The evidence is building daily that the Republican party has a mentally unstable man as the frontrunner for its 2024 ticket. He is prone to all-caps screaming meltdowns on his social media platform. Last night Donald Trump suggested that the outgoing chairman of the Joint Chiefs Of Staff, Mark Milley, should be executed for treason. That was plenty weird. People have been parsing through that one all day. But then tonight, he said something stranger still. He went on a mad riff about automatic voter registration, like this was something new in the world.
Motor-voter isn’t exactly revolutionary. Florida has had it for many years as has other states. God forbid we register people to vote when they renew their driver’s licenses! pic.twitter.com/WC7lPVCfwT
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) September 24, 2023
the tweet ends “& WIN! THE PENNSYLVANIA REPUBLICAN PARTY MUST ENERGIZE, GET TOUGH & STOP THIS SCAM – OUR COUNTRY IS AT STAKE!!!”
ARGGHHH!!! YOU CAN’T REGISTER PEOPLE TO VOTE!!! THEY MIGHT EXERCISE THEIR RIGHTS AND ACTUALLY CAST A BALLOT!!! REPUBLICANS ONLY WIN WHEN PEOPLE STAY HOME!!!! WHERE’S MY FUCKING KETCHUP BOTTLE?!! AND WHERE’S MELANIA-UHUHUHUHHHH???
Man, I’m getting exhausted even trying to imitate his style. Sheesh, where are the tranquilizers? Oh wait, that’s what the serving staff at Bedminster is asking right about now. Maybe Kari’s got some.
Now as well you know, this issue of registering to vote at the DMV is nothing even remotely new, so I’m not sure what Trump is up in arms about. He seems to be stretching for a topic to vent his spleen on. What I personally believe is really going on is that he’s upset over a recent CNN poll which shows Joe Biden 12 points ahead in a hypothetical match up in New Hampshire. Twelve points is a lot and in a swing state, too. That is not an easy thing for Trump to digest and clearly he’s not digesting it. He’s displacing aggression on something which is 1) mundane; 2) totally normal; 3) not going to change no matter how much he screams about it.
The CNN poll was published yesterday and I think that Trump sees it as a harbinger of doom. As well he should. So he’s got that bad news from one swing state, New Hampshire, he’s conflating that with something mundane in Pennsylvania — which is another swing state. Supposedly he’s mucking around in Nevada, yet another swing state, and that’s not working out the way he wants it. The story there (or here, since it’s PolitiZoom’s home, being where Murf and I both reside, in Sin City) is that the GOP has announced it’s going to hold a caucus on Feb. 8 to determine the state’s presidential primary winner.
The problem with that is that “Nevada officials have already scheduled a primary at the ballot box — two days earlier — to determine the state presidential primary winner.” This is getting seriously loony. Michael McDonald, one of Trump’s fake electors in 2020 and the chairman of the Nevada GOP is getting into it with the DeSantis group. I vaguely remember that DeSantis’ roommate, Adam Laxalt, who failed in his Senate run against Catherine Cortez Masto, was going to take care of everything for Ron. Doesn’t look like that’s happening.
And finger-pointing has ensued between the state party chair and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis allies.
A super PAC aligned with DeSantis pointed to the process in its decision to end door-knocking efforts in Nevada this week, calling the state GOP chair a “Trump puppet.” An official with another presidential campaign told NBC News it will probably “write off the state entirely.”
“Irony is not lost on us that Trump and his cronies rail against elections that aren’t actually rigged, but then go rig an entire state’s election,” the official with one of the GOP presidential campaigns charged. The official requested anonymity because the person was not authorized to speak on strategy.
A Trump campaign adviser responded that the caucus system is one dictated by the grassroots.
“To attack Republican leadership for picking a process that they believe should be done by Republicans in Nevada, they’re also essentially attacking Republicans in Iowa,” the Trump adviser said. “You can’t attack a party process without attacking the grassroots.”
Trump campaign adviser Chris LaCivita said DeSantis’ super PAC, Never Back Down, was “out-organized” in the state and now is lodging accusations because of sour grapes.
As you see, whatever Trump’s plans in Nevada, they’re not running smoothly. Nevada is a key early state in the presidential process, being the first contest after New Hampshire and the first one out west. Theoretically, if you win Nevada, it builds momentum going into South Carolina, the final of the four early nominating states.
And Trump needs as much momentum going into South Carolina as he can get, because that’s Tim Scott and Nikki Haley country and he’s not polling well there, because of that.
Bottom line? I think that between the news coming out of New Hampshire and the news coming out of Nevada and the way things are going legally, Trump is realizing that his dreams of reelection are like the proverbial mirage, they’re just disappearing as he approaches them. Conversely, the wheels of justice are becoming all too real and all too loud, as they grind inexorably in his direction.
