment was a core of his last run, and now they're again "lashing about, looking for some an establishment grievance" to make their case against. That's leading to some weird situations where Bernie's speechwriter is getting into Twitter fights with Democratic think tanks and Nate Silver of all people.
The Pod hosts also speculated what would have happened to them if they did the same in '08 when working for Obama.
Dan Pfeiffer: "I mean - you would not have been the speech writer. Plouffe would have just shoo'd you out of the building carrying a shoebox with your possessions if he didn't just murder you on the spot."
But you know, at the end of the day Warren and Sanders are friends. If Sanders does lose to Warren, I don't think he'll mind that much.
Edited by Parable on Jun 25th 2019 at 6:48:27 AM
RE: Mueller testimony - as I mentioned back when he made the public announcement regarding his report, I have to wonder whether the Committee will actually be able to get him to commit any more strongly than he has already. He seemed to make it pretty clear that he would be True Neutral when it comes to the question of whether Trump should be impeached - as in, he'd just say "You read the report - that's up to Congress to determine, not me."
"Why would I inflict myself on somebody else?"![]()
Nothing can mess up a friendship like competing with each other. Especially with the stakes being so high.
That's the big problem with Sanders. He's a natural rebel who needs to stick it to The Man. But he's now in a situation where he doesn't have a convenient target for that.
And Sanders honestly doesn't strike me as someone who would take losing gracefully. Don't forget how long he remained in the primaries race even after it was actually impossible for him to win.
This is a big part of why I want him out asap. Don't let him waste everyone's time again.
Edited by M84 on Jun 25th 2019 at 10:05:37 PM
Disgusted, but not surprisedhttps://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/2019/06/25/day-887/
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/she-s-not-my-type-trump-says-e-jean-carroll-n1021331
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/21/trump-dismisses-new-sexual-assault-allegation-1376698
2/ The New York Post's former top editor deleted a story about E. Jean Carroll's rape allegations against Trump. Col Allan, a Trump supporter and top Rupert Murdoch lieutenant, ordered the story to be scrubbed from the website on Friday, as well a wire story by the Associated Press. Allan returned to the paper in early 2019, reportedly in an effort to make the paper even more friendly to Trump. (CNN / New York Daily News)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/24/media/new-york-post-col-allan-trump/index.html
3/ Congress is trying to pass a $4.5 billion in emergency humanitarian aid to the southwestern border while putting restrictions on Trump's immigration policies. In the Senate, Republicans and Democrats approved a $4.6 billion border aid package last week that contained some limitations to prevent the administration from using the resources for enforcement. The House bill allocates $4.5 billion, but goes further in placing restrictions on the money. Democrats in the House, however, are still concerned that any money they approve will be directed by the Trump administration to advance Trump's immigration policies. The Trump administration, meanwhile, threatened to veto the House measure, claiming it "does not provide adequate funding to meet the current crisis" and "contains partisan provisions designed to hamstring the administration's border enforcement efforts." (New York Times / Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-aid-idUSKCN1TQ1WR
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/24/us/politics/house-senate-border-spending-bills.html
4/ Customs and Border Protection returned more than 100 children back to a troubled Border Patrol station that independent monitors called conditions "unconscionable." Officials said the children were returned to the Clint, Tex. station due to a lack of bed space in U.S. shelters designed for children. Lawyers who visited recently the Clint station said hundreds of minor detainees had been housed for weeks without access to showers, clean clothing, or sufficient food. (Washington Post / CNN)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/25/politics/clint-texas-children/index.html
Border Patrol is rejecting donations of toys, soap, toothbrushes, diapers and medicine for children held in "horrendous," overcrowded facilities. Under the Antideficiency Act, the government can't spend any money or accept any donations other than what Congress has allocated to it. (Texas Tribune / Washington Post / Slate)
https://www.texastribune.org/2019/06/24/texas-border-facility-donations-turned-away/
📌 Day 886: The Trump administration moved most of the children from a remote Border Patrol station in Texas following reports that more than 300 children were detained there with inadequate food, water and sanitation. (Associated Press / New York Times)
