US US Politics General - Discussion of President Biden and other politicians

 

[Overly Serious]

Edit: Can we not embed x265 videos? Or is the just my browser?

It just shows as audio for me and if I download the file and play it on a different OS that I know has h.265 support video appears. So don't know. Maybe just your browser lacks support for h.265?

This is Stanzi. A relatively funnywoman youtube shorts producer who doesn't seem too over the top. Has some genuinely goofy bits aping on the true crime fetishization community. She's a decent clown, she has my clown approval. Honk honk.

Ah, thank you. Alas, the first thing I click on in her channel turns out to be her mocking men for the whole Bear vs. Man thing. C'est la vie.

 

[Rykel22]

The thing with them trying to coast to a Harris victory/get close enough for cheating to be plausible is that the environment and players now are different than 2020. Then we had Trump wrestling with Covid and the Floyd riots and Biden as a throwback to the 2009-2016 Obama era. And a situation where they could print mail-ins without much issue since they locked everything down.

Now, we have a Biden-Harris admin that's got a shit economy around its neck and growing suspicion over the legitimacy of 2020 and how much of Biden's declining health was hidden. Add in Trump being made a political martyr with the dubious convictions and assassination attempt and no world ending threat forcing people to mail in, it becomes harder to keep the margins close.

 

[SCV]

It just shows as audio for me and if I download the file and play it on a different OS that I know has h.265 support video appears.

Same for me. Can you tell me what browser you're using?

Edit: take x264

 

[CaddestSlown]

Ah, thank you. Alas, the first thing I click on in her channel turns out to be her mocking men for the whole Bear vs. Man thing. C'est la vie.

I said relatively for a reason. Compared to others she has a pretty... lighthearted? Only just snarky kind of delivery and presentation. A not so really aggressive approach to how she handles things, but it's clear she has a left-leaning worldview. Less contempt, and more, 'this is silly clown world shit.' Not that that's ENTIRELY BAD. She's still capable of criticizing shit from her own camp, as you posted earlier.

I can respect anyone who clowns on their own team. All targets should be fair targets when it comes to goofs and jokes. People have become so goddamn allergic to satirizing and goofing on people they support. The lost art of the court jester should make its return some day.

 

[X Prime]

Wait a dam minute.
You stupid niggers are unironically doomposting that Hairy Kameltoe might win? Because fucking CNN polls says she in the lead by two billion percent?
Have you niggers heard her speak? Have you seen her policies? Her career history?

Everything else is fake and gay, why not elections and candidate favorability?

 

[Diana Moon Glampers]

Welcome to Whitepill Weekend with your host, Diana Moon Glampers.

Harris is up in the polls this week, but use extreme caution drawing conclusions about what this means for the final election results. It is very true the media is in a fawning mode and will simply praise anything that comes out of Kamala's mouth while sneering about "weird" Vance or whatever.

We're now coming up on week four of a campaign that is 100% substance-free--ironic, considering Harris's increasingly obvious habits.

The Kamala Harris campaign website still has no platform or policy position. The entire website is a brief candidate biography for Harris and Walz, plus donation/volunteering forms. That's all. No one knows what to put on this website. "Weird" is beginning to grow stale, and while the left has loved talking about how terribly angry the right is, no one has actually shown one of the supposed tantrums occurring all the time by right-wing people so very angry at being described as "weird" by the party of Sam Brinton.

Last time I did one of these whitepill updates, I said the media and voters were riding a high of relief over Biden's dropout and would eventually expect Kamala to say something. So when's that going to happen?

My belief is that the next two weeks will be crucial. The left-wing media is already starting to show cracks. They were fine with a week of partying, but it's gone on too long, and the questions have begun.

In the last 48 hours, the cracks have started to show. Better yet, it's starting at the top, with publications that other outlets take their cues from. These earliest murmurs will make it okay for other people to say the same thing, and more.

Yesterday, the New Yorker had this to say:

If Campaign Kamala sticks with this strategy of keeping the candidate on message through speeches and answering few questions from the press corps, will reporters just shrug and let it go? Should we care that she has not done a sitdown interview or had to answer a substantive policy question in weeks?

