U.S. Federal Elections 2024, Presidential, Senate and U.S. House of Representatives

[Josh]

Yet another warning sign for Trump…nearly 20% / 200k voters in Florida voted for DeSantis or Haley rather than Trump, and that was after he had already secured the nomination. Ie, that many people showed up just to specifically vote against him even when there was bo hope of pushing him off the ticket. Probably not super relevant since there is little chance of Florida tipping blue, but also 25% in Arizona did the same thing. It is hard to account for the difference between polling results that have Trump in the lead but the actual primary results that indicate a divided Republican Party.

[17thfabn]

40 minutes ago, Josh said:

Yet another warning sign for Trump…nearly 20% / 200k voters in Florida voted for DeSantis or Haley rather than Trump, and that was after he had already secured the nomination. Ie, that many people showed up just to specifically vote against him even when there was bo hope of pushing him off the ticket.

In Ohio we had our primary election yesterday.

We had several other people running for spots other than president, mostly unopposed. Very low turn out since the presidential selection is already locked up. I don't know what most people's motive for was for voting in the primary. My main interest was the U.S. Senate primary. 

The most important  election on the primary ballot in Ohio was for the Republican's selection for U.S. Senate candidate. Trump's endorsed candidate won with a little over 50% in a three way race. I hope this is a better pick than Walker in Georgia or Oz in Pa. Ohio U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown is pretty far left for moderately conservative Ohio. Yet he has won three times and doesn't seem to stir up much controversy. 

In Ohio Trump got 79% of the vote. So close to the Florida numbers.  I voted against him as a protest. And yet I will probably vote for him in November. 

I think an important voting block for Trump is:

"Republican's that detest him but think his policies are better that the Democrats". I should trade mark that. 

 I didn't like Trump in 2016 or 2020. I had a poor opinion of him ever since I vaguely heard of him back in the 80's when I was stationed in New York. Still I think the policies under Trump were much better than Biden's.

I don't think a lot of Biden's supporters have a warm and fuzzy feeling for him. Most support him because they support his policies. And a visceral hatred of Trump.

Trump on the other hand has that hard core that absolutely loves him. What percentage of the voting eligible people are they?

[Josh]

The OH senate choice is probably sub optimal in terms of best chance of winning, but I think Trump won Ohio by 7% in 2020 so it might not matter.

[17thfabn]

1 hour ago, Josh said:

The OH senate choice is probably sub optimal in terms of best chance of winning, but I think Trump won Ohio by 7% in 2020 so it might not matter.

Trump had pledged to not endorse during Ohio's Senatorial primary. Then went ahead and endorsed. He needs to stay out of local primaries. Only support some one once the locals who know the local scene have picked some one. 

[Josh]

10 minutes ago, 17thfabn said:

Trump had pledged to not endorse during Ohio's Senatorial primary. Then went ahead and endorsed. He needs to stay out of local primaries. Only support some one once the locals who know the local scene have picked some one. 

The problem is that Trump enjoys making everything about him and that he'd rather have someone he considers loyal run and lose than risk someone not loyal running and winning. He is unconcerned whether Republicanism wins or thrives; he is only in the business of generating lackies.

[Harold Jones]

11 hours ago, Josh said:

The problem is that Trump enjoys making everything about him and that he'd rather have someone he considers loyal run and lose than risk someone not loyal running and winning. He is unconcerned whether Republicanism wins or thrives; he is only in the business of generating lackies.

I think he really gets off being the kingmaker in the primaries. He can pass off his candidates failures in the general as proof of election fraud, sabotage by rinos, the deep state or candidates who lied to him and weren't maga true believers.  

[Ivanhoe]

https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/is-the-republican-party-finally-doing-the-election-due-diligence-it-should-have-been-doing-since-2020/
 

Quote

 

This new apparently aggressive approach began almost immediately after Michael Whatley and Lara Trump took over as co-chairs of the committee from Ronna McDaniel, who for seven years seemed incapable of achieving anything beneficial for Republicans, or conservatives for that matter. In addition, a new chief of operations, Chris LaCivita, was brought in.

Four days after these people took over they did a complete house-cleaning of the staff at the committee.

