Election 2020

[Eric the Green]

From the WaPo
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powe...bcd29a1522

Glad to see McAuliffe on this list!

-- The New York Times, looking at the vast number of Democrats who are actively taking steps to prepare 2020 presidential campaigns, notes that the list of contenders may ultimately be the largest since 1976, when Democrats lined up after Watergate for a nomination seen as offering a short path to the White House. From Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin: “In a largely leaderless party, two distinct groups are emerging, defined mostly by age and national stature. On one side are three potential candidates approaching celebrity status who would all be over 70 years old on Election Day: Mr. Biden, and Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. All three are fiery speakers inclined toward economic populism, and they have urged the Democratic Party to shift in that direction since its defeat in November.” From their story:

• Sanders is already planning his first return trip to early-voting Iowa in July, and plans to be the keynote speaker at the convention of a social justice organization that works closely with his political group, Our Revolution.
  
• Warren has mapped out an intensive speaking schedule: “Last weekend, she traveled to Detroit to address the annual fund-raising dinner for the local chapter of the N.A.A.C.P. She has used the release of her latest book, ‘This Fight Is Our Fight,’ to travel the country in recent weeks. This week, she will be the guest of honor at a fund-raising gala for Emily’s List, the Democratic women’s group, and in June, she will be the final speaker at a daylong liberal organizing meeting in San Francisco spearheaded by Susie Tompkins Buell, a prominent Democratic donor.”
  
• “In the Senate alone, as much as a quarter of the Democrats’ 48-member caucus are thought to be giving at least a measure of consideration to the 2020 race, among them Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota andKamala Harris of California. All are closer to 40 than 80.”
  
• The fact Trump could win has emboldened other dark horses: “Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, a 38-year-old veteran of the Iraq war who has been a pointed critic of Mr. Trump, has not ruled out running in private conversations. High-profile city executives — like Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, 46, and Mayor Mitch Landrieu of New Orleans, 56, who did a tour of cable shows last week after overseeing the initial removal of Confederate statues from his city — may also consider the race. … Among Democratic governors, Andrew M. Cuomo of New York and Terry McAuliffe of Virginia are seen as especially active in laying groundwork for 2020. Former Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland, who ran in 2016, has already returned to early primary states to campaign for Democrats.”
  

[Eric the Green]

Mitch Landrieu, who gained notice for the removal of confederate statues as Mayor of New Orleans, has a surprisingly good 15-2 score. That's even better than McAuliffe (11-2), although McAuliffe's score would rise to about the same if he was born before sunrise. He is known as an expert in mediation.

Mayor of New Orleans is not exactly a strong platform from which to run for president, though.

The Atlantic article on Landrieu and NO crime problem.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...es/399386/

Landrieu, who is 55, is bald and tank-like in build. His physical appearance would be intimidating, except that his face is open and nearly perfectly round. He is also pathologically gregarious, a retail politician of almost Bill Clinton–level dexterity, and he has a Clinton-like need to be heard, and to be liked. He is also prolix and self-winding: once he becomes fixed on a subject, the words come in torrents.

“This is absolutely not the state of nature,” he said to me. “It’s treated like it is, but this is a lie. We’ve got to figure out as a nation that the current state of affairs is not acceptable: schools that are not working, people who don’t have jobs, and, consequently, young men killing each other because they don’t see anything better for themselves.”

Landrieu and a largely African American team of law-enforcement officials, sociologists, and government reformers have tried to solve this problem in diverse ways. Under the rubric of a program called nola for Life, they are experimenting with new and comprehensive methods of diverting young black men from the path of self-destruction.

Interview with Atlantic journalist on you tube:




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Landrieu
He is a Leo, a Jones-cusp Boomer, born Aug 16, 1960. His Sun is aligned with the powerful Jupiter-Uranus trine, similar to the charts of Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Eric Garcetti, LA Mayor, has only a 7-7 score.

[pbrower2a]

Here's what I see for 2020.

Favorability:



*approval poll from mid-March supplanted by a poll the next week by the same pollster. Shown as a data point that I wish I had gotten at an opportune time.


Still useful for some states -- but not likely for any states from hereon added to the map. Favorability is 'hope'; approval is 'achievement'. President Trump has quickly developed a clear record of achievements and failures.


