I like the column but question the premise. What are we supposed to act like? Run around yelling, "Threat to democracy!" Seems people are doing that. But mostly the problem is the solution. What is it? It is far from clear that there is some other Democrat that is a sure bet and so Biden may have the best chance of any Democrat. So what do you do? How stupid would you feel if you pushed Biden aside and then the unknown candidate at that stage loses the election? There's a lot of helplessness and uncertainty.
It seems like the messaging is not very good though. Obviously the media who are more interested in 'both sides' than actually doing any reporting are no help, and are just making things worse, but you can't expect someone else to do your work for you.
Hyperbolic statements (like 'threat to democracy') are counterproductive. People tune them out, and Republicans just say the same thing back. What is needed are specifics. For example, abortion is the issue I know best, and what's most effective are real stories of real women and exactly what's happened to them, not abstracts. Similarly, Democrats would be advised to - calmly - give detailed descriptions of the things that Republicans are planning, and the scenarios that would unfold, instead of running around saying the sky is falling.
But that might be too hard for them. If it is, then they fail us, Republicans get their regime, and the old Democratic party gets replaced by whatever ends up becoming the most effective opposition to the regime. 🤷
I think you hit the nail on the head about hyperbolic statements. I am pretty dismayed about the potential for Trump being the next president (although I am also dismayed, not as much but still dismayed, that Biden is the alternative). I think this ties back to the hyperbole though.
First, we had COVID, I am by no means a denier (I'm vaccinated with most of the boosters), but it was hyped as the next bubonic plague. Again, it was really bad, but not so much worse than the flu pandemics of 56 or 68. While that was going on we had the George Floyd protests, along with the great Blue Scare about the horrors of policing (until things went crazy and most everyone realized that was a bad idea). During all of this we were told society ends in 12 years unless we take dramatic climate action (to the tune of several percentage points of global GDP annually if we want to remedy it). Again, climate change is bad...I have solar panels and only drive about 5k miles a year...so I am down with reducing carbon emissions. But it is not an existential threat. Sorry, it just isn't...it will be really bad, particularly for places like Bangladesh, but in developed nations it will be expensive and unpleasant.
Finally, we have Trump...we hear repeatedly about how he will destroy democracy. In fact, the DNC was so concerned they spent $50 million helping his supporters defeat more moderate Republicans. Then then entire democratic house votes repeatedly with the nuttiest of the nutty Trumpists. I get that the Dems don't have to help the Reps run the house...but don't act like that then try to sell people on threats to democracy...Clearly they don't believe them...if they did they might do thing like...ohh I don't know...prevent Trumps supports from getting elected or winning political battles. Honestly, if Trump was that big a threat the opposition party should have grabbed the absolutely most conservative Dem (or even a moderate Rep like Larry Hogan) and run them. I mean, if we are really talking about a threat to democracy, it would justify playing to electorate. Just a thought.
Long story short...Trump is authoritarian and a complete narcissist. In my opinion his language around females and groping them caused me to believe he was unfit back when he was running in 2016. He may even be a threat to democracy, it's just tough to tell anymore because everything, all the time, is an existential threat.
Finally, I am not saying the Reps are any better....they get crazy over their own issues (can you say Ukraine)....it's just that in the case of Trump I think all the Chicken Little Sky is falling rhetoric that has become common place over the last decade is making it difficult to sell the Trump threat.
I think both main parties have gotten stuck on mobilizing their base and decided that making things existential is the best way to do it. For those not closely aligned with either party, it becomes difficult to judge the actual threat presented by any of these problems.
I agree. I'm more or less on team Democrat on issues-- climate, lgbtq, covid, taxes, income, racism, policing, health care, abortion... but every single one of them also feels overhyped. Maybe it's the internet pushing people towards extremes. Or maybe it's reactive partisanship (the Republicans are also overhyped). Or maybe it's just how you get out the vote? I don't know.
That said, I -am- particularly concerned about Trump, and the Cult of Trump, coming to power again. Like, here he is with 4 felony trials ahead of him, 2 concerning his attempts to undermine Democracy itself, and we're like-- oh why not just make him prez again? Yes, he did only do so much damage last time, but how much of that was luck? And how resilient are we now?
It strikes me as a serious risk. A big moment in our history as nation. The partisanship he represents and the straight-up damage he can do as Commander and Chief is scary. Meanwhile, all the other progressive stuff just feels vaguely nice-to-have things. And I wish Democrats would stop screaming so much about them.
Well...it is real and very serious. It'll make the world quite a lot worse. There's even the tail risk of methane feedback loops and worse warming than we're expecting.
But the "12 years to net zero or the world ends" thing really was quite influential for a while. People regularly act like we're all literally going to die and quite soon. You can find plenty of climate scientists who'll say otherwise; here's one: https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1533875297220587520
It's a tribute to how intense the doomerism is that -- even with climate change as bad as it really is and will be -- people still need to get a grip
I believe Climate Change is a manmade catastrophe that we are tossing onto our children and grandchildren. I'd call ot overhyped when people make it into doomsday. I'd also add that it's a whole lot harder to slow down than simply picking the next president.
Totally agree - I come from the conservative side, and, under no scenario, will vote for Biden - but also prefer to not vote for Trump - why I think there is a real third-party opportunity here and am presently involved with no labels - if nothing else, we need to send a shock through the system, I think, as those of us in the middle are increasingly adversely impacted and put at risk by both sides, most of whom, in my view, are primarily motivated by securing or maintaining power at any cost.
While I get you come from the conservative side and "would prefer not to vote for Trump", you don't really see him as a threat to democracy if you would begrudgingly put Trump into the White House again by not voting for (probable) one person who can actually defeat him.
That said - I think you're statement does correlate more to the fact that something like No Labels is going to pilfer off more conservative voters who might vote for Trump rather than centrists who would vote for Biden.
I follow the data closely, and, so far, it indicates a credible third-party ticket would likely pull equally from both sides - that said, I think the greater threat to democracy is the all out assault on no labels by the Democrats in multiple jurisdictions (as this is written, the Delaware Secretary of State is trying to remove no labels from the ballot, even though we clearly qualify for inclusion - just one of many actions the organization is being forced to fight).
I wish third party voters would instead focus on voting reform (eg. rank choice, open primaries, etc.) Third parties will never have any power without them and almost exclusively serve to sabotage to their own causes. They tent to be a "protest vote", but the parties themselves do not care about "protests" anymore than other non-voters.
Threat to democracy = convincing without any proof the majority of Republicans that the election was "stolen", while simultaneously preparing a slate of fake electors to cheat the electoral college.
I'm not saying it isn't so; I'm just saying the messaging strategy isn't working (at least not yet), since Trump leads in the polls, so I would recommend Democrats make adjustments, since their (and all of our) survival is on the line.
Dems have creaky communications strategy. Loathsome though T’ ads are, they own the headlines. Not saying our team should be loaded with crazy and hate, but c’mon! Campaigning like it’s 1965 isn’t going to get anyone under the age of 65. Where are Biden’s surrogates??? Please do not deploy John Kerry etc. Kamala is a terrific person but terrible communicator and campaigner. (She is whiney and nasal and not convincing).
We need help and it should have started 3 years ago
You don't understand. Had Trump been re-elected, you would not be whining, alongside Harris, for help - even assuming that you moved to New Zealand to live next door to Ruth Bader Ginsburg or to Canada to join the throngs of grossly over-privileged entertainers from the hills of Los Angeles and environs.
I have no clue what you are trying to say. Do you think Justice Ginsburg is alive in New Zealand? Thanks for assuming that I am “hanging with grossly over-privileged entertainers from the hills of Los Angeles
The simple solution, which Biden and the Democrats will not go for, is to do what Ruy Teixeira has been telling them to do for years now: abandon their deeply unpopular policies of racism and transgenderism.
But the Democrats are just as much ideological totalitarians at heart as the Republicans, so they won't do that.
Biden, Harris, and EVERY Democrat in Congress (yes, even Joe Manchin) supports the Equality Act, which would allow any man to enter any women's space, place, event, competition, whatever, at will, and make it a violation of federal law to stop him.
Biden condemned the SCOTUS decision banning anti-asian racism in college admissions. I am not aware of any Democrat in Congress who is on record as supporting the decision. Yet in California in the 2020 presidential election, while Biden beat Trump 2-to-1, an "affirmative action" initiative on the same ballot lost, 57% to 43%.