 

Dunno how the new crew will turn out, but they can't hardly do worse than Ronna.

 

[Josh]

I suspect they will run what’s left of it into the ground. I think the GOPs chances of keeping the House have plummeted.

[Mikel2]

On 3/18/2024 at 10:34 PM, R011 said:

JFK has one slight disadvantage over both Trump and Biden or he'd be a sure in.  He died in 1963.  His son JFK Jr died in a plane crash in 1999.  The Kennedy who is currently running is Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the late president's nephew.

 

Judging by the evolution of his brother (Ted), who was one of the architects of the modern democrat party with all its crazyness, I do not have much hope for JFK had he lived longer.

[Josh]

Rep Green has apparently filed a motion for removal of Johnson as Speaker. I think she’s about to become the most hated member of her caucus, pulling this shit not only again, but in an election year.

[17thfabn]

9 hours ago, Josh said:

Rep Green has apparently filed a motion for removal of Johnson as Speaker. I think she’s about to become the most hated member of her caucus, pulling this shit not only again, but in an election year.

She is already very high on the Democrats most hated list. Now that she is working her way up the Republican shiite list, hatred for her can be a bipartisan issue.

With the current balance of power in the U.S. House, if there are no defections the current speaker should be able to hold on.  (218 Republican,  213 Democrat)

[glenn239]

21 hours ago, Josh said:

Rep Green has apparently filed a motion for removal of Johnson as Speaker. I think she’s about to become the most hated member of her caucus, pulling this shit not only again, but in an election year.

What was her motive for doing that?

[Josh]

10 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

What was her motive for doing that?

I’ve no idea.

[Josh]

Apparently the motion to remove does not force a vote the way she filed it (House and Senate procedures can be quite arcane) so this is more of a warning shot not to give any money to Ukraine. The pro Russian wing of the GOP has enough pull to force Ukrainian aid to go through a discharge partition.

[glenn239]

18 minutes ago, Josh said:

Apparently the motion to remove does not force a vote the way she filed it (House and Senate procedures can be quite arcane) so this is more of a warning shot not to give any money to Ukraine. 

Not sending US taxpayer money to line the pockets of the US military industrial complex seems like an issue alot of voters can support.  You sure this is going to make her more hated, or just more hated amongst neocons and Washington swamp types?

[Josh]

On 3/23/2024 at 10:53 AM, glenn239 said:

Not sending US taxpayer money to line the pockets of the US military industrial complex seems like an issue alot of voters can support.  You sure this is going to make her more hated, or just more hated amongst neocons and Washington swamp types?

Ukraine aid still has bipartisan support among voters and lawmakers despite Trumps infatuation with Putin and his attempts to help Russia win its war. And regardless of how one feels about Ukraine aid, the bigger problem that MTG will be hated for is again dividing the Republican caucus. To put her move into perspective: it was condemned by Gaetz, the instigator of the *first* removal. So MTG is not making friends even among the MAGA lawmakers and Freedom Caucus (which she was kicked out of).

 

I do not think it is a stretch to think she will be the most hated member of Congress if Johnson ends up being removed. MTG just turned to Ted Cruz and said “hold my beer”.

Edited March 24 by Josh

[17thfabn]

RFK Jr. picked his running mate. I've never heard of her. Probably will make ZERO difference.

 

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2024/03/26/rfk-jr-running-mate-nicole-shanahan-election-spoiler/73110403007/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicole_Shanahan

 

 

 

Edited March 28 by 17thfabn

[Harold Jones]

I've heard her major qualifications is that she is rich enough to fund the campaign. Oh, and she thinkss vaccines cause autism.

[Josh]

5 hours ago, Harold Jones said:

I've heard her major qualifications is that she is rich enough to fund the campaign. Oh, and she thinkss vaccines cause autism.

Pretty easy on the eyes too, though I suspect her tech bro connections count for more. Google her and set it to images and a musky scent falls over your screen fairly quickly.

[17thfabn]

8 hours ago, Josh said:

Pretty easy on the eyes too, though I suspect her tech bro connections count for more. Google her and set it to images and a musky scent falls over your screen fairly quickly.

Yes she is an attractive lady. Her "tech bro connections" could also bring in more dollars. 