Approval:




Even -- white



Blue, positive and 40-43% 20% saturation
............................ 44-47% 40%
............................ 48-50% 50%
............................ 51-55% 70%
............................ 56%+ 90%

Red, negative and 48-50% 20% (raw approval or favorability)
.......................... 44-47% 30%
.......................... 40-43% 50%
.......................... 35-39% 70%
.......................under 35% 90%

White - tie.

Colors chosen for partisan affiliation

Add 5% to the approval rate for the President, and you will have a rough idea of what share of the binary vote he will get in any state.

I project him to gain nothing from 2016, and to lose at least his three barest wins (Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin).

[Eric the Green]

(05-01-2017, 02:53 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote:

(05-01-2017, 01:24 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: From the WaPo
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powe...bcd29a1522

Glad to see McAuliffe on this list!

-- The New York Times, looking at the vast number of Democrats who are actively taking steps to prepare 2020 presidential campaigns, notes that the list of contenders may ultimately be the largest since 1976, when Democrats lined up after Watergate for a nomination seen as offering a short path to the White House. From Alexander Burns and Jonathan Martin: “In a largely leaderless party, two distinct groups are emerging, defined mostly by age and national stature. On one side are three potential candidates approaching celebrity status who would all be over 70 years old on Election Day: Mr. Biden, and Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. All three are fiery speakers inclined toward economic populism, and they have urged the Democratic Party to shift in that direction since its defeat in November.” From their story:

• Sanders is already planning his first return trip to early-voting Iowa in July, and plans to be the keynote speaker at the convention of a social justice organization that works closely with his political group, Our Revolution.
  
• Warren has mapped out an intensive speaking schedule: “Last weekend, she traveled to Detroit to address the annual fund-raising dinner for the local chapter of the N.A.A.C.P. She has used the release of her latest book, ‘This Fight Is Our Fight,’ to travel the country in recent weeks. This week, she will be the guest of honor at a fund-raising gala for Emily’s List, the Democratic women’s group, and in June, she will be the final speaker at a daylong liberal organizing meeting in San Francisco spearheaded by Susie Tompkins Buell, a prominent Democratic donor.”
  
• “In the Senate alone, as much as a quarter of the Democrats’ 48-member caucus are thought to be giving at least a measure of consideration to the 2020 race, among them Cory Booker of New Jersey, Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota andKamala Harris of California. All are closer to 40 than 80.”
  
• The fact Trump could win has emboldened other dark horses: “Representative Seth Moulton of Massachusetts, a 38-year-old veteran of the Iraq war who has been a pointed critic of Mr. Trump, has not ruled out running in private conversations. High-profile city executives — like Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, 46, and Mayor Mitch Landrieu of New Orleans, 56, who did a tour of cable shows last week after overseeing the initial removal of Confederate statues from his city — may also consider the race. … Among Democratic governors, Andrew M. Cuomo of New York and Terry McAuliffe of Virginia are seen as especially active in laying groundwork for 2020. Former Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland, who ran in 2016, has already returned to early primary states to campaign for Democrats.”
  

Also need to look at GOP challengers. They may push us into a contested GOP primary.

If not successful with that or if losing a contested primary look for an Independent Conservative run outwith the GOP.

I'm sure that will happen, and the challenge could be stiff. The rub is, none have a better horoscope score than The Donald to actually win. Except for a few unlikely choices, including her daughter! And Pataki, who already was rejected by the GOP; and, just barely, Carly Fiorina, who still hasn't enough recognition, and as sharp as she is, would not offer much in the way of a positive alternative to Drump. But then, few Republican or conservative candidates would.

[Ragnarök_62]

(05-01-2017, 11:23 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: <snip>
Also need to look at GOP challengers. They may push us into a contested GOP primary.

If not successful with that or if losing a contested primary look for an Independent Conservative run outwith the GOP.

I'm sure that will happen, and the challenge could be stiff. The rub is, none have a better horoscope score than The Donald to actually win. Except for a few unlikely choices, including her daughter! And Pataki, who already was rejected by the GOP; and, just barely, Carly Fiorina, who still hasn't enough recognition, and as sharp as she is, would not offer much in the way of a positive alternative to Drump. But then, few Republican or conservative candidates would.

I'll use the Rags Election Sane Platform TM as an indicator.

1. 1 point for economic nationalism.
2. 1 point for ignoring PC.
3. 1 point for upholding / expanding safety nets.
4. 1 point for sane foreign policy.
5. 1 point for upholding civil rights
6. 1 point for smacking the MIC.
7. 1 point for smacking party poopers. [Supports BATF, DEA, etc. ]

With the RESP score, Sanders and then Warren are the top 2 picks.