The answer is that reporters should care but shouldn’t expect voters, or even their audiences, to follow suit. This may be a minority view, but I don’t think that journalists are ethically bound to stop Trump and “preserve democracy,” nor do I think that every criticism of or investigation into a liberal candidate needs to be balanced with a cursory statement about how Trump is a lying felon. If Harris is running a campaign that’s full of energy but short on specifics, we should say that, even if we think that Harris’s content-light approach is an optimal strategy for winning in November.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post (while maintaining this is good, actually) has been forced to try to divine a possible platform based on frequency analysis of Kamala's recorded speech. While this article has a forced-grin positive spin, make no mistake: this is how friendly newsrooms issue a warning.

What does Kamala Harris believe? It’s hard to be sure. The vice president has been shedding her prior liberal policy commitments left and right and hasn’t yet replaced them with anything coherent. As her campaign approaches the three-week mark, though, we can glean some insight into what she thinks a Democratic presidential nominee should care about. To do this, we analyzed the words and phrases that Harris has most often used in her campaign — from stump speeches to campaign emails — and compared them with President Joe Biden’s language before he left the race.

The New York Times is even beginning to be impatient, and believes Kamala is shooting herself in the foot by staying so far away from any substantive policy issues or positions:

There’s no risk to Ms. Harris in running as a mainstream Democrat. There’s risk, however, if she doesn’t clearly define herself in the minds of voters. The good vibes surrounding her debut will eventually fade, and when they do Trump campaign staffers will try to define her if she hasn’t beaten them to the punch. The huge swing in public opinion about Ms. Harris over the last few weeks is a reminder that millions of people don’t have firmly held views of her; there’s no guarantee that some won’t swing back.

Yesterday, Rolling Stone decided that the Gaza issue is going to be a specific one where Kamala will need to offer an answer, not just platitudes:

Before they took the stage on Wednesday, Harris and Walz were introduced to the founders of the Uncommitted Movement, Layla Elabed and Abbas Alawieh, who say the campaign invited them to Wednesday’s rally. The invitation, extended after months of lobbying for both a meeting to discuss an arms embargo and speaking slot at the convention, was for a brief introduction during a photo line.

“It was only a few minutes in the photo line-up, and I did get really emotional,” Elabed tells Rolling Stone. “Harris was incredibly sympathetic. And I could feel her sympathy was very genuine… And when I said, ‘Will you meet us?’ She said: ‘Yes, let’s meet.’” Elabed and Alawieh say Harris then directed a staffer to arrange a meeting with them. They’re hopeful it will take place, but no date has been set.

Just an hour ago, the far-left folks at Jacobin joined the fray, saying what no one else dared: that all the forced grins are due to politburo control and punishment for disloyalty:

The press, it seems, will have to persist in the thankless task of demanding answers, even if we risk disrupting the good times.
The risk goes beyond just messing with the vibes — for smaller media outlets, daring to ask about Harris’s policy agenda risks financial punishment from the “big chunk of the public [that] no longer believes journalism is about seeking truth or holding power to account,” as the Atlantic writer Tyler Austin Harper put it. “Instead they see the media as a kind of jack-in-the-box that is supposed to pop up and say ‘Trump is bad!’ over and over . . . like a kid who wants to be read the same bedtime story over every night and throws a fit if you pull a different book off the shelf.”

Because Harris has not outlined a clear legislative agenda, I don’t know where she will end up on policy. She has a history of airing compelling populist economic rhetoric — some of which she’s now echoing on the campaign — but also a history of retreating or soft-pedaling in the face of pressure. We’re certainly doing our part to try to find out what her actual agenda will be (while also aggressively covering the Donald Trump–J. D. Vance ticket), but I’m not sure anyone will ever get clear answers in a political environment where even asking questions is equated with disloyalty.

If you wondered what happened with the media, that Jacobin quote explains it very, very well.

The media outlets that have no idea what to do with a totally policy-free candidate have decided this is a "vibes election" that simply doesn't require policy. They picked this all up at the same time, using the same tired soundbite that appears to have originated nowhere, indicating an actual origin in secret calls from campaign strategists.

The VP pageant is over. The convention is about to begin. People are going to expect new material. Which brings me to my second point:

I've been reviewing a lot of Kamala material in the last week or so, from her SF DA campaign until today. What I have seen is that her current speeches are only barely revised from what she developed for speeches 20 years ago. She is literally using the same anecdotes and telling them with the same words. It's especially strange because it's not like her writing is especially good, where you'd think "make a note and say it just that way next time, that'll never be expressed that well ever again" would be a viable principle.

If Kamala was a stand-up comic, she'd have about one good set's worth of material. That's about to start playing against her.

