99 Comments

I have to say that I am in fear of a possible Rump rise in the polls. As you say, it will inevitably come, but I pray that we stay united and strong. So many of us feel like you just expressed ... so tired of the MAGA era. I am so needing normalcy again. I swear I have aged 20 years instead of just 10 listening to this orange turd and his minions. Let's uplift one another and keep reminding ourselves that better days are ahead if we stick to the plan and vote for Kamala and Tim!

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Yes, to hear about TFG's 'trauma' (which he may be experiencing, along with grifting off of his near assassination) should be within the context of how TFG has collectively traumatized millions of Americans, has grifted and manipulated his followers and will leave them lost and empty-handed -angry. Americans are ready to 'restore goodness' and hope! Vote Blue!!

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Hear, hear Susan.

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Susan, your aged 20 years in 10 resonated with me. I was 62 in 2015, now 71. I know I am now in the “aging” years, but I feel l like I have aged 30 years in 9. This vulgar, vile and wicked man and his gang of low lifes(from Lewandowski to all the rest), has made me so tired and exhausted and ready for sanity and normalcy to return. Have enough people awakened for that to happen? It is time…..

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I’m just one year ahead of you. I am 72, and therefore we have over 60 years of accumulated knowledge and experience. This change of the last few weeks with Harris/Walz reminds me of the late 60s when Bobby Kennedy was campaigning, and more recently of the Obama campaign in 2008. My main fear is that mango Mussellini (to quote a great pundit) will once again get away with it. I have been so disappointed and distraught with him never bringing held accountable. Just hearing about all of the cities he owes money to from 2016 makes me so angry … and yet nothing is done about it. He wreaks havoc wherever he goes, and he’s never once had to pay a price. 🤬🤬🤬

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Susan, “we’re not going back”! Repeat, repeat, repeat.

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Rick, I too am 71. My reaction to MAGA has engaged my interest in protecting Democracy from the Weimar Effect which I learned about in Poli Sci 202 fifty years ago

I’m not exhausted. I’m pissed

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Dave, I am exhausted by Trump and his minions and their stupidity and venality. On the other hand, I AM pissed at all my fellow “Christians” following a guy who is doing a passable imitation of the Antichrist. I will never ever understand it.

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We need to vote for Kamala and Tim however, let’s not forget about the House and Senate. We need to give her a Congress that she can work with.

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I agree. Look at how they were able to manipulate things against Hilary.

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For people in North Carolina, the two MAGA Miscreants (Mark Robinson and Michele Morrow) want to opt out of any Federal Funding for public schools if they are elected.

This would be an unmitigated DISASTER. Programs would be affected, learning would be affected — and for the poor and fixed income here, higher taxes to make up for this loss.

If you want these two to drive you off the cliff, then you know who to vote for. I sincerely hope there are enough people here who know better.

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I was a consultant/coach that worked with improving literacy outcomes for adolescents in NC. Worked in several districts, but CMS mostly for several years. I’ve seen the aggressive push for charters in your state. The charter movement has really hurt public schools across the country, and especially those districts serving students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. We need strong and well-funded public schools.

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Without proper education in history, civics, and critical thinking skills, we're doomed.

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We need to fund quality public-school education in our country as a priority!

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This is out of the Project 2025 Playbook. Both of these two are uneducated and stupid to understand or appreciate the impact on schools here.

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How on earth did Mark Robinson reach this point of prominence? He has said some truly vile and dangerous things.

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It is bizarre. He said something about gun rights back in 2019 or so and it went viral for some reason here. Next thing you know, a group of MAGA Republicans decide he should run for Lieutenant Governor. And he does and he beats his opponent by 300,000 votes. Some here say he is a fluke, but not me. You don’t receive 2.8 million votes in a statewide election and be considered a fluke. Given everything he has said, he is an embarrassment to this state.