Is your musky scent a veiled reference to an alleged affair with a certain well known tech billionaire? 

[Josh]

I actually did not know there were allegations of such, but certainly they are pictured together enough that they seem to know each other.

Being rich and a vaccine denier seems to be her major qualifications.

[seahawk]

If she helps to divide the left vote, good.

[Skywalkre]

Eh... VP picks tend to be meaningless.

As for Kennedy I've heard several pundits now mention that while the Ds are taking this seriously he may actually help them.  There are apparently some indications that  voters in these polls are mostly reacting to the name and he initially gets mostly D support because of it... but when voters actually discover his views he loses said D support and instead picks up support that would go to Trump.

Makes sense.  This election will be even more unpopular than Trump v Clinton back in '16.  Anyone remember that NYT infographic that showed how many eligible voters actually picked Trump and Clinton in the primaries?  We likely have another situation this year where a single digit % of voters picked these two candidates (I guess in defense of D voters they never really had another option... but Rs certainly did).  A lot of folks simply aren't paying attention and don't want to pay attention right now. 

Kind of related to that, David Brooks had an interesting comment this last week.  There's been a lot of talk about the fundraising difference between Biden and Trump (Biden is way ahead).  According to Brooks there are two things the experts who have studied this have learned - the first is that spending actually appears to have very little influence on voter turnout (it does help, but not by much... and while those who spend more tend to win it appears it's more likely that money follows the success instead of causing it) and that voters tend to have a short memory (ads are only effective for a week and then it's as if folks never heard them).

[Josh]

51 minutes ago, Skywalkre said:

Eh... VP picks tend to be meaningless.

As for Kennedy I've heard several pundits now mention that while the Ds are taking this seriously he may actually help them.  There are apparently some indications that  voters in these polls are mostly reacting to the name and he initially gets mostly D support because of it... but when voters actually discover his views he loses said D support and instead picks up support that would go to Trump.

Makes sense.  This election will be even more unpopular than Trump v Clinton back in '16.  Anyone remember that NYT infographic that showed how many eligible voters actually picked Trump and Clinton in the primaries?  We likely have another situation this year where a single digit % of voters picked these two candidates (I guess in defense of D voters they never really had another option... but Rs certainly did).  A lot of folks simply aren't paying attention and don't want to pay attention right now. 

Kind of related to that, David Brooks had an interesting comment this last week.  There's been a lot of talk about the fundraising difference between Biden and Trump (Biden is way ahead).  According to Brooks there are two things the experts who have studied this have learned - the first is that spending actually appears to have very little influence on voter turnout (it does help, but not by much... and while those who spend more tend to win it appears it's more likely that money follows the success instead of causing it) and that voters tend to have a short memory (ads are only effective for a week and then it's as if folks never heard them).

I think that is a fair assessment - both that VPs are meaningless and that money is more a of a measuring stick than an effector. I miss the old 538 site; they actually used small donation money as an adjustment variable in one of their polling average models because they felt it was a good gauge of enthusiasm. And as much as people like me say that Dems are not enthusiastic for Biden (anecdotally, I have not done a study or anything), the money donations seem to indicate that if they are not enthusiastic for Biden, they are at least a bit enthusiastic for not Trump. But I think the flip side of that is that Trump voters might have just been exhausted by all the various donation drives (stop the steal, player cards, indictment donations, meme stock, bibles, etc). There probably is still enthusiasm to vote but perhaps less enthusiasm to spend yet more money.

I suspect November is going to be impossible to predict this year; there are just too many outlining variables.

Edited March 31 by Josh

[17thfabn]

3 hours ago, Josh said:

I suspect November is going to be impossible to predict this year; there are just too many outlining variables.

Who known what events in the coming months will shape the election.

And then there are is proverbial October surprise:

In mid-October 1840, shortly before the 1840 presidential election, federal prosecutors announced plans to charge top Whig Party officials with "most stupendous and atrocious fraud" for paying Pennsylvanians to cross state lines and vote for Whig candidates in New York during the 1838 elections.[3] In 1844, an abolitionist newspaper published an article, purportedly based on a book titled Roorback's Tour Through the Southern and Western States in the Year 1836, implying that James K. Polk had his slaves branded.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_surprise