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President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Moderator1, Nov 12, 2016.

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  1. Neutral Corner

    Neutral Corner Well-Known Member

    I wonder what is in the counter-intelligence section of the Mueller Report, which was not released. We may hear some of it once Congress gets to see it.

    Bottom line is that unless things change radically, the Report is a done deal and Trump survived it. He did so by attacking his own DOJ, the FBI, the U.S. Intelligence services. He lied countless times. He encouraged his people to lie. He trolled pardons to those under investigations. He refused to testify, answering only a few written questions, and refused to answer written follow up questions. He is unquestionably not innocent, but will likely never be found guilty of the matters in the report.

    There are at least fourteen other investigations still active, and I think that several of those are going to stick. SDNY is likely to be able to prove financial crimes. The time line on all of that is questionable though, and the 2020 election grows closer. It won't be long before bringing a case against Trump during the election becomes a political problem. He retains a viable shot at reelection, as things stand.

    The Dem leadership does not want to impeach, knowing that they don't have the sort of case that has any chance in the Senate. That's probably a correct calculation, but it leaves rank and file Dems frustrated and angry, which is not where you want them going to an election.
     
  2. BadgerBeer

    BadgerBeer Well-Known Member

    I have seen predictions that Trump will win in '20. But wasn't he able to win at least partly because of poor turnout from the left? I may be wrong but I don't believe that he has added any to his base during his first 3 years and I have a hard time believing the left will not be energized come '20. I guess that voter suppression is a concern but how does he win without adding to his base?
     
    Neutral Corner likes this.
  3. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    It was specifically lower turnout from African-American voters in Philly, Detroit and Milwaukee that hurt Clinton. Otherwise, Democratic turnout was pretty normal. Some say this was due to voter suppression, but only in Wisconsin does that seem a factor. Most was due to natural lowered enthusiasm without Obama on the ballot.
     
  4. BitterYoungMatador2

    BitterYoungMatador2 Well-Known Member

    It was a combination of low voter turnout among Democrats who thought this was in the bag plus Butthurt Bernie supporters plus people who stayed home because they hated both candidates. If I recall correctly, Trump got fewer votes than Romney in 2012.
     
  5. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    Lower percentage, not fewer votes.
     
  6. typefitter

    typefitter Well-Known Member

    I don't understand the Democratic calculus here. Wouldn't you want America to see the Republicans try to defend Trump? Don't you want to force GOP Senators to vote against impeachment?

    EDIT: The only way I understand it is, if the Democrats want to face Trump in 2020. Which I get, sort of, except that last time he won.
     
  7. tapintoamerica

    tapintoamerica Well-Known Member

  8. Neutral Corner

    Neutral Corner Well-Known Member

    I *have* to think that there are a lot of Americans who will vote against Trump and end our long national nightmare. His floor of support is stable.

    If I'm wrong it's going to hurt a lot.
     
  9. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    IMO this is just the usual Democratic leadership timidity, born of a generation that had its brains beaten out in numerous elections from 1972-2016. They vaguely remember than impeaching Clinton was very unpopular, forgetting that 1. Clinton had a job approval rating near 60 even as most people thought he was a slimy horndog, and 2. Bush won the next election despite this.
     
  10. garrow

    garrow Well-Known Member

    Of course!

     
    lakefront likes this.
  11. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    A lot of things went really right for him, including electoral college victories by small margins in some strategically important places that got him the victory. Flip a relatively few number of votes in PA, Wisconsin, Michigan -- we are talking about votes in the tens of thousands of people, not hundreds of thousands -- and he isn't president.

    I think the reason he was able to carry those states is that economically, a broad swath of people are struggling, and in Hillary Clinton they saw more of the same BS they had gotten from Obama that didn't magically make their lives better (and in fact, they felt like their standards of living had declined), except without the likability of Obama, and a hubris in her where she came across as having disdain for the people she was courting. So a lot of people who are gullible or don't have good BS detectors voted for Trump thinking they'd give him a chance.

    Whether they should have known better or not, my guess is that he will hold onto about 35 percent of the population that is just sad -- the idiots you see at the rallies -- but there are 10 to 15 percent of the people who voted for him who have to be disgusted at this point by the reality of what they got. A lot of women in particular, I'd guess, who have become more and more turned off by the level of discourse that has come with him, and what it has done to the daily conversation in the country.

    We'll see, I guess. A little depends, of course, on who the Democrats nominate. But I can't imagine this is an election they have to actually win, at this point. It's one they have to be smart enough not to lose. Keep in mind also, an economic snapshot in the months leading up to the election will have way more impact than the things we are talking about. The irony is that Donald Trump will have very little impact on that, particularly because he no longer controls the House, so they can't fiscally just recklessly blow up our debt some more and inject a sugar-high of some sort (maybe a big spending bill that they tout as "infrastructure") that would give some short-term juice at the expense of the future. Even if he could pull something like that off, way more of the phoniness of our economy has been due to monetary manipulation over the last couple of decades rather than fiscal games, and it has left a lot of people behind, creating wealth disparity and a lot of people struggling to make ends meet. Those people were clueless about what actually has screwed them, and they were susceptible to Trump's populist BS last time around. With their standards of living just as challenged today, they likely aren't falling for the same load of crap again. They'll move onto someone else making ridiculous promises to them.
     
    HanSenSE likes this.
  12. DanielSimpsonDay

    DanielSimpsonDay Well-Known Member

    Dave Mustaine, Michael Sweet, Blackie Lawless...
     
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