Trump's Card

[Femme Folle]

https://twitter.com/christinawilkie/status/1034259820386365441

[ursus arctos]

[

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1034209609492426759?s=21

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/s...492426759?s=21

[anton pulisov]

Nothing says melting pot more than having candidates called "Ted Cruz" and "Beto O'Rourke".

[Sporting]

Anyone here from Fort Worth?:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...e-years-prison

[anton pulisov]

I have no words. Besides the ridiculousness of being wiped from the electoral register for tax fraud, what part of "provisional" do these dicks not understand?

Yeah, the Voting Rights Act totally wasn't needed anymore

[WOM]

They understand anything that scares black voters away from the polls. How many blacks will read / hear about this story and steer clear 'just in case'? Unbefuckinglievable.

[anton pulisov]

Totally. If I think there is even a 1% risk that I am going to jail if I show up to vote, then I won't vote.

This is miles away from Sweden, where the government automatically adds you to the electoral register once you turn 18 (or are naturalised), and sends every entitled person the correct ballots in the post, no matter where in the world they might live. And the polling places are open for a couple of weeks, with postal ballots also available for anybody who wants one, no questions asked.

[ursus arctos]

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1034810550025433090

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/...10550025433090

[Ginger Yellow]

Manafort must be pleased.

[WOM]

Does he leave with some shred of professional credibility and dignity? Or in tatters, like all the others?

[ursus arctos]

He will find a home among the right wing think tanks and lobbying firms, if only for his work on judicial nominations.

It isn’t as if he was a Titan of the Bar before this gig.

[ursus arctos]

The governor’s race in Florida is off to a strong start

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1034836353438167040?s=21

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1...438167040?s=21

[ad hoc]

Not sure if this is the right thread but fuck off Giuliani you anti democratic cunt https://www.politico.eu/article/rudy...laus-iohannis/

[ursus arctos]

He's a piece of work

[ursus arctos]

https://twitter.com/JeffreyToobin/status/1034880702058258434

https://twitter.com/JeffreyToobin/st...80702058258434

[ursus arctos]

https://twitter.com/SamanthaJPower/status/1034930962340241408

https://twitter.com/SamanthaJPower/s...30962340241408

The WaPo story is absolutely appalling, if unsurprising.

[Femme Folle]

trump's latest reason for wanting to fire Sessions:

https://twitter.com/grantstern/status/1034965565448900609

[anton pulisov]

This thread is very mystic in my current browser.

[tries in different browser]

[Satchmo Distel]

I don't want to overplay it, but there is an interesting counter-dynamic with the mid terms. Normally, the people who are more reliable votes are the elderly, the wealthy and the educated. These historically have been Republican demographics (educated doesn't seem intuitive until you realise that education is a proxy for parental and inherited wealth in a lot of ways).

But this time out, educated and wealthy might not swing so strongly Republican - the Trumpcores are generally ill educated and poor - which means the usual inherent mid-term advantage of Republicans *might* be diluted. Anything that damages that group of regular voters turnout could have oversized impacts.

Can't really agree with this. The wealthy have been bribed with tax cuts and the voting in 2016, although untypical, still correlated with class to a significant degree. Turnout is just unknowable at this stage but I think elderly racists will show up in large numbers and poor blacks in low ones unless the Dems make extraordinary efforts to help them get registered and transported to the stations.

But I would love to be proved wrong and it is theoretically possible that Trump has pissed off enough people to flip the usual patterns.

[ursus arctos]

A serious get out the vote is absolutely necessary for the Democrats, but I think you seriously over-estimate the impact of tax cuts.

The major beneficiaries of the cuts were a few thousand plutocrats, almost all of whom live in a handful of non-competitive districts (many of them held by Democrats in NYC and California). Given the huge enthusiasm of their donors, the RNC were fully intending to make the cuts the centrepiece of their campaign, but abandoned that when they realised that it wasn't getting any traction at all with the actual electorate.

[Femme Folle]

That reminds me, I need to check my withholdings to make sure I don't get a big surprise at the end of the year. I don't have a lot of time left to make adjustments.

The "tax cuts" are a scam. And a sham.

[Ginger Yellow]

Trump now threatening to pull out of the WTO if he doesn't get his way, and saying the EU is almost as bad as China because its consumers habitually buy European cars, not American cars. Never mind that at least until recently US companies owned some of the biggest brands in Europe (and still do own some), this is an odd basis for a trade war, especially from a president who has given executive orders about buying American.

[ursus arctos]

His long-tenuous grasp on reality is slipping every day

[Sporting]

And now this:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ugee-programme

[ursus arctos]

There are no limits to their depravity.

And Sporting, to answer a question you were asked not to ask elsewhere, my view is that 45's influence on the "United Bid" for the World Cup was entirely negative. Infantino's sycophantic visit to pay hommage was sickening (and more USians should be calling out federation president Cordeiro for enthusiastically participating in the spectacle).