It's going to be even worse because she's a woman. At some point, a few good conservative pieces by Republican women will be published that call out how awful it would be for the first woman president to get there on a "vibes campaign" when every man has been expected to have a platform. The DEI candidate stuff is going to come back into play more and more as Harris proves to be an empty suit. In a month or two the articles saying "don't you feel duped, independent voters who thought Kamala seemed like a breath of fresh air because everyone seemed to think she'd have a plan? Isn't it weird how the media went along with all the campaign surrogates and never bothered asking questions?" will be a steady drumbeat.

I believe the Harris campaign is in a state of analysis paralysis, surrounded by surveys and crosstabs and big data numbers but unable to decide which exact combination of disavowals and re-avowals will gain her more than she loses. Typically, when someone with some internal instability has this level of analysis paralysis, what happens next is that they make an impulsive decision that casts the data aside.

What's worst for the Harris campaign is that they're right: nearly any decision they can make will cost them votes versus the honeymoon vibes high. Once you've decided you're entitled to that level of votes and nothing else will do, you'll just stand around paralyzed until you're forced into a choice, then inevitably will decide you must have made the wrong one. We may see some aggressive flip-flopping even between her first stabs at a policy position and November.

That just about wraps it up for this week. Next week, we'll talk about phone spam and how Kamala is already wearing out her welcome...plus signs that all is not as well as they would claim when it comes to fundraising.

 

[Sekirodiealot]

I'm convinced there's a lot of people in here who were in middleschool and highschool during the 2016 elections. I don't understand their points of view.

I graduated highschool in 2016 around the time the elections kicked off

 

[FMW13]

Lmao imagine if a Democrat politician had as many skeletons in the closet as Vance does. You'd be all over him. Go look at the pictures of the San Fran fag parade Bowman-Hamel-Vance attended. It's got purple haired guys with mohawks wearing nothing but frilly miniskirts making out with each other. Your eyeliner-wearing idol thinks that's great.

All of the above applies to Biden in 2020. Guess who "won" the election?

That I'm right? This is 2022 all over again. You people have the same mindset as Charlie Brown kicking the football.

Are you HHH’s burner account?

 

[The Nothingness]

The people who are calling me "weird" think that it's weird that I don't want to live in a pod in a Democrat bluehive city and eat the bugs.

Guilty as charged. I'm big weird then.

The people who stick things up their asshole and believe they can change their gender by taking drugs and mutilating their bodies say you are weird.

 

[FMW13]

Never underestimate the power of media control, "orange man bad", and identity politics. Am I saying Trump has no chance? No, but Kamala shouldn't be underestimated. Not because she's a good politician but with how much identity politics and astroturfing is being put out there's still a chance she can win. Though I will say that she will be awful as president even if she does win.

Oh I defenitly agree. There still is the danger of fuckery. But I feel something might happen at the DNC.

 

[UncleAdolf]

@Diana Moon Glampers

Probably true... but c'mon, now. You're just egging the doomers on with this.

 

[Jacques1194]

The thing with them trying to coast to a Harris victory/get close enough for cheating to be plausible is that the environment and players now are different than 2020. Then we had Trump wrestling with Covid and the Floyd riots and Biden as a throwback to the 2009-2016 Obama era. And a situation where they could print mail-ins without much issue since they locked everything down.

Now, we have a Biden-Harris admin that's got a shit economy around its neck and growing suspicion over the legitimacy of 2020 and how much of Biden's declining health was hidden. Add in Trump being made a political martyr with the dubious convictions and assassination attempt and no world ending threat forcing people to mail in, it becomes harder to keep the margins close.

I honestly think this election will depend on how many people dont want Trump more than actually liking Harris. I'm seeing so many normal everyday people going "Both candidates are horrible." Even my democrat leaning friends dont like Harris, but will probably vote for her because she's not Trump.

 

[The Ugly One]

It's just dooming based on stuff like:

View attachment 6292963

I hope this wakes people up to the fact that these things can be astroturfed like everything else.

There's no evidence whatsoever anybody is doing that. A better explanation for why every single indicator is starting to trend toward Kamala is that Democrat voters are starting to warm up to her and are deciding that stopping Hiltermort from genociding transfolx is important. 2020 was a referendum on Trump, and it was narrow enough they could cheat to win, despite Biden being the worst candidate of all time and running the worst campaign of all time. They're just rerunning the 2020 playbook without lockdowns; why assume it can't possibly work?