Voters hate the Democrats' racism. Even a substantial proportion of Black voters hate it. Read Teixeira.
Folks make plans for potential natural disasters. My hometown is at the base of a giant volcano and everyone knows what to do when it erupts. If geologists started saying that an eruption was increasingly likely in the next few months, I would expect folks in the lahar zone to start planning and reserving accommodations while they evacuated, or folks who plan to stay to stock up on critical supplies. Maybe others would decide that now's the time to move permanently away.
A lahar is a slow moving natural disaster, both because the event itself usually leaves enough time for folks to respond and because it's almost always broadcast with a high degree of confidence months in advance by professionals who monitor the volcano. In other words, it's exactly like this potentail political disaster.
So yes, it's shocking to see how few folks are preparing for what a second Trump presidency would entail. Now to be clear, I'm not apocalyptic about this. The vast majority of people will continue to live happy and normal lives under Trump. Many (a little under half of the country) will feel like things are finally back on the right track. But a ton of others will find their current situation unacceptable, even inconceivable. And for *those* people, the sense of numbness and complacency today in both their political and their personal decision-making is bizarrely discordant with their stated beliefs.
I think people should vote in the GOP primary, that's obviously a good idea and in collective terms would reduce the (very high) odds Trump is the GOP nominee.
Well, if we accept the assumption that a second Trump term is a uniquely dangerous threat to American democracy, the conversation in Democratic circles about the *Republican* primary has been extremely unserious.
The first line of defense against a second Trump term is Trump losing the Republican primary. Yet until he dropped out last week, the entire discourse among Democrats has been to elevate Chris Christie, who was essentially a spoiler candidate damaging the conservative candidates with an outside shot of beating Trump.
When Haley (who Democrats may dislike but at the end of the day is a normal conservative Republican as opposed to a completely unique threat to American democracy) surfaced as a viable alternative, the immediate Democratic immune response was to try to give her the Mitt Romney "binders full of women" treatment by spending 72 hours discussing a gaffe which she promptly corrected.
I also constantly see Democratic commenters making hyperbolic statements to the effect that any more electable Republican would be "more dangerous than Trump."
This kind of attitude towards the Republican primary is completely counterproductive if one actually sees Trump as uniquely threatening.
The solution should be to get away from first-past-the-post plurality-rules voting so people don't have to settle for the lesser of two evils, but there's not enough discussion of that and what discussion exists focuses on ranked choice voting that doesn't actually solve the problem.
Can confirm that none of the normies in my life believe we’re headed for a Trump-Biden rematch.
But, I dunno, I don’t sense the doomerism you describe. Instead, what I detect is fatigue. Things will pick up as the election gets closer, no doubt. But honestly, I just think people are exhausted and burned out by the past decade of politics. This just isn’t going to be 2016 or 2020. That hair-on-fire-energy is gone.
I firmly believe that if Biden were to change running mates it would give him the edge he needs to beat trump. I voted for trump in 16, voted 3rd party in 20 and will do so again in 24 unless Haley gets the nomination. If Amy Klobuchar or Gavin Newsom were the VP then people would shrug and say "well when Biden dies things will be ok." A Harris presidency is very concerning.
well.........Trump lost my vote when he said in July of 2020 he would not respect the results if he lost......and he didn't. Democrats hate Trump and hated his policies and they attacked him for 4 years. Many if not most Republicans, myself included generally view Trumps administration and presidency (while taxing and unpleasant) as a success from a policy perspective. Its also worth noting that his foreign policy was fairly hands off. I may disagree with much of what Biden has done (I didn't expect to) but I do go to bed at night feeling comfortable that a 40 year foreign policy veteran is at the helm. Harris is an empty suit with no experience who has not shown that she is up to the job. She has klutzed her way through the past 4 years. I won't vote for Trump again and I definitely don't want him as president again but I don't view him as the embodiment of evil or Hitler and I think in 4 more years he would be gone. I believe the country would survive him. Certain people can handle the job........I may not like them (Trump) or agree with them (Biden) but I believe they can handle it. I have serious reservations that Harris can.
This is why so many view Republicans, even "moderate" ones, as irrational. Otherwise you wouldn't:
1) view Trump's policies as a success when association with him poisoned Republican policies for a generation of people, at least.
2) be able to say in the same paragraph that you believed him when he said he wouldn't accept the results of the election and that you believe he'll be gone in four years.
I think its pretty clear that half the country approved of his policies and this poisoned generation you speak of does not exist. In the end he left office, whether he accepted the results or not, which is also what I expected
I legit do not understand how someone who voted for Trump in 2016 can call Harris an empty suit with no experience.
I'm not saying you have to like Harris, but, like, she's a banal, mainstream Democrat, with a banal, mainstream Democrat resume. She'd be a terrible candidate, but if Biden croaked in 2026 and Harris took office, she'd basically do all the same shit Biden does except she'd be younger and certain media outlets would write annoying stories about how she's a woman of color. It'd be fine.
two things. One, your underestimating Biden's experience. Obama tapped him because of his FP credentials. Two, I was concerned with Trump in 2016 (and he was not my first choice) but he had a strong team and the world was not as dangerous. Harris would immediately face serious tests from our adversaries.
1) His foreign policy "experience" and 2) More importantly, his deep and long-standing experience in Congress which he, as the most junior member of the Senate, he conspicuously lacked.
As it turned out, it didn't work out too badly for him.
Your points about Biden's experience and the world being less dangerous in 2016 are both well-taken. And I do think Biden has been a very good foreign policy president (I think he's looking like the best one since Bush the Elder, at least as of now).
Trump's team was fine (early on), but I'm not sure it was exceptionally strong, except for maybe Mattis.
More importantly, Harris would have the same team as Biden and largely pursue the same policies. I think you raise a good point that she'd likely do it less skillfully, and that does matter. Still, the difference between her and Biden will be much smaller than the difference between Biden and Trump.
I think Biden has mismanaged Iran and the Afghanistan exit was clearly a disaster but I would give him a passing grade. To suggest that Harris listens to the same people and makes the same decisions is fair, but she will be pressed as a newbie and at the end of the day the President needs to know what they are doing.
I detest this new Republican isolationism. I support Haley for that reason if for no other. I'm not sure that Russia can conquer the Ukraine......in fact I don't believe they can short of nukes but yes, I'm cognizant of the possibility of NATO troops staring across a fence at Russian troops in Poland or Romania. If Amy Klobuchar or Gavin Newsom were the VP I might consider voting for Biden for that reason alone. Isolationism begets wars. I will add only this, for all his tyrant love talk, Trump did not make life easy on Putin when he was in power. I no longer trust Trump on Russia but I'm not sure that its a given that he would flush the Ukraine but I am sure he would force them to the table. Perhaps we should force them to the table though. We are only arming Ukraine enough not to lose because we are afraid of what Putin would do if the Ukraine was clearly going to defeat Russia. I really don't know.
A Harris presidency would be, at a minimum, twenty times bigly more concerning than another Trump presidency. The invasion at US borders would be terminated; NATO would be paying the beloved democrat and progressive and leftist "fair share"; Iran would be shuffling throughout the middle east looking for handouts; the mullahs would be ousted; and, yes, it is likely that mean tweets would abound.
I would like a revisit to Haley given the changing environment we are in right now. DeSantis’ strategy has been to go all-in on Iowa, but his numbers suggest there is a risk he loses out to Haley in the contest. If he does, it is quite likely he will throw in the towel and we will very much be in a two-person race between Haley and Trump going in NH, Haley’s strongest state.
As we know, success begets success and given Trump’s legal woes, I have a feeling Haley’s chances are likely undercounted at the moment.
Trump's legal woes have yet to manifest themselves in any meaningful way. The election is not that far away. There really isn't a lot of time for a trial, conviction, sentencing.
Since we are on Nate Silver's page, and there is this weird obsession with betting, well, if I were a betting man, which I am not, I would bet that Trump's campaign is not significantly impacted by his legal "woes."
Ehh, it’s not actually clear success begets success coming out of New Hampshire. Think of all the recent New Hampshire winners who ended up going nowhere - Muskie, Hart, Tsongas, almost Bill Bradley, Hillary Clinton in 2008, Bernie (twice!), McCain, McCain in 2000, even Pat freaking Buchanan. It’s really not a predictor of much.