https://apnews.com/a7a9acc4c6a546829a258e008d10d705
📌 Day 834: John Kelly joined the board of a company that operates the largest facility for unaccompanied migrant children. Caliburn International is the parent company of Comprehensive Health Services, which operates Homestead and three other shelters for unaccompanied migrant children in Texas. Prior to joining the Trump administration, Kelly had been on the board of advisors of DC Capital Partners, an investment firm that now owns Caliburn. (CBS News)
5/ The Customs and Border Protection agency's acting commissioner will resign in the coming weeks amid an increase in the number of undocumented migrants crossing the border and the fight over how to address it. John Sanders assumed the role after Kevin Mc Aleenan replaced Kirstjen Nielsen as homeland security secretary this spring. (New York Times / CNN / Reuters)
6/ Trump declined to say if he has confidence in FBI Director Christopher Wray. When asked about his level of confidence in Wray, Trump replied: "Well, we'll see how it turns out." Trump added that he disagrees with the FBI director, who previously said he does not believe the bureau "spied" on Trump's 2016 campaign. (The Hill / CNN / Axios)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/24/politics/trump-chris-wray-confidence/index.html
📌 Day 838: FBI Director Christopher Wray said he would not call the 2016 investigation into Trump's campaign advisers "spying." When asked during a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing if he had "any evidence that any illegal surveillance" into the Trump 2016 campaign occurred, Wray told lawmakers that "I don't think I personally have any evidence of that sort." Wray's comments are in contrast to those made by Attorney General William Barr at a Senate hearing on April 10th, where he claimed that "spying did occur, yes," calling it "a big deal." The Justice Department inspector general is expected to issue a report in the next month or two about the origins of the FBI investigation into the Trump campaign. Wray asked lawmakers to wait for the report. (Washington Post / NBC News / CNN)
7/ Trump is privately considering withdrawing from a defense treaty with Japan. Trump claimed the pact is too one-sided, because it guarantees U.S. aid if Japan is ever attacked, but doesn't require Japan's military to do the same for America. The treaty was signed more than 60 years ago and constitutes the foundation of the post-war alliance between the two countries after World War II. (Bloomberg)
8/ Iran called Trump's White House "mentally retarded" and promised that Iran wouldn't be intimidated by new, "fruitless sanctions." Iran's Foreign Ministry also said Trump's leadership would lead to "the permanent closure of the road of diplomacy" between the two countries and that Iran would take new steps to reduce its commitments under the nuclear deal with world powers on July 7th. Trump meanwhile, threatened that any attack by Iran would be answered with "great and overwhelming force" and in some cases, "overwhelming will mean obliteration." (New York Times / Politico / Bloomberg / NBC News / The Independent / Washington Post)
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/iran-says-new-sanctions-mean-end-diplomacy-n1021311
9/ Trump claimed he has the authority to initiate a military strike against Iran without congressional approval, but said he likes "the idea of keeping Congress abreast." Speaker Nancy Pelosi asserted that Trump would need congressional approval for any "hostilities" against Iran. Jim Inhofe, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, however, believes that Trump's authority to take military action against Iran falls within his executive power, but outside the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force. (The Hill / CNN)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/24/politics/trump-congressional-approval-iran/index.html
poll/ 65% of voters support Trump's decision to call off the planned military strike against Iran. 14% opposed the decision. Only 36% of voters support U.S. military actions against Iran in response to the downed surveillance drone. 42% oppose military action against Iran, while 22% say they have no opinion. (Politico)
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/25/trump-iran-poll-1378852
The Commerce Department ordered a former official not to answer questions from the House Oversight and Reform Committee about the Trump administration's decision to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census. Commerce Department lawyers instructed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross' senior adviser and counsel, James Uthmeier, not to answer the committee's questions about his contacts with the White House or his conversations with Ross regarding the citizenship question. (Washington Post / Politico)