Have you niggers heard her speak? Have you seen her policies? Her career history?

Could have said the same about Joe Biden in 2020, and he won.

 

[CarlKingofDucks]

When the formerly orange man gets in again I hope he actually punishes his enemies this time.

 

[FrancineCansMcGee]

Go look at the pictures of the San Fran fag parade Bowman-Hamel-Vance attended. It's got purple haired guys with mohawks wearing nothing but frilly miniskirts making out with each other. Your eyeliner-wearing idol thinks that's great.

Remember when John Kerry decided to do a, "Look, I love guns!" photo opp? That didn't change anybody's votes on the pro or anti-gun control side. Why not? Because at the end of the day it didn't change anything about his career leading up to that point or how he would govern as President. It takes a little more than this to change how people perceive someone. Nobody is going to think Vance is weirder on gay issues than Harris/Walz just like nobody was going to think Kerry was more pro-gun than George W. Bush.

 

[Bob's Fuckass Head]

Interestingly enough walz has links to a pro Hitler, pro Palestinian Muslim guy.

https://www.rvmnews.com/2024/08/kamalas-vp-pick-linked-to-pro-hamas-cleric-who-shared-pro-hitler-glorification/

I didn't see one yet, so just here's an archive of that article just in case.

 

[Thomas Talus]

Are you HHH’s burner account?

He's just angry because Ukraine launched a special military operation into his homeland.

 

[mlanguishi]

Remember when John Kerry decided to do a, "Look, I love guns!" photo opp? That didn't change anybody's votes on the pro or anti-gun control side. Why not? Because at the end of the day it didn't change anything about his career leading up to that point or how he would govern as President. It takes a little more than this to change how people perceive someone. Nobody is going to think Vance is weirder on gay issues than Harris/Walz just like nobody was going to think Kerry was more pro-gun than George W. Bush.
View attachment 6293617

That reminds me of my alltime favorite politician being an idiot with guns (Al Gore in Vietnam here). Dick Cheney shooting his friend would've been #1 if it was on video though.

 

[Get the rope Macaulay!]

, but to engage with the crowd.

its the markings of a good speaker, if you're going to say the same shit to everyone, just write it down. this is literal pubic speaking 101

and they are the lawyers who far and away go to trial the most

its very easy to be a shitty prosecutor and still win, the judge is almost always on your side, and the jury usually is too. its a big reason most people take plea deals, the jury sides with the prosecutor a hilariously high amount of the time. Look how good Rudy Giuliani was and realize despite how bullshit RICO is he still took down the mafia despite being as incompetent in the 80s as he is today. Also if she's a prosecutor that means she's mostly spending time around the same people outside of the jury. a lot easier to talk to friends in public than a crowd of weirdos.

One of my great grandfathers was an immigrant from Russia (modern day Ukraine)

so we know which side your family was on in the revolution.

! Ben Franklin and Charles Carroll would want you to.

not true. Ben hated the bill of rights and therefore your freedom of speech.

Lol Steve Martin said no when they called him up to play Steve walz

his ego wouldn't take it. Steve Martin did Roger Stone for SNL and when the crowd didn't laugh at his joke about being a "wild and crazy guy" he said he was retiring from show biz altogether. He understands the demo for SNL isn't the type that knows or cares about who the fuck Steve Martin is and the ones that do *gasp* are probably conservatives at this point. It makes a lot of sense, most of the other SNL alumni he was with in the 70s all have shows on Fox Nation or other conservative channels, so being proudly pro-Walz would mean none of those white hairs show up to his next banjo performance. SNL really fucked him on the Roger Stone thing, as much as people talk about that era, most of their celebrity political cameos didn't play out and him not even getting a laugh on such a blatant memberberry was probably a real sign for him.

The astroturfed "weird" thing isn't working,

its actually working amazingly on the people who its supposed to work on : Democrats planning on flipping, it reminds them of why they hate the GOP and how they'll be ostracized if they become open trump supporters. Imagine being someone who was part of the in-crowd in their little friend group, knowing you'll be abandoned by your "new family" if you become a trump supporter would be quite the thing to keep you in line. And if you really do believe the voting results in the 2020 election, then as a democrat your strategy really should be one of containment because you understand you can win easily as long as none of the people who voted biden in 2020 forget to this time around.

 

[Hey Johnny Bravo]

I have serious FOMO because I wasn't able to watch the Trump rally with you folks last night and post in the thread.