Oddly, I think DeSantis, despite poor polling, is a bit underrated right now as the GOP nominee. Despite his energetic demeanor, Trump is almost 80 years old, and a sudden health scare is more likely than ever before. If Trump falls ill due to a health related reason, I think his base of support will finally turn on him, forcing Trump to drop out. And DeSantis seems like the next best thing for Trump’s base if Trump isn’t an option.
With that said, if Trump’s health doesn’t become a factor in the next few months, I think you’re right about Haley. In my opinion, I believe the odds for GOP nominee right now is 50% Trump, 23% Haley, 22% DeSantis, and 5% Ramaswamy (just for good measure).
Has Trump had any major health scare since he caught COVID in 2020? I'm not aware of any, so I think you're overrating the chance of that happening in the next few months.
He hasn’t, but there’s a good chance he might. For instance, a random heart attack isn’t unusual for someone who’s 77, even if he or she has no history of heart disease. What if Trump needs open heart surgery, and his doctors advises him to stay off the campaign trail from months?
I agree. I think DeSantis finishes 3rd Monday and drops out. Haley wins NH and then has a month to prepare for SC. At the very least, we will fortunately have a one on one contest probably from SC through super Tuesday. It could happen.
Haley's chances might be undercounted, but it's still far from the modal outcome. I'd take the over on Haley at 5%, and probably at 10%, though not by much. I'd take the under on her at 20%.
“this is basically Iowa’s punishment for fucking up so badly in 2020 that it took six days to figure out who won. (Even now it’s not entirely clear whether the answer was Pete Buttigieg or Bernie Sanders.)” LMFAO 😅
"But nobody seems to be acting as though Trump is an existential threat to democracy or anything else."
This isn't quite true, there are court cases to get Trump off the ballot, and that's in addition to several litigation efforts to prosecute Trump, some of which are stronger on the merits than others. Some people are clearly acting as though Trump is an existential threat to democracy, and prominent political commentators opposed to a second Trump term have written about their support of these efforts. Maybe they're wrong, but they're clearly taking him seriously.
But Nate, here's the thing. The Democrats have constructed a no-fail election strategy. Raise enough money to hire ballot harvesters, give out gift cards, then use the media to scare the bejesus out of them, wherein lazy voters who would not turn out for Biden will if someone knocks on their door and gently coaxes them through it, maybe even offering a gift card. So they'll have the ballots long before Election Day. Problem for them is that if this country is stuck with Biden for four more years? That's going to finally collapse the empire. They will deserve everything they have coming. A Trump win would be the best thing for the Democrats and for the country because it would pierce the delusion and everyone could start from scratch and rebuild their parties.
No, I don't think the guy who tried to do a coup [1] winning would be good for the country. Even if I imagine myself as Trump's biggest fan, I can only imagine saying "goddammit, I really wish he hadn't tried to do a coup."
[1] Google "Eastman memo" if you reflexively don't believe me.
He didn't try to do a coup. The Barack Obama administration was the coup back in 2016 and ongoing. They never had any intention of allowing Trump to lead or to serve. He was protesting the election which was corrupt. That is not a "coup." The media has lied to you about that.
No, he was doing a coup. He was attempting to coerce his Vice President, Mike Pence, to throw out the electoral votes and throw it to the House, despite the fact that Joe Biden had won the majority of the electoral college. Again, google "Eastman memos."
That isn't a "coup." He wanted to debate a corrupt election (I left the Democratic Party in 2020 because of that election, which wasn't fair and was as rigged as I have ever seen). Trump was pushing the boundaries of what is allowed but that is not a coup. A coup would be an army of people with weapons attempting to overtake the government. We look like fools to call it something it wasn't.
Everyone is so paranoid, so suspicious. Just like the 1950s. I was a major Clinton and Biden advocate online - you can find all my old writing on Medium. But I had no idea how corrupt they are and how naive I was. I will never vote for them as they are now.
A) It is a coup d'etat to overthrow the democratic will of the people, even if you come up with some legalistic bullshit to try to cover that up. If you think otherwise, then I'm sure you would be fine with Joe Biden and the Democratic Senate filling up the SCOTUS with 80 of Biden's cronies, then signing an executive order to say that Joe Biden will rule forever as President, and have SCOTUS agree with him. After all, that would be completely within all laws and procedures.
B) No, he did not want to "debate a corrupt election." He was given every opportunity to fight the imaginary fake ballots, and he failed, over, and over, in the courts. Even if I pretend that there was actually outcome determinative fraud, if you lose in the courts, then that is just TOO FUCKING BAD. I got a nasty bite from a dog while walking down the street minding my own business, leaving me with $2k medical bills, and the people in question wriggled their way out of paying in court. I don't get to break into their house and steal their shit. Similarly, Trump had his chance to go to court, had no viable evidence of theft, and fucking lost. The coup attempt was completely beyond the pale, the acts of a wannabe dictator and caudillo.
I think Trump winning in 2016 pierced any kind of delusion that one party had exclusive control over the process. You could put GWB in 2000 in there as well.
Note, neither won the popular vote those years, so if there was any indictment of some aspect of the system, it was (and is) that the Electoral College is strikingly undemocratic.
Speaking to the reality, not the perception, what makes this moment different is that if Republicans win the election, they will have more power than any party has had in this country since the Democrats in 1965. I think that's very underappreciated. They would hold all the levers of power, such that the only checks and balances would be potential internal Republican divisions.
Republicans have made no secret that they plan radical changes for this country. (Project 2025, for instance). That's not some conspiracy; it's public information. But very few voters seem to be aware of it. Democratic campaigns also, at least right now, do not seem to be taking this seriously.
Those are the real stakes. Trump is a distraction. I'm still not sure whether he's boosting Republican chances or holding them back, but the question is whether the election is ever going to be about the Republican agenda, or if it will continue to be hidden in plain sight all the way through to November.
The Supreme Court has a 6-3 lean, while in 2017 it was a 5-4 Republican lean with Roberts as an occasional swing vote. That could make the difference - it did for Dobbs!
We also shouldn't discount the possibility that a Republican administration with a Republican congress might just ignore a court decision, since the courts do not have any independent way to enforce their rulings. It would be radical, but it's something they might do if they got into trouble and doubled down.
Yes. They have the federal courts, in a way they did not then, and the party has been almost completely purged of skeptics or dissent over the last eight years. They've also had time to figure out what worked and what didn't, and to be ready this time.
Does progressive domination of academia, Big Tech, the upper echelons of the intelligence services and military, professional medical and legal associations mean nothing?
That is exactly what we would find out. It's more correct to say they would hold all the levers of state power. That is not something America is used to or, I would argue, prepared for. History, from other countries at least, also shows that such elites as you describe can be sidelined more easily than one might think. I suppose the Republicans would need to keep the very wealthy from turning on them in any significant way, but such individuals are so isolated (and secured) from the world the rest of us have to live in, that radical changes to government and society affect them the least.
Completely fwiw, but 2020 was a great year for me actually. Was there anxiety involved at the time? Sure. But my job wasnt at risk, nobody i know well died, i worked from home and got to spend way more time with family and take long walks during middle of the day, etc. Dont write this to rub it in but just to say covid wasn't a traumatic event for everyone and I've yet to see comprehensive surveys on how population divides up on the topic.
"...2020 was the worst year of most of our lives."
A good question for a poll. As a member of the majority of people who are introverts, a year where I was enabled to avoid needless interaction was rather nice.
The column fails to mention that the Democrats control most of the voting apparatus in the swing states. Trump will be ahead on election night, but just like in 2020, absentee and mail-in ballots will put Biden over the top. Whether Biden is in a nursing home or not will be irrelevant. There is no way the ruling class of this country allows Trump to return.
It's really strange that we continue to act like former President Trump isn't an anomaly. That presidents are problematic and imperfect, no matter their party or intentions, is truth. However no president has ever placed themselves before country. Nixon, as an example, might have been delusional enough to think he must win because he knew best for nation, but he still was, despite his self-aggrandizement and dishonesty, working for the nation, at least as he perceived its wellbeing.
Fifty years from now, or perhaps sooner, when the emotional baggage of the boomers has evaporated, I think that Nixon might be viewed the best president of the 20th century, and a tragic figure. With Johnson a close second on both counts. Unfortunately I’m a boomer & will never know...
