OK, Hear Me Out on this One…
Some of our Salon customers believe I’m a conspiracy theorist, so to fuel that conclusion here’s another one. Hear me out…There have been rumors flying around for over a year that Trump was going to replace Pantywaist Pence with Nikki Haley. That’s been fed by weird tweets from Haley herself and recently commentary by Paul Begala predicting Trump is going to do just that. Everyone in Trumpworld has been lamely trying to slap that one down, but I’ve never been convinced that Trump is NOT going to take Pence out.
It’s no secret that Pence is a toad of the first order, adding no political capital to Trump’s dwindling account. He’s a Yes Man of the worst order, complete with his longing looks of Trump adoration and his aggrieved voice whenever he’s burdened with explaining Trump’s latest soiling of the carpets in the WH. Now, Trump has put him in charge of the Coronavirus response, a job that he is totally unsuited (not to mention unqualified) for. Pence’s response so far has been predictably awful, from mixed messaging to photos of a room full of white men deciding the fates of over 300 million Americans. The effort is going to fail, and, in fact, has probably already failed. There is almost certainly going to be an rapid increase in cases and bad news of larger outbreaks. When that happens, guess who’s going to be the patsy? That’s right, Mike Pence. Trump will have “no choice” but to remove him as VP for incompetence and get a more “beautiful” and “fantastic” and “best qualified ever” candidate which will just so happen to be Haley. It will be a cynical effort to save his suburban mom voting block.
Call me crazy…
Okay, first comment. I’m sharing this bumper car with you, El. (We’re friends, I call him by his first name.)
Begala sees it but hints the size of the Battleship Texas have been dropped and made large holes in common sense. Anybody want to make a bet with the Juanita/Jefe consortium that we’re right.
By the way, Begala grew up in Fort Bend County and worked at Court’s Hardware store in Stafford. He was also the president of the student body at UT. He’s genuinely a decent man.
1I gave up on trying to guess what the limits are to Trump”s behavior years ago.
You already listed the most likely characteristics Pence has to stay V.P. from Trump’s point of view.
Now if you really want me to call you crazy, okay, but probably not on this topic.
2El Jefe that’s some “bait and switch” of the highest order. Maybe the one time you may be right, and now we can call you crazy?
3@jane – I think you already have, plus a few other things.
4Trump just blamed Obama for the Coronavirus situation. Pence is a back-up
5Nikki Haley strikes me as the Colin Powell of this administration. She provides a small aura of credibility, microscopic compared to Colin Powell, but it’s the best Trump can find. She has the appearance of not acting the complete yes-woman, as she kinda-sorta one time stood up to Trump, but she’ll carry water for him without complaint.
I see her as a weasel in lemming’s clothing, willing to lead us all off the cliff, and as a woman she can undercut concerns about the Misogynist in Chief.
Pence is dull, Haley is the shiny new thing Trump needs to trot out on stage for 2020 election campaigns. I’m not a betting man, but I’d put a few bucks down on your conspiracy coming to pass El Jefe.
6I started tweeting yesterday that Trump put Pence in charge so he would have a fall guy. However I had not considered the Nikki Haley replacement yet.
7I agree with Karen, Rick, El Jefe, and JJ herownself. Pence will be the scapegoat. Haley as running mate is TIC’s lame attempt to lure back white suburban college-educated women. Ain’t gonna happen – that luring back part. TIC irrepairably damaged his credibility with the Mom Vote & he’s only going to get crazier. Besides, Pence just might find himself getting sworn in when the Orange Idiot drops comatose or dead. Take a look & listen to recent press conferences: slurred speech, droopy right eye, posture crooked & more sloppy than usual. The bodily stress of keeping up lies + germaphobia + self-medicating anti-histamines & whatever else has the TIC runnin’ on empty.
And for a few grins – https://politicalpunchline.com
8Nikki Haley? What, was Sarah Palin not available?
9I’ve seen speculation on the twitter machine about this for a few days. It seems like Haley has been angling for (sucking up for) just this thing since last year. Now Pence has been put into the position of being the fall guy even though the “buck” stops at trump’s desk when he gutted the infectious division* in 2018. Dems need to find more Haley dirt and get it PR ready so it’s ready to roll out if this happens.
*whatever it was called, you know what I’m talking about!