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My hope is NC’s voters do not go down this terrifying road. The states’ elections for local, state and Federal office are all impactful. It’s gonna be a long night, and I fear, close races and recounts. Please not Bush v Gore or Franken v Coleman.

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Remember, rethugs don't like education, they want us all to be ignorant and that's how they stay in power. They hate the teacher's unions because they work for the common good in benefitting the children and the schools.

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I am done with GOP fear mongering. Hope is on the horizon and I will vote accordingly.

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It appears that the toxic MAGAT’S will try everything possible to ruin Harris’s trajectory, but they also will have to manage their obviously shitting himself King Orange Weirdo. Part of that will be his sentencing on 9/18 as well as Judge Chutkan releasing more documentation to establish his criminality in the Jan 6 trial. I predict that there will be more unhappy surprises for the DonOLD team to deal with and they will just keep coming up until the election.

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I can’t tell you how much I wish karma gets them all! Where it HURTS!

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Great analysis as always Steve! In graduate school, I was friends with the sister of Paul Bucha, the Congressional Medal of Honor awardee for valor in the Vietnam War. I was livid when Traitor Trump actually stated that given the Presidential Medal of Freedom was a higher honor than the Congressional Medal of Honor! If any of your readers want to learn of Paul Bucha’s bravery, look up his citation for the Congressional Medal of Honor on the internet!

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A distinct pattern of dismissing military heroism. The reason is his especially malignant narcissism; he fraudulently avoided the draft several times and has no connections to the military. His grandfather ran a whore house in Alaska for example. So anyone provided with a level of heroism is automatically dismissed. He is a repugnant asshole, whoring himself to any billionaire as he constantly needs funds for his pack of wolves - his lawyers. I become nauseous at the site of him.

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That was spot on MT, I loathe the insipid orange turd at a cellular level. I can think of no American in my lifetime other than Oswald that I have felt that way about. I disliked Nixon intensely but he was a saint in comparison. I’m a combat vet, he brings out feelings in me that I reserve for mortal enemies of our nation. I want to see him jailed until he breathes no more, no matter how long that takes. I want him to know when they lock him up that he will never ever walk out of there as a free man. About that I’m crystal clear. 💥

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Dick … Whenever I see or hear that ridiculous Cheeto, I have this visceral reaction of pure hatred. I hate the feeling because it is such negative energy. It sets me in a bad mood because he is such a malignant force in our discourse. I hated Nixon, too, but this guy is a million times worse. I want him to be held accountable and hope he gets manhandled like he has urged the cops to do so many times. I know I sound unchristian and bitter … I see Harris and Walz and I literally get uplifted. They engender such positive feelings of hope and caring for others. They are normal and elicit such a feeling of patriotism in me. Isn’t it strange that so many of us just yearn for normal now?

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Aug 18·edited Aug 18

Thank you Dick for enduring combat on behalf of our country. I am truly grateful. I am also a veteran, not combat although sometimes having been stationed at Walter Reed it felt like it! I get the same sick feeling every time I see that traitors' face or hear that awful whining. I feel a victory for our country will have been achieved when he is imprisoned for life. He is a traitor to America and the Constitution and has used the freedoms it provides to scam and cheat and steal his way through life. Enough.

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Well said Steve! The MSM are a bunch of money grubbing weasels and scoundrels. We need to break up the corporate media monopolies soon.

That said, I know the MSM will do its best to keep this race competitive. The WaPPo already jumped on the bandwagon with its recent headline about Harris’s price gouging agenda, claiming we need serious ideas. By the way, they claim price gouging doesn’t exist. Huh??? Every industry only has about 4-5 companies that control 70-80% of the market share. In some cases just two; Coke and Pepsi for the soft drink and snack food industry. So call it price gouging or a lack of competition, the right course is to break up the monopolies and allow the market to find the equilibrium for supply and demand.