Millennial here, and oh gosh, I sincerely hope not. Nixon was a bad president and a bad person for more reasons than just Watergate. He intentionally foiled peace talks that that were set to end the Vietnam War because his "anti-war" campaign was dependent on the war continuing. Once elected, he needlessly escslated war in Laos and Cambodia.
If younger generations some day soften their views of Nixon, it would be due to ignorance of history -- or because future presidents are so roundly bad that even the worst presidents of the past start looking pretty alright. Neither of these are outside the realm of possibility over the next 50 years, but I really, really hope they don't come to pass.
If you look at Nixon’s actual accomplishments, I think you will see that he was a pretty good president.
For example, from Wikipedia: “President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on December 2, 1970, after Nixon signed an executive order.[3] The order establishing the EPA was ratified by committee hearings in the House and Senate.”
And: “In his first months in office, Nixon set out to eliminate federal tax liability for those earning below the poverty line. Out of concern for the wholly dependent as well as those in low-earning working families, he then proposed reform of what was a “catch-as catch-can” program of Food Stamps.” https://kansaspress.ku.edu/blog/2021/02/25/child-poverty-and-richard-nixons-family-security-act/.
And, of course, he normalized relations with China.
As for Vietnam, he inherited a war escalated into a disaster by Johnson, then won it, only to see the Democrats, led by Frank Churchill, pull the rug out from under that.
On civil rights: “Few Americans know it, but in fact Richard Nixon, even more than John Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson, shaped the civil-rights landscape we inhabit today. Nixon broke the will of the South, making school desegregation, long on the books but largely unimplemented, a reality for millions of children black and white. He presided over the nationalization of the Voting Rights Act, extending it beyond the South to cover all Americans—including Latinos. He oversaw the birth of bilingual education and averted the death of historically black colleges. Most important, for better or worse, he and his aides created affirmative action as we know it, turning a vague idea about a leg up at the starting gate into a vast national web of "goals and timetables" at colleges, corporations, and government contracting agencies.” https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/05/a-surprise-but-not-a-success/302488/.
As for his personal character, it’s hard to say. He made a serious misjudgment on Watergate, but in the context of politics, no worse than many others. I don’t recall anyone suggesting sexual scandals like those of Kennedy or Clinton. He seems to have been an alcoholic, but I suspect you’d have to read a decent biography to form a good opinion on that.
In short, he really was a mid-road & effective president. Don’t believe everything you read or see about the man. But as I said, he was a tragic figure - and so not surprisingly the subject of the best opera involving a US president, Nixon in China.
The Democratic "party" is composed of insider consultants competing for influence who are already Team Biden or cannot begin to compete with the faction that controls the White House and outsider media-consumers who have been trained to think any fact that might help Trump (such as Biden's age) is "misinformation". There is no constituency that could push Biden aside even if he were Feinstein-senile.
I think people just forget how bad Trump is. The media decided a while ago not to give him airtime to bloviate, which I think has led people to forget what a nightmare it is when that guy's face is on your television every minute of every day. Biden, however, is still a massive liability. He seems to be deteriorating almost by the minute, it's actually a sad site.
Ironic that the media actually think that by soft-censoring Donald Trump, they are serving the higher purpose of helping to defeat him. Even if that were true it would be questionable journalistic ethics, but even worse it seems to be backfiring, shielding him from the negative opinions that voters ought to be forming from his legal issues and general awfulness, but aren't because it's not being reported.
"The pandemic, however, was an extremely traumatic shared experience that I’m convinced the world still really hasn’t processed yet. Between the mass death and the massive disruption to the fabric of everyday life, 2020 was the worst year of most of our lives.'"
What is he talking about.? Nobody in my neighborhood has mentioned Covid in the last 12 months.
Instead, they are saying 2021 , 2022 and 2023 inflation, prices and mortgage rates are the worst years of their lives.
The truth is that Donald Trump is a crazy person with a sane ideology, and Joe Biden is a sane person with a crazy ideology. It's interesting that the Israel and Gaza issue stands out because it's the rare instance where Joe Biden sticks to a logical and traditional ideology, reminiscent of the good old days of the Democratic Party before 'wokeness' took the wheel and drove it off the sanity cliff. On other fronts, like their open borders approach to immigration or championing surgical solutions for confused "trans" kids, or their enthusiastic embrace of reverse racism, it seems the Democrats have gone full-throttle into the realm of the wildly absurd.
I don’t think Trump has any ideology, unless a certain short term pragmatism is an ideology. Things that look ideological, like his judicial selections, are just things that he’s not interested in so he hands them off to someone else. I think that’s really how we wound up with Fauci - he knew the virus was an issue but since there didn’t seem to be anything in it for him, he was content to appear in charge and let the medical bureaucracy handle it. I’ll give you crazy, in the sense that he doesn’t let anything interfere with what he wants to be the truth.
As for Biden, he’s slipping off the sled, assuming he’s still on it. At this point, I don’t think the policies of his administration are actually the result of his involvement. Rather, the machinery of the presidency might be like that of the latter part of the Wilson administration - in the hands of someone else, maybe his wife, maybe a committee of Democratic Party insiders. This may be the reason he hasn’t removed himself from the 2024 presidential campaign and insured his place as the man who save the nation from Trump - the people actually in control think they can ride him into another term where they will continue to run things.
To be fair to Biden, while there are unserious obsessives within the broad Democratic church, Biden himself has pretty much totally ignored them and focused on bread-and-butter economic issues. It's more like he's a sane person with a sane ideology, some of the people who support him are crazy but that's inevitable when 50% of the electorate is voting for you.
Donald Trump a crazy person? Seems pretty sane to me. I've never seen him do anything crazy. Some sophomoric tweets, but that's far from crazy. And the man is not ideological at all. He's practical. Like any good executive and deal maker, he tries to balance competing interests to reach a win-win solution where all sides are happy. Does a pretty good job, too, especially on the foreign policy side. His work on Kim Jong Un was stellar.
Many politicians have done the same things Donald Trump did to contest the results of an election. Asking for recounts, filing court cases, calling for protests, asking for delays in certification, calling the results illegitimate. When those all failed he left office, right on schedule leaving a very gracious (Joe Biden's words) letter for his successor behind.
I like the column but question the premise. What are we supposed to act like? Run around yelling, "Threat to democracy!" Seems people are doing that. But mostly the problem is the solution. What is it? It is far from clear that there is some other Democrat that is a sure bet and so Biden may have the best chance of any Democrat. So what do you do? How stupid would you feel if you pushed Biden aside and then the unknown candidate at that stage loses the election? There's a lot of helplessness and uncertainty.
It seems like the messaging is not very good though. Obviously the media who are more interested in 'both sides' than actually doing any reporting are no help, and are just making things worse, but you can't expect someone else to do your work for you.
Hyperbolic statements (like 'threat to democracy') are counterproductive. People tune them out, and Republicans just say the same thing back. What is needed are specifics. For example, abortion is the issue I know best, and what's most effective are real stories of real women and exactly what's happened to them, not abstracts. Similarly, Democrats would be advised to - calmly - give detailed descriptions of the things that Republicans are planning, and the scenarios that would unfold, instead of running around saying the sky is falling.
But that might be too hard for them. If it is, then they fail us, Republicans get their regime, and the old Democratic party gets replaced by whatever ends up becoming the most effective opposition to the regime. 🤷
I think you hit the nail on the head about hyperbolic statements. I am pretty dismayed about the potential for Trump being the next president (although I am also dismayed, not as much but still dismayed, that Biden is the alternative). I think this ties back to the hyperbole though.
First, we had COVID, I am by no means a denier (I'm vaccinated with most of the boosters), but it was hyped as the next bubonic plague. Again, it was really bad, but not so much worse than the flu pandemics of 56 or 68. While that was going on we had the George Floyd protests, along with the great Blue Scare about the horrors of policing (until things went crazy and most everyone realized that was a bad idea). During all of this we were told society ends in 12 years unless we take dramatic climate action (to the tune of several percentage points of global GDP annually if we want to remedy it). Again, climate change is bad...I have solar panels and only drive about 5k miles a year...so I am down with reducing carbon emissions. But it is not an existential threat. Sorry, it just isn't...it will be really bad, particularly for places like Bangladesh, but in developed nations it will be expensive and unpleasant.
