The 2016 Presidential Election Trainwreck

[Jeff Lebowski]

Since my fantasies of (i) a deadlocked GOP convention that would produce a nominee like Kasich or even Romney, and (ii) a Hillary indictment, seemed doomed to remain only fantasies, I’m adding a third, with an even lower likelihood of coming to fruition. The fantasy arose from Joe Klein’s recent column in Time. Klein, you may recall, is a liberal columnist who wrote Primary Colors, a thinly veiled rip on the first Clinton campaign. Anyway, he suggests Nikki Haley, the GOP governor of South Carolina, for Hillary’s running mate. In my fantasy (and yes, I’m aware of the ick factor of any fantasy involving Hillary), the two women get together and agree on major points (the ideological gap between them really isn’t huge, I believe), and present a theme of compromise, not demagogic divisiveness. My youthful fantasies of Raquel Welch were more fun, with a similar probability. Still, such a move by Hillary would make me actually want to vote for her.

[Eddie]

My Hillary hate is growing, especially with butt kiss articles like this. Still #nevertrump and #neverhillary and #alwaymitt.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/...tprint/482259/

"...Arkansas “has left the SEC of politics for the Big 12.”

Ha!

[ewth8tr]

Orrin Hatch just gave Trump his endorsement.... http://fox13now.com/2016/05/12/sen-h...ndorses-trump/

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

[SCcoug]

Embedded Tweet

[SCcoug]

Trump is so bizarre and insecure. Can't wait until he tries to go incognito as his press secretary.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...ory.html?asdfk

[PaloAltoCougar]

Trump is so bizarre and insecure. Can't wait until he tries to go incognito as his press secretary.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...ory.html?asdfk

He is truly a very strange dude and remarkably narcissistic. Lucky for us (at least until he's elected), the combination of him being both a publicity hound and pretty clueless as to social norms has left us with a treasure trove of head-scratching moments to review and savor. Hundreds of reporters (not to mention the Clinton machine) are no doubt assembling many more of these stories for our enjoyment and dismay.

[Commando]

I cannot stand people who brag about themselves on any level.

[chrisrenrut]

I cannot stand people who brag about themselves on any level.

???

CUF Concert Brag Thread.
Started by Commando, 10-06-2011 03:27 PM

[Maximus]

trump threatens amazon and wash post because of negative articles

http://reason.com/blog/2016/05/13/tr...washington-pos

Every hour we’re getting calls from reporters from The Washington Post asking ridiculous questions. And I will tell you, this is owned as a toy by Jeff Bezos, who controls Amazon. Amazon is getting away with murder, tax-wise. He’s using The Washington Post for power so that the politicians in Washington don’t tax Amazon like they should be taxed.

He’s getting absolutely away—he’s worried about me, and I think he said that to somebody, it was in some article—where he thinks I would go after him for antitrust. Because he’s got a huge antitrust problem because he’s controlling so much. Amazon is controlling so much of what they’re doing. And what they’ve done is he bought this paper for practically nothing. And he’s using that as a tool for political power against me and against other people. And I’ll tell you what, we can’t let him get away with it.

So he’s got about 20, 25—I just heard they are taking these really bad stories. I mean, they, you know, wrong, I wouldn’t even say bad, they’re wrong. And in many cases they have no proper information, and they’re putting them together, they’re slopping them together, and they’re going to do a book.

And the book is going to be all false stuff because the stories are so wrong. And the reporters—I mean, one after another. So what they are doing is he’s using that as a political instrument to try and stop antitrust, which he thinks I believe he’s antitrust, in other words, what he’s got is a monopoly. And he wants to make sure I don’t get in. So, it’s one of those things. But I’ll tell you what. I’ll tell you what. What he’s doing’s wrong.

[Sullyute]

Orrin Hatch just gave Trump his endorsement.... http://fox13now.com/2016/05/12/sen-h...ndorses-trump/

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

Nice to see Orrin jumping on the Trump Train.

[old_gregg]

trump threatens amazon and wash post because of negative articles

http://reason.com/blog/2016/05/13/tr...washington-pos

i look forward to a trump-led doj that pursues antitrust actions against companies that "control[] so much of what they're doing."

[Applejack]

i look forward to a trump-led doj that pursues antitrust actions against companies that "control[] so much of what they're doing."

Chill, dude. At least he'll carve out an exception for "political instruments [used] to try and stop antitrust." The real problem with Bezos, as Trump rightly pointed out, is that "he's antitrust." You can't let a guy like that exist.

Trump has a great grasp of what antitrust is. Perhaps the greatest grasp of any one on the planet.

[Omaha 680]

trump threatens amazon and wash post because of negative articles

http://reason.com/blog/2016/05/13/tr...washington-pos

That quote reads like that Miss Teen South Carolina girl trying to explain the Iraq War.

[Northwestcoug]

Trump is so bizarre and insecure. Can't wait until he tries to go incognito as his press secretary.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...ory.html?asdfk

I love Allahpundit's take on why he wouldn't turn just admit that it's his voice, and frame it as some dumb practical joke:

I think he panicked when he saw the WaPo thing this morning and decided that the cumulative weirdness of what happened was simply too much. Billionaires don’t pose as lowly publicists; if they are going to pose, they certainly wouldn’t do it as hamhandedly as Trump appears to have done it; and even if they’re going to do it, and do it clumsily, they wouldn’t use their disguise for something as tawdry as whispering to reporters about what a ladies’ man they are (especially if they’re married at the time). That’s fine for a reality-show tabloid-sheet star but not for a would-be president. It reeks of neediness. Total beta move for the consummate alpha male.

[PaloAltoCougar]

That reminds me of a link I saw yesterday. It was captioned "Who Said It: Presidential Hopeful Donald Trump or 'Idiocracy' President Camacho?"

Joel Stein's column in this week's Time provides a mildly amusing comparison between Idiocracy and the current campaign, and notes the branding expertise of Trump may be even better than that of President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho.

I especially liked Stein's observation that even our movies are becoming stupider, with superheroes fighting each other.

When I was in third grade and kids on the playground talked about what would happen if Superman fought Batman, the rest of us knew that the answer was that those kids weren’t going to college.