The House Oversight and Reform Committee called on the House to hold Attorney General William Barr and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in contempt for defying congressional subpoenas related to whether the administration was seeking to discriminate against certain groups by adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census. (Reuters)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-congress-census-idUSKCN1TQ16P
Trump has been frequently snapping at Mick Mulvaney and expressing more frustration with him than usual, revealing a slow deterioration of their relationship. Trump has recently asked people what kind of leadership and value they think Mulvaney is adding. Trump, however, is unlikely to replace his acting chief of staff – his third chief of staff in less than two-and-a-half years – anytime soon. (Politico)
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/25/trump-mick-mulvaney-white-house-1379594
The Treasury Department's inspector general will open an investigation into why Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin delayed the new $20 bill featuring Harriet Tubman. The Trump administration has denied that it delayed the release of the bill. Trump, however, has publicly lamented the idea of replacing Andrew Jackson. (New York Times / Washington Post)
The White House directed Kellyanne Conway to reject a request to testify before the House Oversight Committee about her repeated violations of the Hatch Act, a federal ethics law that bars government officials from engaging in political activities at work. (New York Times / Washington Post)
A federal judge ruled that the Democrats' emoluments lawsuit against Trump can proceed. District Judge Emmet Sullivan said discovery could begin Friday, and Democrats are expected seek financial information, interviews and other records from Trump and the Trump Organization. The Trump administration can still try to delay or block Democrats from issuing subpoenas by appealing directly to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to intervene. (Washington Post)
Just fuck.
Fuck.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.On related news, we have a father and daughter drowning to death while attempting to cross to the US from Mexico's own migrant camps
.
The article explains how this had came to pass (namely due to something called "metering", a limit on how mnay asylum seekers are allowed) and how this is the result of Trump's nativist stance on immigration. But then again, its not like his unwillingness to succor anyone that isn't White isn't already apparent.
Edited by MorningStar1337 on Jun 25th 2019 at 8:01:03 AM
One black online associate of mine, anecdotal as it may be, said that people who don't understand why black voters go for Biden are missing that most black voters are entirely used to voting for white politicians with questionable pasts as the lesser of two evils. They're not so much voting for Biden as not persuaded by anyone else's chances and against Trump.
They've chosen him as a known quantity and prefer that right now than a lot of promises by other candidates.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jun 25th 2019 at 11:30:21 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.That's been brought up before. That whole scandal with the Governor of Virginia that had people up in arms here, was apparently mostly brushed off by black people in Virginia apparently because things like that are expected.
Which is obviously sad in it's own way. Though I always do have to wonder how much we factor in people's poor pasts into judging who they are now, or how they behave.
Although with Biden it seems less about the history itself, and more the fact he went with the anecdote he did instead of better ones he probably could have used.
![]()
Black people are shrewd voters. They've spent too long hoping and fighting for a shred of progress to let perfect be the enemy of the good, and Biden would be an improvement over the status quo, even if he's something of a personification of the bare minimum.
Though I expect there's a lot of generational and regional granularity that any statement of the demographic is missing.
Edited by CrimsonZephyr on Jun 25th 2019 at 2:27:39 PM
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."Isn't it older black voters, specifically, for Biden. I think that age factor has been pointed out her fairly often.
I think a similar thing happened with Clinton vs. Sanders, with the old black people going for Clinton, and the young going for Sanders. If I'm remembering right, that same divide also existed between older and younger Democratic leaning women.
Edited by LSBK on Jun 25th 2019 at 1:33:01 PM
A personal anecdote, during a feminist theory class I was taking in the aftermath of the 2016 election, I recall one girl saying she was at odds with basically all of her female friends in the fact that she was for Hillary over Bernie basically from the beginning.
She thought Hillary was too hawkish foreign-policy wise, but preferred her to Bernie on basically everything else.
Really, that whole class was interesting, listening to different opinions of Hillary and comparing the demographics.