Finally, we have Trump...we hear repeatedly about how he will destroy democracy. In fact, the DNC was so concerned they spent $50 million helping his supporters defeat more moderate Republicans. Then then entire democratic house votes repeatedly with the nuttiest of the nutty Trumpists. I get that the Dems don't have to help the Reps run the house...but don't act like that then try to sell people on threats to democracy...Clearly they don't believe them...if they did they might do thing like...ohh I don't know...prevent Trumps supports from getting elected or winning political battles. Honestly, if Trump was that big a threat the opposition party should have grabbed the absolutely most conservative Dem (or even a moderate Rep like Larry Hogan) and run them. I mean, if we are really talking about a threat to democracy, it would justify playing to electorate. Just a thought.
Long story short...Trump is authoritarian and a complete narcissist. In my opinion his language around females and groping them caused me to believe he was unfit back when he was running in 2016. He may even be a threat to democracy, it's just tough to tell anymore because everything, all the time, is an existential threat.
Finally, I am not saying the Reps are any better....they get crazy over their own issues (can you say Ukraine)....it's just that in the case of Trump I think all the Chicken Little Sky is falling rhetoric that has become common place over the last decade is making it difficult to sell the Trump threat.
I think both main parties have gotten stuck on mobilizing their base and decided that making things existential is the best way to do it. For those not closely aligned with either party, it becomes difficult to judge the actual threat presented by any of these problems.
I agree. I'm more or less on team Democrat on issues-- climate, lgbtq, covid, taxes, income, racism, policing, health care, abortion... but every single one of them also feels overhyped. Maybe it's the internet pushing people towards extremes. Or maybe it's reactive partisanship (the Republicans are also overhyped). Or maybe it's just how you get out the vote? I don't know.
That said, I -am- particularly concerned about Trump, and the Cult of Trump, coming to power again. Like, here he is with 4 felony trials ahead of him, 2 concerning his attempts to undermine Democracy itself, and we're like-- oh why not just make him prez again? Yes, he did only do so much damage last time, but how much of that was luck? And how resilient are we now?
It strikes me as a serious risk. A big moment in our history as nation. The partisanship he represents and the straight-up damage he can do as Commander and Chief is scary. Meanwhile, all the other progressive stuff just feels vaguely nice-to-have things. And I wish Democrats would stop screaming so much about them.
"Climate changer overhyped"? Another reason I'm not a Democrat, but a leftist.
Well...it is real and very serious. It'll make the world quite a lot worse. There's even the tail risk of methane feedback loops and worse warming than we're expecting.
But the "12 years to net zero or the world ends" thing really was quite influential for a while. People regularly act like we're all literally going to die and quite soon. You can find plenty of climate scientists who'll say otherwise; here's one: https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1533875297220587520
It's a tribute to how intense the doomerism is that -- even with climate change as bad as it really is and will be -- people still need to get a grip
Yes, you can always find some stupid people saying stupid things.
It's useful to set up some rules for evaluating debates. For example, does Biden say things like this? Do Democratic members of Congress?
If not, then maybe these dim loudmouths aren't that important.
“doomerism”. Nailed it!
I believe Climate Change is a manmade catastrophe that we are tossing onto our children and grandchildren. I'd call ot overhyped when people make it into doomsday. I'd also add that it's a whole lot harder to slow down than simply picking the next president.
Totally agree - I come from the conservative side, and, under no scenario, will vote for Biden - but also prefer to not vote for Trump - why I think there is a real third-party opportunity here and am presently involved with no labels - if nothing else, we need to send a shock through the system, I think, as those of us in the middle are increasingly adversely impacted and put at risk by both sides, most of whom, in my view, are primarily motivated by securing or maintaining power at any cost.
While I get you come from the conservative side and "would prefer not to vote for Trump", you don't really see him as a threat to democracy if you would begrudgingly put Trump into the White House again by not voting for (probable) one person who can actually defeat him.
That said - I think you're statement does correlate more to the fact that something like No Labels is going to pilfer off more conservative voters who might vote for Trump rather than centrists who would vote for Biden.
I follow the data closely, and, so far, it indicates a credible third-party ticket would likely pull equally from both sides - that said, I think the greater threat to democracy is the all out assault on no labels by the Democrats in multiple jurisdictions (as this is written, the Delaware Secretary of State is trying to remove no labels from the ballot, even though we clearly qualify for inclusion - just one of many actions the organization is being forced to fight).
I wish third party voters would instead focus on voting reform (eg. rank choice, open primaries, etc.) Third parties will never have any power without them and almost exclusively serve to sabotage to their own causes. They tent to be a "protest vote", but the parties themselves do not care about "protests" anymore than other non-voters.
Covid was far worse than the flu pandemics. Covid killed 0.35% of US population compared to 0.042% and 0.05% 1957 and 1968 pandemics, respectively.
Has anyone talked about the likelihood of either/both candidate(s) passing away, the chances of that, and what happens next if one or both expire???
Endlessly
Matt Taibbi's reporting from Iowa has been excellent at Racket News.
Threat to democracy = convincing without any proof the majority of Republicans that the election was "stolen", while simultaneously preparing a slate of fake electors to cheat the electoral college.
I'm not saying it isn't so; I'm just saying the messaging strategy isn't working (at least not yet), since Trump leads in the polls, so I would recommend Democrats make adjustments, since their (and all of our) survival is on the line.
Dems have creaky communications strategy. Loathsome though T’ ads are, they own the headlines. Not saying our team should be loaded with crazy and hate, but c’mon! Campaigning like it’s 1965 isn’t going to get anyone under the age of 65. Where are Biden’s surrogates??? Please do not deploy John Kerry etc. Kamala is a terrific person but terrible communicator and campaigner. (She is whiney and nasal and not convincing).
We need help and it should have started 3 years ago
Please explain what makes Kamala a "terrific person"? She has no major successes (Border is worse than ever).
You don't understand. Had Trump been re-elected, you would not be whining, alongside Harris, for help - even assuming that you moved to New Zealand to live next door to Ruth Bader Ginsburg or to Canada to join the throngs of grossly over-privileged entertainers from the hills of Los Angeles and environs.
I have no clue what you are trying to say. Do you think Justice Ginsburg is alive in New Zealand? Thanks for assuming that I am “hanging with grossly over-privileged entertainers from the hills of Los Angeles
Pray tell who you hang with!
The simple solution, which Biden and the Democrats will not go for, is to do what Ruy Teixeira has been telling them to do for years now: abandon their deeply unpopular policies of racism and transgenderism.
But the Democrats are just as much ideological totalitarians at heart as the Republicans, so they won't do that.
Yes, because other than wingnut grifting on the worst of transgenderism, the idea that national Dems are really "woke" is laughable.
Biden, Harris, and EVERY Democrat in Congress (yes, even Joe Manchin) supports the Equality Act, which would allow any man to enter any women's space, place, event, competition, whatever, at will, and make it a violation of federal law to stop him.
Biden condemned the SCOTUS decision banning anti-asian racism in college admissions. I am not aware of any Democrat in Congress who is on record as supporting the decision. Yet in California in the 2020 presidential election, while Biden beat Trump 2-to-1, an "affirmative action" initiative on the same ballot lost, 57% to 43%.
Voters hate the Democrats' racism. Even a substantial proportion of Black voters hate it. Read Teixeira.
The reality of the Equality Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equality_Act_(United_States)
The reality: https://www.hrc.org/resources/equality
The reality: https://www.npr.org/2021/02/24/969591569/house-to-vote-on-equality-act-heres-what-the-law-would-do
The fact that even Yachtsman Joe Manchin supports it shows that, once again, your bullshit is exactly that, Mark. Once again, bye!
The reality is that what I wrote is completely correct. That is how similar state laws already on the books are being interpreted: https://nypost.com/2022/08/09/woman-banned-from-ymca-for-treatment-of-trans-employee/
For a book-length treatment of the subject by a radical feminist lawyer, see "The Reckoning" by Kara Dansky:
https://www.amazon.com/Reckoning-Democrats-Betrayed-Women-Girls/dp/B0CN32BXC2
All, NB: MarkS is not Mark Shields (&, not THE Mark Shields)!
Absolutely correct!
THE Mark Shields is buried somewhere in PBS's headquarters.