Additionally, I think the MSM will fail in its quest to raise Trump’s prospects. He is self-imploding and his cognitive abilities are declining rapidly. The man is his own worst enemy, since he can’t get out of his own way.

And his campaign is in CYA mode. They’re leaking faster than the Deepwater Horizon. And the blame game has already commenced.

My bet, Harris will have a commanding lead by the end debate of the first debate, and then her campaign will head into the stratosphere…:)

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And Robert it only took 7 seconds of watching Newsmax to hear the host say..."All people have to do is shop at the lower priced stores"!

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Well said, Robert.

Yea, price gouging is a real thing. Groceries chains and their parent companies have had record profits since the beginning of COVID. No more proof than that is needed. Also, about the media, Jon Stewart said this back in May and it's proven true over and over:

"Outrage is the engine of our modern media economy."

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When the CEO of Pepsi says that we can charge more because our products are popular, he is setting the price, not the market. Hence, it’s either price gouging or price fixing; a distinction without a difference since it all ends with consumers paying more. Not to mention, the lack of competition adds to the issue. These monopolies need to be broken up. They have too much power with Congress.

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I’m trying to brace myself…we have to hold on and stay strong!

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One more thing, Steve ... I am very curious what you think of reports coming from Jan 6th participants were in constant contact with Republican legislators that day and before. Do you think that they will see justice?

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My dream debate: Trump: $$&*,#@$$!!??$. Kamala: ‘I want to talk about making Social Security solvent for 75 years.’

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maga and the republican party have been OVER for sane people for a very long time The question is why hasnt the other half of the country caught on ?

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MAGA-Cult: a mass movement, indoctrination of millions through brain-washing/media.

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If voting for the GOP, middle class people are voting against their own benefit. I call that stupidity.

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Sandra....Low & middle class whites have been voting against their economic interests for 40 years....since Reagan actually. HE was the beginning of the end.

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and McConnell as well. Blame him for the Supreme Accomplices.

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Millions of followers are brainwashed by MAGA leaders and social-media algorithms.

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Yesterday while reading another stupid statement by my Rep, running for Senate, I realized how tired and bored I was. From Trump to down ballet Republicans they are boring, old, tired. While I realize that we have some heavy days ahead of us, my hope is that others are tired of it, bored with the rhetoric and wanting to move on from it all.

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founding

Indiana Insomnia

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Halftime peptalk. Ready for a bruising second half! That said, I do feel like Trump is receding from his ceiling and will never get back to that. Cheers, Steve.

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Me too, however he has some new ads airing in NC and they are brutal for Kamala. Specifically the one where Trvmp's voice talks about how bad things are and KH chimes in after each segment with "'That's Bidenomics". The dem campaign needs to rebut this with clever ads right away. Many in NC will believe the lies.

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Yes, and there is no staged Trump "American Royal Family' as there was in 2015/2016.

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Totally agree that much - not all - of the print and broadcast media have stoked diviseness, angst and fear over the last decade. This includes previously venerable print media such as the Washington Post and NYT. Why keep printing Trump’s angry, venomous and lying comments when they only need to say that he continues to insult and falsify. WaPo’s tagline “Democracy Dies in Darkness” rings true as motto but not as current practice. Democracy may also die in Drivel and in Division.

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Trump's cognitive deterioration and simmering rage at being challenged by a Black woman will continue to impair his performances. Hopefully, the press will be as critical and persistent in following up on his gaffes and memory slips as they had been with Biden.

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Ken....We've passed THAT point where media holds D accountable for anything....its been 10 years and I see little change. The young, attractive, yet smart female reporters are no match for D and his disinfo. The guys are not much better....you know who they are as they've revealed themselves in last 2 months.

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No doubt, the Trump production studio presents WWE wrestling press conference formats replacing mud and theatrics for serious policy discussions.

Journalists could certainly be disoriented and intimidated, but it is disappointing that after 10 years, they haven't figured out how to tame this beast.