Edited by LSBK on Jun 25th 2019 at 1:40:03 PM
With the Warren student loan plan, I actually have a concern that she's failing to address professional student loan debt.
Professionals make above-average salaries, but they also carry a ridiculous amount of student loans. Because professional degrees are priced for the highest salaries a degreeholder can earn, they price out careers like general practitioner (medicine) and public defender (law) that are necessary for the functioning of the system but don't earn salaries that would justify $200,000 degrees. If Warren is going to focus her debt relief program on the middle class' past, I'd want her to also have a program for the professional class going forward.
One of the things that people examined in hindsight is the fact that women are not inclined to vote as a block the way blacks or other groups necessarily are. White Upper class women are more likely to vote, say, upper class white than woman. Ditto poor, religious, and so on.
I don't think Hillary was a flawed candidate but her loss struck people harder than it would have normally because a lot of people walked into it fully confidant and thus viewed it as a complete upset.
And why not? Trump is an embarrassment.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.Re: Student Loan Debt
There's no reason not to eliminate all 1.3 trillion dollars of government owned student loan debt. It would achieve the results a government program to stimulate the economy would by massively freeing up a educated workforce from crippling debt.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.Age is a major factor, but Nate Silver put out a breakdown of that that was posted here a while back then ignored for the most part, its not so much that the age brackets have different stances or desires here.... its that the older candidates have had the experience of watching there preferred less moderate candidate getting beaten down when the election goes from the primaries to the general election....
And they are not willing to repeat that same mistake agian, leading too.
Because less moderate candidates do a very good job of motivating the base... the other base, to vote AGAINST them.
Edited by Imca on Jun 25th 2019 at 11:56:10 AM
Its a rather horrific political strategy:
"Old white guy makes Trumpeteers less inclined to go out and vote because they don't fear the brown horde."
It's like they want a repeat of what's happened with the NRA.
They're suffering bankruptcy because no one is afraid of Trump taking their guns.
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.Horrific but shrewd.
Its easy to forget that as much as we hate Trump, the right hates candidates like Warren and people like AoC just as much, so they would push just as hard agianst then.... paired that with the fact that they make up nearly half of the voter base.... and most of peoples news intake.
And it is easy to see why they have witnessed that in the past, and aren't willing to repeat it.... people tend to change from events that are traumatic... and I would really hope that "The public elects a canidate that campaigns on taking your rights away" can be seen as to why that would be traumatic.
Edited by Imca on Jun 26th 2019 at 12:03:55 PM
Because that's not how it works.
A lot of people are interested in getting rid of Trump first and foremost, I've linked to such polls in this thread. These people are going to vote irrespective of whether the candidate is Biden or someone else. See all the people in this thread who have said they don't like Biden/Sanders/Buttigieg/>whoever> but said that they still would vote for them over Trump.
I think it's worth differentiating between a presidential election and a midterm election because a) the "you must nominate liberal/conservative candidates to turn your base out" narrative got coined in the context of midterms and b) a presidential election has a much higher turnout by default and the "hate this guy" factor is amplified there.
Edited by SeptimusHeap on Jun 26th 2019 at 9:04:29 PM
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanTangentially-related anecdote: I can still remember local publications (or something, the memory isn't that clear) saying that progressives beat the establishment in Maryland after the midterms ended, but when I saw the results, most of the Democrats seeking re-election held onto their seats.
I'm still not sure what to make of that.
Edited by PhysicalStamina on Jun 26th 2019 at 7:19:53 AM
i'm tired, my friend538 did an article on this last year.
A sign your local publications need better staff.
Edited by M84 on Jun 26th 2019 at 7:22:40 PM
Disgusted, but not surprised

Speaking of subpoenas (which reminded me of the threats of being held in contempt of Congress for refusing to obey them)... How many things have the Congressional Democrats threatened to hold people in contempt of Congress over, and what's the sitch on each of them? I remember it all started with Barr's refusal to hand over the unredacted Mueller report.
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.