Folks make plans for potential natural disasters. My hometown is at the base of a giant volcano and everyone knows what to do when it erupts. If geologists started saying that an eruption was increasingly likely in the next few months, I would expect folks in the lahar zone to start planning and reserving accommodations while they evacuated, or folks who plan to stay to stock up on critical supplies. Maybe others would decide that now's the time to move permanently away.
A lahar is a slow moving natural disaster, both because the event itself usually leaves enough time for folks to respond and because it's almost always broadcast with a high degree of confidence months in advance by professionals who monitor the volcano. In other words, it's exactly like this potentail political disaster.
So yes, it's shocking to see how few folks are preparing for what a second Trump presidency would entail. Now to be clear, I'm not apocalyptic about this. The vast majority of people will continue to live happy and normal lives under Trump. Many (a little under half of the country) will feel like things are finally back on the right track. But a ton of others will find their current situation unacceptable, even inconceivable. And for *those* people, the sense of numbness and complacency today in both their political and their personal decision-making is bizarrely discordant with their stated beliefs.
I think people should vote in the GOP primary, that's obviously a good idea and in collective terms would reduce the (very high) odds Trump is the GOP nominee.
Well, if we accept the assumption that a second Trump term is a uniquely dangerous threat to American democracy, the conversation in Democratic circles about the *Republican* primary has been extremely unserious.
The first line of defense against a second Trump term is Trump losing the Republican primary. Yet until he dropped out last week, the entire discourse among Democrats has been to elevate Chris Christie, who was essentially a spoiler candidate damaging the conservative candidates with an outside shot of beating Trump.
When Haley (who Democrats may dislike but at the end of the day is a normal conservative Republican as opposed to a completely unique threat to American democracy) surfaced as a viable alternative, the immediate Democratic immune response was to try to give her the Mitt Romney "binders full of women" treatment by spending 72 hours discussing a gaffe which she promptly corrected.
I also constantly see Democratic commenters making hyperbolic statements to the effect that any more electable Republican would be "more dangerous than Trump."
This kind of attitude towards the Republican primary is completely counterproductive if one actually sees Trump as uniquely threatening.
And meanwhile they've been helping Trump with all the legal nonsense. He wasn't going to win Colorado or Maine to begin with.
The solution should be to get away from first-past-the-post plurality-rules voting so people don't have to settle for the lesser of two evils, but there's not enough discussion of that and what discussion exists focuses on ranked choice voting that doesn't actually solve the problem.
But John Kerry is joining JB's campaign!
That's former Massachusetts U.S. Senator Heinz. Kerry re-married exceptionally well and took his spouse's last name - amongst other attributes.
Can confirm that none of the normies in my life believe we’re headed for a Trump-Biden rematch.
But, I dunno, I don’t sense the doomerism you describe. Instead, what I detect is fatigue. Things will pick up as the election gets closer, no doubt. But honestly, I just think people are exhausted and burned out by the past decade of politics. This just isn’t going to be 2016 or 2020. That hair-on-fire-energy is gone.
Ignorance is bliss!! Knowledge is useless in politics today…nobody gives a shit about my informed opinion.
You’re commenting on a Nate Silver Substack post. What makes you not a normie?
I know I am.
I firmly believe that if Biden were to change running mates it would give him the edge he needs to beat trump. I voted for trump in 16, voted 3rd party in 20 and will do so again in 24 unless Haley gets the nomination. If Amy Klobuchar or Gavin Newsom were the VP then people would shrug and say "well when Biden dies things will be ok." A Harris presidency is very concerning.
Can you elaborate on what is concerning about a Harris presidency? Would it be more or less concerning than another Trump presidency?
well.........Trump lost my vote when he said in July of 2020 he would not respect the results if he lost......and he didn't. Democrats hate Trump and hated his policies and they attacked him for 4 years. Many if not most Republicans, myself included generally view Trumps administration and presidency (while taxing and unpleasant) as a success from a policy perspective. Its also worth noting that his foreign policy was fairly hands off. I may disagree with much of what Biden has done (I didn't expect to) but I do go to bed at night feeling comfortable that a 40 year foreign policy veteran is at the helm. Harris is an empty suit with no experience who has not shown that she is up to the job. She has klutzed her way through the past 4 years. I won't vote for Trump again and I definitely don't want him as president again but I don't view him as the embodiment of evil or Hitler and I think in 4 more years he would be gone. I believe the country would survive him. Certain people can handle the job........I may not like them (Trump) or agree with them (Biden) but I believe they can handle it. I have serious reservations that Harris can.
This is why so many view Republicans, even "moderate" ones, as irrational. Otherwise you wouldn't:
1) view Trump's policies as a success when association with him poisoned Republican policies for a generation of people, at least.
2) be able to say in the same paragraph that you believed him when he said he wouldn't accept the results of the election and that you believe he'll be gone in four years.
I think its pretty clear that half the country approved of his policies and this poisoned generation you speak of does not exist. In the end he left office, whether he accepted the results or not, which is also what I expected
"half the country"
Might want to check that math.
He lost the election but the country is evenly divided. Will you accept the math if he wins in November?
I legit do not understand how someone who voted for Trump in 2016 can call Harris an empty suit with no experience.
I'm not saying you have to like Harris, but, like, she's a banal, mainstream Democrat, with a banal, mainstream Democrat resume. She'd be a terrible candidate, but if Biden croaked in 2026 and Harris took office, she'd basically do all the same shit Biden does except she'd be younger and certain media outlets would write annoying stories about how she's a woman of color. It'd be fine.
two things. One, your underestimating Biden's experience. Obama tapped him because of his FP credentials. Two, I was concerned with Trump in 2016 (and he was not my first choice) but he had a strong team and the world was not as dangerous. Harris would immediately face serious tests from our adversaries.
Obama tapped Biden for two reasons:
1) His foreign policy "experience" and 2) More importantly, his deep and long-standing experience in Congress which he, as the most junior member of the Senate, he conspicuously lacked.
As it turned out, it didn't work out too badly for him.
Your points about Biden's experience and the world being less dangerous in 2016 are both well-taken. And I do think Biden has been a very good foreign policy president (I think he's looking like the best one since Bush the Elder, at least as of now).
Trump's team was fine (early on), but I'm not sure it was exceptionally strong, except for maybe Mattis.
More importantly, Harris would have the same team as Biden and largely pursue the same policies. I think you raise a good point that she'd likely do it less skillfully, and that does matter. Still, the difference between her and Biden will be much smaller than the difference between Biden and Trump.
I think Biden has mismanaged Iran and the Afghanistan exit was clearly a disaster but I would give him a passing grade. To suggest that Harris listens to the same people and makes the same decisions is fair, but she will be pressed as a newbie and at the end of the day the President needs to know what they are doing.
Out of curiosity, what is your position on Ukraine?
With Trump as President, all US support for Ukraine will end, and Russia will almost certainly win the war. How do you feel about that?
I detest this new Republican isolationism. I support Haley for that reason if for no other. I'm not sure that Russia can conquer the Ukraine......in fact I don't believe they can short of nukes but yes, I'm cognizant of the possibility of NATO troops staring across a fence at Russian troops in Poland or Romania. If Amy Klobuchar or Gavin Newsom were the VP I might consider voting for Biden for that reason alone. Isolationism begets wars. I will add only this, for all his tyrant love talk, Trump did not make life easy on Putin when he was in power. I no longer trust Trump on Russia but I'm not sure that its a given that he would flush the Ukraine but I am sure he would force them to the table. Perhaps we should force them to the table though. We are only arming Ukraine enough not to lose because we are afraid of what Putin would do if the Ukraine was clearly going to defeat Russia. I really don't know.
Maybe Europe should and will step up and provide more military aid to Ukraine. Why should the US continue to provide a vast majority of the aid?
You would not be happy with my answer.
A Harris presidency would be, at a minimum, twenty times bigly more concerning than another Trump presidency. The invasion at US borders would be terminated; NATO would be paying the beloved democrat and progressive and leftist "fair share"; Iran would be shuffling throughout the middle east looking for handouts; the mullahs would be ousted; and, yes, it is likely that mean tweets would abound.
You’re delusional
Less concerning.
Like a rattlesnake bite.
Revised handle for David Brooks?
Nah, I'm a REAL J. Mark Shields, have been for 70 years tomorrow, even if I'm not THE Mark Shields... ;)
Happy birthday, our Mr. Brooks.