10I think you underestimate demented donnies delusions.
11Yeah I accept that he will replace pence based upon designed failure of coronavirus response but give me odds and I would be willing to bet he either names ivanka or jared as replacement vp
On the same topic, but for the eventual Democratic presidential candidate, probably Biden:
Why not select Barack Obama as his/our 2020 VP running mate?
I don’t know if it’s allowed for a former President to serve as a VP, and possibly [quite probably?] assume the Presidency. It would likely assure a victory, with coattails too.
But even better, this would drive the Rethugs, and especially Comrade Trump, absolutely stark raving slobbering mad!
Just imagine how many aging MAGAots would die off from stress-related causes [perhaps even YKW], with a move like this, between the Dem convention until November.
One MAGAot down is worth ~four ‘maybe’ potential Dem voters on election day.
Anyone know if such a candidacy is allowed? If so, let’s do it [and y’all know I’m not particularly fond of BHO’s presidential chops, but whatever it takes…].
12Bingo!
It would be quite legal for President Obama to run and serve as the Democratic Vice President, and then serve again as President should it become necessary.
I think that he would be willing to do this, for the good of the nation [and several other quite interesting reasons, for one– just imagine the effect on the Mango Mussolini…].
What the fuck are we waiting for?
I know there are a number of deserving candidates for a VP selection, but we need an absolute ‘sure thing’. Who better than Barack Obama?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_President_of_the_United_States#Term_of_office
“Additionally, neither the Constitution’s eligibility provisions nor the Twenty-second Amendment’s presidential term limit explicitly disqualify a twice-elected president from serving as vice president. As of the 2016 election cycle however, no former president has tested the amendment’s legal restrictions or meaning by running for the vice presidency.[60][61]”
13k@11: maybe that’s another reason Trump has moved his official state of residence from NY to FL. The constitution forbids a president and vice-president being from the same state (yeah, I know: weird, but it’s in Amendment 12). So he leaves Jughead and spouse behind for that.
Naw, who am I kidding? That requires foresight and intelligence that neither he nor his minions are capable of. He’s bailing out to FL to avoid the NY state subpoenas that are sure to hound him for the rest of his unnatural life.
14Okay, you’re crazy. If this truly is the plan, you give Trump undue credence; he’s utterly incapable of this kind of analysis – this stinks of Jared.
15So 2020 will be Trump, Haley with Rona Romney as GOP head against Biden, Klobuchar and Pete as head of the DNC?
16I’m sure Trump wants to replace Pence but not with Nikki. Im thinking Trump really wants to run with his little Vanky. His staff will have a hell of a time talking him out of it.
17THIS ^^^^^^^^^^^
18I honestly mean no disrespect El Jefe but I file this observation
19of yours about our mewling moron VP as “really, Captain Obvious?”. The other big plus for 45 is that HE didn’t have to get too close to any Covid germs.
That’s not a conspiracy theory,El Jefe. It’s a logical conclusion. Pence is utterly, obviously, unfit for the head of a committee determining the US response to COVID-19. We are miles behind the eight ball, already into community spread, with too few dollars, too few scientists, too few tests, too few hospital beds, and on, and on, and on. We’re begging people not to buy surgical masks, because hospital personnel might run out, and they’re made in (you guessed it!) China.
Trump doesn’t like Pence and never has, any more than Pence likes Trump. I think a lot of people–at least on the blogs I read–figured out that Pence had been set up to fail on the day he was appointed. Replacing him with Nikki Haley? Wait till Trump’s base finds out that her parents are from India and she’s a Hindu. They’re not gonna like that.
20He cannot easily jettison Pence, who is a darling of the evangelicals in a way that Haley is not.
21The evangelicals are already tied to demented donnie to the point they canNOT desert him.
22Besides “family” values would be selling point for Ivanka
None of this means anything depending upon what deserted path his random tongue decides to wander down that morning
If that happens, that would be when Melania packs up and leaves! And tRump will never see his youngest child ever again.
23Well, hell done had a frost! I finally agree with Jefe on something. Prior to my deactivation of my FB account in response to the flood of Anarchist BS from the Bernster/trumsters on Wednesday – I posted the same thing the day after the appointment. God I wish 45 would get a better Showrunner – they just keep jumping the shark and no one will cancel this failed reality show.
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