So he’s focusing on complete B.S. in Pennsylvania, in order to process the terror going from his small thumbs through his tiny brain and then down to his two-sizes too small soul.
That’s my opinion, in any event. Stay tuned. There will be many more all-caps meltdowns, threats of violence, executions, who knows what all, on the next episode of As Trump World Turns.
Registering to vote is not a new thing, but it sounds like trump just discovered it. Many people are saying they knew nothing about this. /s He’s got to have something to justify his ranting.
He didn’t know Puerto Rico was a territory, like states out west used to be territories before they became states. This was news to him. And he thinks you need I.D. to buy a loaf of bread. That I loved. I don’t think Trump ever went to a grocery store in his life. I’d love to put him in one, just to see his reaction. Welcome to Earth, Donald. This is how we buy food. Not everybody has employees who make omelettes at an omelette bar.
At last, Trump has achieved total incoherence — his recent public statements might have been composed by a glitchy piece of AI software. His rants have left the “word salad” label far behind and reached the “verbal vomit” level.
He’s bouncing off walls right now. I can’t predict how this will end, nobody can, but it is going to be batshit. I feel very safe in predicting that much.
The BEST result for trump (aside from getting reelected) is to die, whether from a heart attack, an aneurism or some other natural event. Thus avoiding the debacle of losing several trials, going to prison and losing all his money.
You can’t blame AI on this. I’ve been playing with chatGPT the past few days. It’s pretty amazing and nothing glitchy about it. see for yourself:
Default (GPT-3.5)
User
At last, Trump has achieved total incoherence — his recent public statements might have been composed by a glitchy piece of AI software. His rants have left the “word salad” label far behind and reached the “verbal vomit” level.
ChatGPT
It seems like you’re expressing an opinion about former President Donald Trump’s recent public statements. Political opinions can be highly polarized, and people have different views on his communication style and statements. Some may agree with your assessment, while others might have a different perspective. It’s important to engage in constructive and respectful dialogue when discussing political figures and their actions. If you have any specific questions or would like information on a particular topic related to this, feel free to ask, and I’ll do my best to provide you with information or insights.
The freak out could be based on Taylor Swift called for her fans to register to vote recently and they overwhelmingly did. He must know young female voters are unlikely to vote for him so it is time to stop women from voting without saying it out right.
The whole “caucus” process should be eliminated anyway. It’s not fair to anyone. There’s nothing “grass roots” about it, either. The process requires people to take time out of their schedule (usually at night, of course) and spend HOURS publicly declaring their support for one candidate. And then they repeat the process–usually several more times, depending on how much support each candidate actually receives. There are only so many delegates to be awarded (none of whom are actually selected the night of the caucus itself) so candidates expecting to get any delegates must achieve a certain minimum level of support at the caucus, hence the need to repeat the public declaration of support–when candidates are eliminated due to lack of support, their supporters will be “sweet-talked” and “wooed” into supporting one of the “surviving” candidates. At a certain point, the caucus has to come to a close with a “final vote” being taken, at which point the future delegates will be “awarded” though this is only a “placeholder” count as the ACTUAL awarding and assigning of delegates won’t happen for months after the caucus results are played out through “conventions” in which few of the caucus participants (the ones who spent hours standing around, actually playing “presidential candidate roulette”) will ever take part.
Additionally, the law regarding *voting* (ie, you have a right to take unpaid time off from work to vote without your employer’s interference–note, that right simply means if you have to stand in line for longer than expected, your employer can’t fire you for not returning to work in a timely manner) does NOT apply to caucuses since there’s no “voting” as such. The caucus is not a secret ballot. So, “third shift” or “late shift” workers have no legal protection; if they take time off without having obtained the employer’s permission (which can be revoked if the employer deems it necessary–first responders are out of luck here), they can be terminated or their pay can be docked as the employer sees fit (not even union representation can provide aid in this case).
Just the fact that you have to publicly proclaim who you want to vote for seems to to go against how voting is supposed to be a private matter between you and the voting booth/ballot.
I’m sure many people do not attend because they want to keep their politics private.
Just maybe, your article above, is an expression of how this malodorous lump of an ex-president is doing his level best to remove some of the guardrails protecting the inbuilt fairness mechanisms of the American voting system. Trump’s delusional thinking and jaundiced eye can only focus on how he perceives the checks and balances of fairness mechanisms are unfairly built into the American voting system; not only to himself, but to his crime family; his enablers; his adoring brethren and the echo chamber they all exist within. His delusional perception of reality is simply not equitable with what fairness is, both individually and collectively. To flesh this idea out further, see this interesting 2021 Bloomberg article ‘Fairness is in the eye of the beholder’.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-10-09/judging-fairness-is-determined-by-yourpersonality-traits-and-is-not-objective