Thanks, Henri! 😉
You were the first to wish me well on this 3 score and 10 milestone! 🎉
I would like a revisit to Haley given the changing environment we are in right now. DeSantis’ strategy has been to go all-in on Iowa, but his numbers suggest there is a risk he loses out to Haley in the contest. If he does, it is quite likely he will throw in the towel and we will very much be in a two-person race between Haley and Trump going in NH, Haley’s strongest state.
As we know, success begets success and given Trump’s legal woes, I have a feeling Haley’s chances are likely undercounted at the moment.
Trump's legal woes have yet to manifest themselves in any meaningful way. The election is not that far away. There really isn't a lot of time for a trial, conviction, sentencing.
Since we are on Nate Silver's page, and there is this weird obsession with betting, well, if I were a betting man, which I am not, I would bet that Trump's campaign is not significantly impacted by his legal "woes."
Ehh, it’s not actually clear success begets success coming out of New Hampshire. Think of all the recent New Hampshire winners who ended up going nowhere - Muskie, Hart, Tsongas, almost Bill Bradley, Hillary Clinton in 2008, Bernie (twice!), McCain, McCain in 2000, even Pat freaking Buchanan. It’s really not a predictor of much.
Oddly, I think DeSantis, despite poor polling, is a bit underrated right now as the GOP nominee. Despite his energetic demeanor, Trump is almost 80 years old, and a sudden health scare is more likely than ever before. If Trump falls ill due to a health related reason, I think his base of support will finally turn on him, forcing Trump to drop out. And DeSantis seems like the next best thing for Trump’s base if Trump isn’t an option.
With that said, if Trump’s health doesn’t become a factor in the next few months, I think you’re right about Haley. In my opinion, I believe the odds for GOP nominee right now is 50% Trump, 23% Haley, 22% DeSantis, and 5% Ramaswamy (just for good measure).
Has Trump had any major health scare since he caught COVID in 2020? I'm not aware of any, so I think you're overrating the chance of that happening in the next few months.
He hasn’t, but there’s a good chance he might. For instance, a random heart attack isn’t unusual for someone who’s 77, even if he or she has no history of heart disease. What if Trump needs open heart surgery, and his doctors advises him to stay off the campaign trail from months?
I agree. I think DeSantis finishes 3rd Monday and drops out. Haley wins NH and then has a month to prepare for SC. At the very least, we will fortunately have a one on one contest probably from SC through super Tuesday. It could happen.
Haley's chances might be undercounted, but it's still far from the modal outcome. I'd take the over on Haley at 5%, and probably at 10%, though not by much. I'd take the under on her at 20%.
Hope so!🫣
“this is basically Iowa’s punishment for fucking up so badly in 2020 that it took six days to figure out who won. (Even now it’s not entirely clear whether the answer was Pete Buttigieg or Bernie Sanders.)” LMFAO 😅
What is the conclusion or message of this article? It seems like a rambling, stream-of-consciousness, 3:00am screed.
People are taking Trump literally but not seriously.
"But nobody seems to be acting as though Trump is an existential threat to democracy or anything else."
This isn't quite true, there are court cases to get Trump off the ballot, and that's in addition to several litigation efforts to prosecute Trump, some of which are stronger on the merits than others. Some people are clearly acting as though Trump is an existential threat to democracy, and prominent political commentators opposed to a second Trump term have written about their support of these efforts. Maybe they're wrong, but they're clearly taking him seriously.
Maybe in the end that's that actually the best way to think and talk about Trump: that is, like Trump.
Thank you. Those were my thoughts too. Silver needs a good night's sleep. A vacation to somewhere far from New York City wouldn't hurt either.
But Nate, here's the thing. The Democrats have constructed a no-fail election strategy. Raise enough money to hire ballot harvesters, give out gift cards, then use the media to scare the bejesus out of them, wherein lazy voters who would not turn out for Biden will if someone knocks on their door and gently coaxes them through it, maybe even offering a gift card. So they'll have the ballots long before Election Day. Problem for them is that if this country is stuck with Biden for four more years? That's going to finally collapse the empire. They will deserve everything they have coming. A Trump win would be the best thing for the Democrats and for the country because it would pierce the delusion and everyone could start from scratch and rebuild their parties.
Sasha is correctly observant and willing to see straight, which is what is required this year more than ever. The rest of you not.
No, I don't think the guy who tried to do a coup [1] winning would be good for the country. Even if I imagine myself as Trump's biggest fan, I can only imagine saying "goddammit, I really wish he hadn't tried to do a coup."
[1] Google "Eastman memo" if you reflexively don't believe me.
He didn't try to do a coup. The Barack Obama administration was the coup back in 2016 and ongoing. They never had any intention of allowing Trump to lead or to serve. He was protesting the election which was corrupt. That is not a "coup." The media has lied to you about that.
No, he was doing a coup. He was attempting to coerce his Vice President, Mike Pence, to throw out the electoral votes and throw it to the House, despite the fact that Joe Biden had won the majority of the electoral college. Again, google "Eastman memos."
That isn't a "coup." He wanted to debate a corrupt election (I left the Democratic Party in 2020 because of that election, which wasn't fair and was as rigged as I have ever seen). Trump was pushing the boundaries of what is allowed but that is not a coup. A coup would be an army of people with weapons attempting to overtake the government. We look like fools to call it something it wasn't.
You know, you really don't sound like someone who supported the Democratic party in the past. Maybe ever.
Everyone is so paranoid, so suspicious. Just like the 1950s. I was a major Clinton and Biden advocate online - you can find all my old writing on Medium. But I had no idea how corrupt they are and how naive I was. I will never vote for them as they are now.
And ps I don't care how you vote. I was responding to Nate's piece.
A) It is a coup d'etat to overthrow the democratic will of the people, even if you come up with some legalistic bullshit to try to cover that up. If you think otherwise, then I'm sure you would be fine with Joe Biden and the Democratic Senate filling up the SCOTUS with 80 of Biden's cronies, then signing an executive order to say that Joe Biden will rule forever as President, and have SCOTUS agree with him. After all, that would be completely within all laws and procedures.
B) No, he did not want to "debate a corrupt election." He was given every opportunity to fight the imaginary fake ballots, and he failed, over, and over, in the courts. Even if I pretend that there was actually outcome determinative fraud, if you lose in the courts, then that is just TOO FUCKING BAD. I got a nasty bite from a dog while walking down the street minding my own business, leaving me with $2k medical bills, and the people in question wriggled their way out of paying in court. I don't get to break into their house and steal their shit. Similarly, Trump had his chance to go to court, had no viable evidence of theft, and fucking lost. The coup attempt was completely beyond the pale, the acts of a wannabe dictator and caudillo.
Your comment really shows how devoted and delusional Trump's supporters really are.
I think Trump winning in 2016 pierced any kind of delusion that one party had exclusive control over the process. You could put GWB in 2000 in there as well.
Note, neither won the popular vote those years, so if there was any indictment of some aspect of the system, it was (and is) that the Electoral College is strikingly undemocratic.
Speaking to the reality, not the perception, what makes this moment different is that if Republicans win the election, they will have more power than any party has had in this country since the Democrats in 1965. I think that's very underappreciated. They would hold all the levers of power, such that the only checks and balances would be potential internal Republican divisions.
Republicans have made no secret that they plan radical changes for this country. (Project 2025, for instance). That's not some conspiracy; it's public information. But very few voters seem to be aware of it. Democratic campaigns also, at least right now, do not seem to be taking this seriously.
Those are the real stakes. Trump is a distraction. I'm still not sure whether he's boosting Republican chances or holding them back, but the question is whether the election is ever going to be about the Republican agenda, or if it will continue to be hidden in plain sight all the way through to November.
? Would they materially have more power than in 2017
The Supreme Court has a 6-3 lean, while in 2017 it was a 5-4 Republican lean with Roberts as an occasional swing vote. That could make the difference - it did for Dobbs!
We also shouldn't discount the possibility that a Republican administration with a Republican congress might just ignore a court decision, since the courts do not have any independent way to enforce their rulings. It would be radical, but it's something they might do if they got into trouble and doubled down.
Yes. They have the federal courts, in a way they did not then, and the party has been almost completely purged of skeptics or dissent over the last eight years. They've also had time to figure out what worked and what didn't, and to be ready this time.
