President Mumble
This morning NPR played a clip of President Biden saying something but I couldn't understand what he was saying. Is his voice beyond help or would he benefit from a voice coach?
-----
Four years ago today, in the Biden/Trump two way polls, Biden was 8.6% ahead. Today, he's 2.7% behind. That's an 11.3% drop. Voters have experienced a Trump term, and a Biden term, and more of them would rather have another Trump term than another Biden term. Not even counting the Electoral College bias toward Trump.
In November 2020, Biden won the state of Virginia by 10 points. He's currently tied with Trump in Virginia, according to polls. Again, a double-digit drop.
Whereas incumbent US Senator Kaine of Virginia, a Democrat, leads his Republican challenger by 14 points. Virginia doesn't hate incumbent Democrats in general, but Biden might lose Virginia at the presidential level for the first time in 20 years.
Yet, I was reading some reader comments over at the New York Times, and a lot of Democrats were saying stuff like the DNC rigged the primaries for Biden -- look at how Democratic voters displace blame from themselves! There were other options on the primary ballot, and voters could have at least cast a protest vote against Biden, to show Biden that he was no longer their choice. When voters did this to LBJ back in 1968, LBJ dropped out. Democrats, you have only yourselves to blame for backing such an unpopular incumbent. But, no, they'll scapegoat "The DNC".
-----
Meanwhile, Republicans decided to have an actual party platform this year, unlike 2020. I took a look, and although I did see some outright lies and some things that made me laugh out loud, I think their platform is probably a good illustration of what Trump wants to do as President. It even looks like he wrote it himself, it looks like a superlong tweet of his, including all sorts of inappropriate capitalizations and even ALL CAPS.
There's no need to try to suss out what Project 2025 is up to or whatever, just read the platform.
-----
And, Trump chose first-term Senator JD Vance as his VP. Vance had zero political experience before his election to the US Senate (from Ohio, where he was born) in 2022, although he was well known as an author for his 2016 memoir: Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis. Most candidates for national office pen a memoir, but in this case Vance wrote his several years before starting his political career, so as far as memoirs by politicians go, it might be more honest? I haven't read it, but I'm curious.
His memoir was made into an Oscar-nominated film in 2020, which is probably unique for a national politician, except he wasn't one yet, but the film was generally panned for having big-name actors play small-town poor people -- Hollywood carpetbagging.
Usually the choice of a VP has little effect on the overall race, even when the VP choice was poorly made. I doubt there's anybody who was planning on voting for Trump who will not now because of Vance, or anybody who was planning on voting for Biden who will not now because of Vance. But Trump passed over the chance to pick somebody other than another white male, who could also have more experience than Vance. White guys don't need experience to run the country, though, they're already white guys, that's all you need, to be a white guy.
-----
Four years ago today, in the Biden/Trump two way polls, Biden was 8.6% ahead. Today, he's 2.7% behind. That's an 11.3% drop. Voters have experienced a Trump term, and a Biden term, and more of them would rather have another Trump term than another Biden term. Not even counting the Electoral College bias toward Trump.
In November 2020, Biden won the state of Virginia by 10 points. He's currently tied with Trump in Virginia, according to polls. Again, a double-digit drop.
Whereas incumbent US Senator Kaine of Virginia, a Democrat, leads his Republican challenger by 14 points. Virginia doesn't hate incumbent Democrats in general, but Biden might lose Virginia at the presidential level for the first time in 20 years.
Yet, I was reading some reader comments over at the New York Times, and a lot of Democrats were saying stuff like the DNC rigged the primaries for Biden -- look at how Democratic voters displace blame from themselves! There were other options on the primary ballot, and voters could have at least cast a protest vote against Biden, to show Biden that he was no longer their choice. When voters did this to LBJ back in 1968, LBJ dropped out. Democrats, you have only yourselves to blame for backing such an unpopular incumbent. But, no, they'll scapegoat "The DNC".
-----
Meanwhile, Republicans decided to have an actual party platform this year, unlike 2020. I took a look, and although I did see some outright lies and some things that made me laugh out loud, I think their platform is probably a good illustration of what Trump wants to do as President. It even looks like he wrote it himself, it looks like a superlong tweet of his, including all sorts of inappropriate capitalizations and even ALL CAPS.
There's no need to try to suss out what Project 2025 is up to or whatever, just read the platform.
-----
And, Trump chose first-term Senator JD Vance as his VP. Vance had zero political experience before his election to the US Senate (from Ohio, where he was born) in 2022, although he was well known as an author for his 2016 memoir: Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis. Most candidates for national office pen a memoir, but in this case Vance wrote his several years before starting his political career, so as far as memoirs by politicians go, it might be more honest? I haven't read it, but I'm curious.
His memoir was made into an Oscar-nominated film in 2020, which is probably unique for a national politician, except he wasn't one yet, but the film was generally panned for having big-name actors play small-town poor people -- Hollywood carpetbagging.
Usually the choice of a VP has little effect on the overall race, even when the VP choice was poorly made. I doubt there's anybody who was planning on voting for Trump who will not now because of Vance, or anybody who was planning on voting for Biden who will not now because of Vance. But Trump passed over the chance to pick somebody other than another white male, who could also have more experience than Vance. White guys don't need experience to run the country, though, they're already white guys, that's all you need, to be a white guy.