Amy Klobuchar is ending her bid for the presidency and will endorse Joe Biden. She is joining other mainstream Democrats in coalescing around Biden to head off the potential for Sanders to lead the ticket which could be disastrous not only at the presidential level, but also in many down ballot races.
On Saturday, Richard Parker laid out a great argument for restoring our Republic, using history as his guide. He’s virulently anti-Trumpism, but also opposes Bernie, and for good reason. Tough read, but a good one.
Five Thirty Eight has posted a Super Tuesday simulation so you can pick your scenario, and now that Buttigieg and Steyer have finally dropped out, the various scenarios are much clearer to see. Warren, Bloomberg, and Klobuchar supporters will hate this exercise since it won’t let you pick an individual primary simulation that has less than .5% chance of winning. I couldn’t come up with a scenario that shows a path to the nomination for Warren and Klobuchar, but if you pick Bloomberg even in states he’s trailing, the simulation gives a path for him to at least have a seat at the table during the convention. I played with the model for a bit, and was able to come up with wins for both Sanders and Biden. The model recalculates probabilities with each selection, so it’s interesting to play around with it. If you look at their primary forecast, “No One” is leading since there are still too many zero percent candidates diluting the votes of actual candidates. Bloomberg’s entry has also lowered the odds for everyone. Once Warren and Klobuchar finally drop out, the battle against Bloomberg will begin in earnest, and that will be a battle royal.
If you’re in a Super Tuesday state, be sure to vote tomorrow if you haven’t already.
In the first actual primary of 2020, Joe Biden smoked the opposition, taking 49% of primary voters in South Carolina. Bernie’s showing was lame, at less than 20%; the Zero Percenters trailed far behind him. Steyer has already dropped out. Time for Mayor Pete, Warren, Klobuchar, and all the rest to do the same. This is between Biden, Bloomberg, and Sanders. Everyone else needs to go home.
Trump and Giuliani are close to succeeding in permanently damaging Joe Biden through their illegal extortion scheme to smear him. Add that to attacks from the left who support zero chance presidential candidates, and that makes for an almost insurmountable task for Biden to take the nomination. It’s a shame, and it’s unfair, but Biden has a real problem. Similar to Hillary’s baggage in 2016, Biden has been saddled with a “scandal” that’s not a scandal at all. The problem? It doesn’t matter if it’s true; the damage is done. If Biden doesn’t bounce back by double digits in Nevada and South Carolina, it’s going to be over.
So, who can beat Trump in November? It’s clearly none of the top four Dem candidates, and that has been apparent for months. Trump is a vicious campaigner and slanderer, and I can’t see ANY of the primary leaders with enough fortitude or toughness to top him. There’s only one out there, and that’s Bloomberg. An ACTUAL billionaire, Bloomberg has the resources on top of NY toughness. He’s already hitting Trump where it hurts insulting him about his silly hairdo, heavy makeup, and obesity. He’s a street fighter, and an objective numbers guy. He’s already risen to third in the latest Quinnipiac poll and he’s not even on the early states’ ballots. Bloomberg won’t take any shit off of Trump, AND will attract those he needs to win – independents, moderate Republicans, and suburban women, the same coalition Barack Obama so successfully assembled in 2008 and 2012, and the one the Dems rode to victory in 2018. It’s a winning combination. Tom Friedman made the perfect case for Bloomberg in today’s NY Times. You can read that here.
And before you say it, I know some of you hate me for my opinions on this election and the last. I’ve been excoriated for those opinions and some of you have even accused me of misogyny and worse because I didn’t support Hillary, Harris, Klobuchar, or Warren. I’m about winning. Period. As I’ve said before, all policies are secondary in this election. There is one issue and one issue only in 2020 – beating Trump. I’m not going to waste even one second arguing over healthcare plans, student loans, war fighting, or even climate change. Those policy questions are important, critical even. But THIS is not the year for those discussions. As Friedman noted, another four Trump years will destroy our country. His corruption is total, and his control over the Senate, the Judiciary, and the DOJ is nothing short of shocking. Trump must be beaten and beaten badly to run him out of office. Bloomberg is our last, best chance if (when) Biden stumbles; the remaining candidates simply are not. I know you hate that, but it is what it is.
This afternoon, in the style of a banana republic, Republicans in the Senate, aided and abetted by Chief Justice John Roberts, voted to support Trump’s lawbreaking and stonewalling by acquitting him of both articles of impeachment, after not hearing one witness. Lamar Alexander was the nail in the coffin of the impeachment attempt, siding with corruption rather than The People. Murkowski caving on witnesses was the crowning blow. Romney was the only Republican to stand on his hind legs and vote to convict the SOB on Article 1, he voted to acquit on Article 2. Of course, the two Shitheads from Texas sided with the criminal. What an embarrassment. With this acquittal, the Senate has communicated to Trump that illegally using US taxpayer money to extort a foreign government for his own personal gain is fine. Foreign interference in US elections is welcome. Lying to and stonewalling Congress is Okey Dokey. Smearing good public servants for personal gain is appropriate, and using private individuals to form US policy is sweet.
The outcome was really never in doubt. Corrupt Republicans, led by henchman Mitch McConnell, resisted seeing any evidence, hearing any witnesses, or honoring their oaths to be impartial. Despite a large number of Americans wanting a fair trial, the Senate once again followed the orders of their masters who were at once stuffing their pockets full of money and threatening to put their “heads on a pike” should they dare oppose the president of the United States King Donald I Il Douche who is beholding only to Vladimir Putin, Erdogan, and Saudi princes.
If you think Trump acted badly after Barr successfully buried the Mueller report, you ain’t seen nothing yet. On his way to prison, Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, predicted that he wouldn’t leave office quietly. The Senate has now guaranteed that prediction. Without guardrails, Trump will unleash a massive effort to tilt the election toward himself, threatening opponents, and welcoming the Russians or any other foreign power who ally themselves with him. And, if by some remote chance this massive corruption results in an electoral loss, he will declare the election invalid and declare martial law. What comes next we’ve seen before in Germany, Italy, multiple Central American states, and Cambodia. And none of that was pretty.
I’m sad to say that the end of the great American experiment has come. After decades of lies and propaganda pumped out by Fox Noise, Rush Limbaugh, and other talking heads, aided by Russian intelligence, the US government, led by abjectly corrupt Republicans, has weakened our country to the point that truth is unfindable; under McConnell, the US Senate is a wasteland of weirdos, liars, morons, and the cynically corrupt. Much of the House is the same. Trump played millions of Americans for chumps, and after years of stupidifying, they fell for it, suspending disbelief and accepting massive gaslighting as truth. Corruption and criminality are now the norm. The vision of the Founders is dead, led to the grave by Trump, Mitch McConnell, his corrupt Republican Party, and enabled by the corrupt majority on the Supreme Court.
Everyone, even if they deny it, knows this was not a trial in any sense of the word. It was a sham from the moment it passed from Nancy Pelosi’s hands into McConnell’s. But we also something else – history will not be kind to those who did this. Generations behind us will look at this time in our history and will pinpoint the precise time of death of the most remarkable experiment in self government in world history.