However, they now should be smelling blood in the water. Trump is unraveling both from unrequited narcissistic injury and brain rot. If the press is unable to put their other oar in the water and hit simple targets, they might as well retire the institution of journalism.

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They're only incentive is clicks and views so they make money. Nothing else matters, certainly not facts. That along with authoritarians have undermined the media everywhere they take power. Nearly from day 1 of announcing he was running in 2015, he started framing them as "fake news". For those already inclined to believe in conspiracies and distrust respected, public serving institutions, the slope to complete ignorance and obtuseness is indeed very steep and slippery.

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MAGA taps into a vein of discontent and fear. Trump's vulgar attacks and vicious lies feed those starving grievances. Consequently, truth, facts or evidence becomes irrelevant since they only rain on the "fuck the elites" parade. Trump captured a negative popularist sentiment. Harris's strategy is capturing positive solutions for populist struggles. Positive solutions should win over vacuous negative grievances.

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Trump just made any comeback a lot more difficult as he continues to disparage veterans and praise those who remain loyal and financially supportive:

"In the video that has circulated online and in the media, the former president was recognizing Miriam Adelson in the audience who he awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom during his time in office.

As he described the medal as the civilian version of the Medal of Honor, he went on to opine that the Medal of Freedom was 'much better' than the military’s top award, because those awarded the latter are, in his words, 'either in very bad shape because they’ve been hit so many times by bullets or they’re dead.'

He continued by comparing Miriam to MoH recipients saying, 'She gets it and she’s a healthy beautiful woman. They are rated equal.'”https://www.vfw.org/media-and-events/latest-releases/archives/2024/8/vfw-admonishes-former-president-for-medal-of-honor-remarks

Trump is obviously totally out of touch with American values and his comparison of the MOH with the MOF is offensive to everyone with a sense of decence.

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Aug 17·edited Aug 17

Trump’s comment was repulsive, as was the military guy who was interviewed by Kaitlyn Collins during her show last night on CNN. He doubled down on Trump’s ignorant opinion about the huge difference between the Medal of Freedom vs the Medal of Honor, insisting that Trump was truly a friend of the military, yada yada yada. Kaitlyn pointed out 2 former generals who had served under Trump and recalled that both had denounced Trump and his grotesque behavior. I noted though that she hadn’t talked about Gen Milley and his letter of resignation. Vance also supported Trump’s comments and one has to wonder who in the military is spewing such hatred and infiltrating the minds of those who stand to defend the US.

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I have heard that anywhere TV’s are allowed on military bases they are usually tuned into Fux Propaganda. Is it any wonder the enlisted ranks think he’s great. That shit is being pounded into their heads all the time.

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Yea, and then asshole JD Vance, a former Marine, gets behind a microphone and says, "[TFG] loves veterans." The outright disingenuous lies about and disrespect for those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, you know, the military, NOT the folks writing TFG checks, are disgusting. It shows just how much of a grifter and piece of shit he is.

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Thank you for keeping us informed and prepared. Your commentary is therapeutic. Thank God for Steve Schmidt.

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The profound, constant sense of dread that has accompanied these past 10 years has taken a huge toll on our collective mental health. Kamala has offered a reprieve from this dread while injecting real hope and joy.

While I believe defeating Trump will put an end to his political story, I’m not as certain, MAGA, the Freedom Caucus, Tea Party, Movement Conservatives and white supremacists will go away as quietly. They seem deeply embedded in our nation as a remnant of the very issues that have divided us since the Civil War.

And then we have the oligarchs whose rapacious hunger for power and wealth undermine democracy at every opportunity. Let us not be lulled into complacency; protecting democracy is like washing dishes, it never ends.

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How to address this is a difficult thing because once it starts, it takes on a life of its own. When we look around at what is going on in the world and the kind of men in power in countries like China, India, Iran, Syria, Turkey, and Russia, we are not seeing a pleasant or promising future.

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