mtutiger

My issue isn't with covering him or even giving him this town hall, it's how they executed it. This was not an event that was supposed to inform the audience or get tough answers, it was basically a televised rally for the former President with an audience filled with people who are already in the tank for him. The only real saving grace is that there's a decent chance the ratings weren't all that good anyway (he was going up against NBA/NHL playoffs and there's still a ton of Trump fatigue outside of the hardcore base) and that every time he ends up in the news, his poll #'s among the broader electorate tends to go down.

The idea that CNN's CEO thinks it's the media's job to "make news" seems like a good reason to take the remote and put it on just about any other channel. (Fox/Newsmax/OANN nothwithstanding)

If Licht was interested in correcting some screwups involving overlooking parts of the electorate, he could have started by inviting some of the suburban moms who actually cared about things like Roe being overturned into the audience and delivered a surprisingly poor midterm for the GOP in 2022. But the myth of 2015/16 lives on because the financial incentives for the media dictate that.

That right there is some uncharacteristically bad defense from the Guardians... wow

Something to watch with polling: the breakdown between national polling and state polling. The latter has tended to be friendlier to Dems/Biden since the last Midterm cycle.

And yet Kevin will let him stick around lol

The other part about illegal immigration and the spike in asylum seekers (they are conflated a lot but are two different things, fwiw) is that the debate is completely uncentered around actually fixing the problem and more about short term band aids. Militarizing the border and forcing asylum seekers to apply for asylum in other jurisdictions, those are band aids.... they don't solve the problem of people making the choice to trek 1000s of miles to try to get to the United States. The only real way the problem is truly solved is through policy change and cooperation with origin countries that involve helping to raise the standard of living enough that it dissuades people from deciding to make that trek.... but OTOH, the people who are most animated by the border tend to be the same people who want to indiscriminately cut foreign aid and think it's all a waste of money, so my guess is that we will be dealing with the status quo regardless of who is in office going forward.

A good example of why "thoughts and prayers" are deeply unsatistying... they all come with an expiration date.

Texas resident here....Yes, Texas is trending blue. Those aren't just liberal talking points. Now, the degree to which it trends blue is dependent on a few things, including border issues and how it impacts the thinking of those who live down in the Valley. But the trend is there. Particularly given the population difference between places in the Texas Triangle (ie. DFW/Houston/SA/Austin) and the Valley, whose population is to Texas what the UP is to Michigan

The obsession with the Kennedys in general is very weird from the right wing conspiracy crowd... now added to that is the RFK Jr. campaign that is being cheerled as a stalking horse campaign by the same folks

As frustrating as Maton has been, Kreidler hasn't proven that he can be better. I think he sticks around, but batting him cleanup needs to stop for a while

Bieber hasn't had a clean inning all night, no damage regardless.

Honestly, Tork would probably be OK too... just cannot trust Maton up there to make contact against breaking/offspeed stuff

Good God, we live in stupid times

"Donald Trump Found Guilty of Sexual Assault. Here's Why that's Good News for Trump" -Maggie Haberman, probably

Why do they keep putting Wolfie Maton in the cleanup spot??? What an outrage

I know ballmich more or less disappeared after Trump was elected (except one time leading up to the 2020 election), but his brand of engagement really was a leading indicator of the direction that the GOP was lurching in.... so much of the themes and language he used have become increasingly mainstreamed in conservative thought.

I love how the same people that had no problem playing identity politics with the Nashville shooter all of a sudden are alluding to the Allen shooter as being a "false flag".... It's all so transparent and all so dumb.

Hence why I said: "Absent those, they would probably still be overperforming, but more modestly."

Gotta say, love being told by a guy that marinates in Russian propaganda apparently on a daily basis that I, guy who lives in a 50/50 neighborhood in a 50/50 county in a state that Donald Trump won and works in a pretty conservative workplace/industry, engages in "groupthink"... PigSnuggler probably needs to look in the mirror a little bit.