>They would hold all the levers of power
Does progressive domination of academia, Big Tech, the upper echelons of the intelligence services and military, professional medical and legal associations mean nothing?
That is exactly what we would find out. It's more correct to say they would hold all the levers of state power. That is not something America is used to or, I would argue, prepared for. History, from other countries at least, also shows that such elites as you describe can be sidelined more easily than one might think. I suppose the Republicans would need to keep the very wealthy from turning on them in any significant way, but such individuals are so isolated (and secured) from the world the rest of us have to live in, that radical changes to government and society affect them the least.
Very true.
Completely fwiw, but 2020 was a great year for me actually. Was there anxiety involved at the time? Sure. But my job wasnt at risk, nobody i know well died, i worked from home and got to spend way more time with family and take long walks during middle of the day, etc. Dont write this to rub it in but just to say covid wasn't a traumatic event for everyone and I've yet to see comprehensive surveys on how population divides up on the topic.
"...2020 was the worst year of most of our lives."
A good question for a poll. As a member of the majority of people who are introverts, a year where I was enabled to avoid needless interaction was rather nice.
The column fails to mention that the Democrats control most of the voting apparatus in the swing states. Trump will be ahead on election night, but just like in 2020, absentee and mail-in ballots will put Biden over the top. Whether Biden is in a nursing home or not will be irrelevant. There is no way the ruling class of this country allows Trump to return.
It's really strange that we continue to act like former President Trump isn't an anomaly. That presidents are problematic and imperfect, no matter their party or intentions, is truth. However no president has ever placed themselves before country. Nixon, as an example, might have been delusional enough to think he must win because he knew best for nation, but he still was, despite his self-aggrandizement and dishonesty, working for the nation, at least as he perceived its wellbeing.
Fifty years from now, or perhaps sooner, when the emotional baggage of the boomers has evaporated, I think that Nixon might be viewed the best president of the 20th century, and a tragic figure. With Johnson a close second on both counts. Unfortunately I’m a boomer & will never know...
Millennial here, and oh gosh, I sincerely hope not. Nixon was a bad president and a bad person for more reasons than just Watergate. He intentionally foiled peace talks that that were set to end the Vietnam War because his "anti-war" campaign was dependent on the war continuing. Once elected, he needlessly escslated war in Laos and Cambodia.
If younger generations some day soften their views of Nixon, it would be due to ignorance of history -- or because future presidents are so roundly bad that even the worst presidents of the past start looking pretty alright. Neither of these are outside the realm of possibility over the next 50 years, but I really, really hope they don't come to pass.
If you look at Nixon’s actual accomplishments, I think you will see that he was a pretty good president.
For example, from Wikipedia: “President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on December 2, 1970, after Nixon signed an executive order.[3] The order establishing the EPA was ratified by committee hearings in the House and Senate.”
And: “In his first months in office, Nixon set out to eliminate federal tax liability for those earning below the poverty line. Out of concern for the wholly dependent as well as those in low-earning working families, he then proposed reform of what was a “catch-as catch-can” program of Food Stamps.” https://kansaspress.ku.edu/blog/2021/02/25/child-poverty-and-richard-nixons-family-security-act/.
And, of course, he normalized relations with China.
As for Vietnam, he inherited a war escalated into a disaster by Johnson, then won it, only to see the Democrats, led by Frank Churchill, pull the rug out from under that.
On civil rights: “Few Americans know it, but in fact Richard Nixon, even more than John Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson, shaped the civil-rights landscape we inhabit today. Nixon broke the will of the South, making school desegregation, long on the books but largely unimplemented, a reality for millions of children black and white. He presided over the nationalization of the Voting Rights Act, extending it beyond the South to cover all Americans—including Latinos. He oversaw the birth of bilingual education and averted the death of historically black colleges. Most important, for better or worse, he and his aides created affirmative action as we know it, turning a vague idea about a leg up at the starting gate into a vast national web of "goals and timetables" at colleges, corporations, and government contracting agencies.” https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/05/a-surprise-but-not-a-success/302488/.
As for his personal character, it’s hard to say. He made a serious misjudgment on Watergate, but in the context of politics, no worse than many others. I don’t recall anyone suggesting sexual scandals like those of Kennedy or Clinton. He seems to have been an alcoholic, but I suspect you’d have to read a decent biography to form a good opinion on that.
In short, he really was a mid-road & effective president. Don’t believe everything you read or see about the man. But as I said, he was a tragic figure - and so not surprisingly the subject of the best opera involving a US president, Nixon in China.
The Democratic "party" is composed of insider consultants competing for influence who are already Team Biden or cannot begin to compete with the faction that controls the White House and outsider media-consumers who have been trained to think any fact that might help Trump (such as Biden's age) is "misinformation". There is no constituency that could push Biden aside even if he were Feinstein-senile.
I think people just forget how bad Trump is. The media decided a while ago not to give him airtime to bloviate, which I think has led people to forget what a nightmare it is when that guy's face is on your television every minute of every day. Biden, however, is still a massive liability. He seems to be deteriorating almost by the minute, it's actually a sad site.
Ironic that the media actually think that by soft-censoring Donald Trump, they are serving the higher purpose of helping to defeat him. Even if that were true it would be questionable journalistic ethics, but even worse it seems to be backfiring, shielding him from the negative opinions that voters ought to be forming from his legal issues and general awfulness, but aren't because it's not being reported.
"The pandemic, however, was an extremely traumatic shared experience that I’m convinced the world still really hasn’t processed yet. Between the mass death and the massive disruption to the fabric of everyday life, 2020 was the worst year of most of our lives.'"
What is he talking about.? Nobody in my neighborhood has mentioned Covid in the last 12 months.
Instead, they are saying 2021 , 2022 and 2023 inflation, prices and mortgage rates are the worst years of their lives.
The truth is that Donald Trump is a crazy person with a sane ideology, and Joe Biden is a sane person with a crazy ideology. It's interesting that the Israel and Gaza issue stands out because it's the rare instance where Joe Biden sticks to a logical and traditional ideology, reminiscent of the good old days of the Democratic Party before 'wokeness' took the wheel and drove it off the sanity cliff. On other fronts, like their open borders approach to immigration or championing surgical solutions for confused "trans" kids, or their enthusiastic embrace of reverse racism, it seems the Democrats have gone full-throttle into the realm of the wildly absurd.
Yes, wildly absurd indeed. Yet, very real and very disturbing.
I don’t think Trump has any ideology, unless a certain short term pragmatism is an ideology. Things that look ideological, like his judicial selections, are just things that he’s not interested in so he hands them off to someone else. I think that’s really how we wound up with Fauci - he knew the virus was an issue but since there didn’t seem to be anything in it for him, he was content to appear in charge and let the medical bureaucracy handle it. I’ll give you crazy, in the sense that he doesn’t let anything interfere with what he wants to be the truth.
As for Biden, he’s slipping off the sled, assuming he’s still on it. At this point, I don’t think the policies of his administration are actually the result of his involvement. Rather, the machinery of the presidency might be like that of the latter part of the Wilson administration - in the hands of someone else, maybe his wife, maybe a committee of Democratic Party insiders. This may be the reason he hasn’t removed himself from the 2024 presidential campaign and insured his place as the man who save the nation from Trump - the people actually in control think they can ride him into another term where they will continue to run things.
To be fair to Biden, while there are unserious obsessives within the broad Democratic church, Biden himself has pretty much totally ignored them and focused on bread-and-butter economic issues. It's more like he's a sane person with a sane ideology, some of the people who support him are crazy but that's inevitable when 50% of the electorate is voting for you.
He is definitely complicit regarding the open border
Donald Trump a crazy person? Seems pretty sane to me. I've never seen him do anything crazy. Some sophomoric tweets, but that's far from crazy. And the man is not ideological at all. He's practical. Like any good executive and deal maker, he tries to balance competing interests to reach a win-win solution where all sides are happy. Does a pretty good job, too, especially on the foreign policy side. His work on Kim Jong Un was stellar.
Attempting to overthrow the democratic will of the people is pretty insane.
Many politicians have done the same things Donald Trump did to contest the results of an election. Asking for recounts, filing court cases, calling for protests, asking for delays in certification, calling the results illegitimate. When those all failed he left office, right on schedule leaving a very gracious (Joe Biden's words) letter for his successor behind.
Seems sane to me.