Election 2020 - Here we go again

[Thad]

Q3 fundraising numbers are coming out.

Sanders: $25.3M
Warren: $24.6M
Buttigieg: $19.1M
Biden: $15.2M
Harris: $11.6M

Biden still has a lot of advantages in this race, but his lead is slipping and those numbers ain't great.

It's crossed my mind that Trump may have brought an impeachment inquiry down on himself by trying to meddle with a campaign that was going to collapse all on its own. How very Nixonian.

[Brantly B.]

It's so fucking exactly like Watergate that I'm waiting for a broken AI to tell me that the Patriots set it all up that way.

As codenames go, Whistle Blower isn't as direct as Deep Throat, but...

[beatbandito]

but wait until we find out that's their legal name like Reality Winner

[Blossom]

[Mongrel]

do it do it do it

[Upthorn]

God fucking dammit, no! That's how we ended up with Trump in the first place!

[Mongrel]

Nevertheless, she persisted.

[Blossom]

[Mongrel]

If she really is that fucking stupid she is going to get fucking shredded.

[Brantly B.]

Gotta admit though, her setups are still spot-on.

[Thad]

Debate doesn't seem like it really did much that's going to move the needle. Top three are still top three; Biden's still the frontrunner, Warren's gained enough ground that the other candidates are going after her like she's the frontrunner, and I don't think anybody could have done a better job of shrugging off a recent heart attack than Sanders did (though I kinda wish he'd pivoted it to a healthcare pitch -- "I have great healthcare, and I think all Americans should have the same access to healthcare that I do," that kinda thing). I still think his recent polling in Iowa, and especially New Hampshire, is cause for concern, but I think tonight showed he's still in the game.

Also there were nine other candidates on the stage, which is at least five too many. I suppose that I'd rather the DNC err on the side of allowing too many candidates in than too few, but making the threshold for qualifying for the fourth debate exactly the same as the third is a pretty baffling decision. Steyer said some good things but he shouldn't be in the race. Gabbard's got some chutzpah criticizing Trump's Syria policy. I wish Beto would run for Senate again, though I can see why he wouldn't want to try again after losing to Ted Cruz (and I wanted to fucking throttle him when he pulled the "we should treat these companies like publishers" talking point, which is exactly the sort of bullshit Cruz says). Harris's "If you really want to hold corporations accountable, why won't you help me make Twitter ban Trump?" moment was fucking baffling. Booker and Castro are running for VP. Buttigieg did fine I guess, though that time he said people shouldn't be arguing at a debate is kinda like that time somebody told me to stop being so theatrical at drama camp. Yang spouted some dumbass line about "you can't use twentieth-century antitrust law" that could have just as easily sprung from Ajit Pai's mouth. (There's actually a perfectly reasonable criticism there; while I support Warren's proposal to break up the big tech companies, that in and of itself won't fix their problems; if you split Facebook and Instagram back up into separate companies, okay, that introduces some competition, and that's a good thing, but splitting one giant, dominant social media company into two giant, dominant social media companies doesn't really fix the problem that there are a few giant Internet companies with an outsized influence on the information people consume. Still and all, saying antitrust laws are ineffectual because they're old is fucking stupid.) Was Klobuchar the first person to actually say that we should put pharmaceutical executives in prison, or was it Harris? Either way, a good sentiment from a bad candidate.

And I guess that's all of them?

Anyway, I watched the debate. I think it was probably pretty meaningless in the scheme of things. But we'll see how news coverage looks over the next couple of days, because that's more important than what happens in the debate itself.

[Grath]

I don't think anybody could have done a better job of shrugging off a recent heart attack than Sanders did (though I kinda wish he'd pivoted it to a healthcare pitch -- "I have great healthcare, and I think all Americans should have the same access to healthcare that I do," that kinda thing).

[Thad]

Which is good, but I'd have liked to have seen him say it on stage. The point of the debates is to attract voters beyond the ones who already follow you on Twitter.

Though I still think he did a great job. He had to address the heart attack, he did, I think he did a good job of that, and not only that but the younger candidates made a point of saying they don't think it's reasonable to make an issue of the older candidates' ages. (I forget which of them pointed out the obvious, that any candidate on that stage is healthier and fitter for office than Trump -- Castro, maybe?)

[beatbandito]

[Mongrel]

Apparently Bernie gave a truthful answer which is pretty much exactly what black parents tell their children, (be polite, try your best to not give the cop any excuse to shoot you), and everyone gave him hell for it.

[Blossom]

Yeah, the media is (predictably) all over itself to misrepresent what Bernie said - they have your life in your hands and might kill you for no reason, make sure their camera is on, and give respect knowing that it might not save you. Advice to try to stay alive, and a recognition that it's 100% about the cop not shooting you, not about you not getting shot. Shockingly, almost every black American who isn't an overt Kamala stan is responding to the statement with some variant of "this is exactly what my parents told me and is what I'd tell my kids", often with a link to this Vox article on "the talk".

[Mongrel]

Bernie might have been rightly given shit for riding on his past work while ignoring the present state of black America, but it seems to me like that reply shows he's listening now at least.

Course I'm just a white guy living in a place where the cops probably won't shoot you, even if you're black (of course, if you're indigenous and live out west...).

[Büge]

West, meaning Etobicoke?

[Mongrel]

There's a joke in there about "Anything west of Cape Spear".

[Friday]

*googles Cape Spear, fully expecting it to be the easternmost town/place in Canada*

yep