[Eric the Green]

If I were looking only at my top 2 picks for their policies and proposals, those would be my top 2 picks.

But unfortunately, as all elections demonstrate, there are particular horoscope aspects that indicate candidates who can actually win. They correspond with character and personality traits which Americans prefer; indicating candidates who can communicate and appeal to them.

Only 3 candidates with a negative score (and just barely negative at that) have ever been elected president in 58 elections. Hillary, for example, had a negative score of 9-11, although Jupiter rising may have given her a boost, if the birth time I used for her was correct. (LBJ and TR got the biggest boosts from Jupiter rising, offsetting their weak scores, because Jupiter was right on the Ascendant aka Eastern horizon in their charts).

Unfortunately, our top two picks do not have the highest scores among current potential candidates.

Including show-biz types like Trump himself, these are the Dem. and Rep. candidates with the best scores (subject to adjustment if birth times become known, including whether Jupiter is rising):

Ivanka Trump R 16-2
Mitch Landrieu D 15-2
Gavin Newsom D 7-1
Seth Meyers D 20-3
Terry McAuliffe D 11-2 (score rises if he's born early in the morning)
George Pataki R 15-3
Oprah Winfrey D 10-3
Antonio Villaraigosa D 15-5
Chris Murphy D 9-3
Michael Moore D 16-6
Debbie Stabenow D 8-3
Tom Vilsack D 15-6
Roy Cooper D 10-4
Jason Carter D 10-4
Jared Kushner R 10-4
Sherrod Brown D 19-8
Carly Fiorina R 16-7
Donald Trump R 9-4
Janet Napolitano D 11-5
Tammy Baldwin D 13-6
Bernie Sanders D/I 14-7
Steve Bannon R 10-5
Stephen Colbert D 20-11
Chuck Schumer D 15-8
Andrew Cuomo D 11-6
Tulsi Gabbard D 11-6
Richard Blumenthal D 11-6
Chelsea Clinton D 9-5
Brian Schweitzer D 9-5
Rob Portman R 14-8
Lincoln Chafee D 15-9
Kelly Ayotte R 13-8
Joe Biden D 13-8

3rd party and independent candidates are at a disadvantage. Those with the best scores are:
Jill Stein G 16-2
Lawrence Kotlikoff 13-2
Evan McMullin 6-2
J.B. Rocky Anderson 14-8
Mike Bloomberg 8-5

A higher positive score, and a double-digit to single-digit score, are better.

An upcoming Saturn Return blocks candidates from winning. Tammy Baldwin and Stephen Colbert have this obstacle for 2020, and Gavin Newsom for 2024. According to past patterns, Colbert could possibly win, but his term would be a disaster. But then, this is a 4T.

http://philosopherswheel.com/presidentialelections.html

[Eric the Green]

(05-01-2017, 11:23 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: I'm sure that will happen, and the challenge could be stiff. The rub is, none have a better horoscope score than The Donald to actually win. Except for a few unlikely choices, including her daughter! And Pataki, who already was rejected by the GOP; and, just barely, Carly Fiorina, who still hasn't enough recognition, and as sharp as she is, would not offer much in the way of a positive alternative to Drump. But then, few Republican or conservative candidates would.

I mean, his daughter

[pbrower2a]

Gallup's weekly poll, which will be the last to include Election Day 2018, shows Trump approval at 38% and disapproval at 58%. He has been at worse spots, but this is not how one wants to start the campaign for 2020.

[Marypoza]

(05-01-2017, 03:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Mitch Landrieu, who gained notice for the removal of confederate statues as Mayor of New Orleans, has a surprisingly good 15-2 score. That's even better than McAuliffe (11-2), although McAuliffe's score would rise to about the same if he was born before sunrise. He is known as an expert in mediation.

Mayor of New Orleans is not exactly a strong platform from which to run for president, though.

The Atlantic article on Landrieu and NO crime problem.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...es/399386/

Landrieu, who is 55, is bald and tank-like in build. His physical appearance would be intimidating, except that his face is open and nearly perfectly round. He is also pathologically gregarious, a retail politician of almost Bill Clinton–level dexterity, and he has a Clinton-like need to be heard, and to be liked. He is also prolix and self-winding: once he becomes fixed on a subject, the words come in torrents.

“This is absolutely not the state of nature,” he said to me. “It’s treated like it is, but this is a lie. We’ve got to figure out as a nation that the current state of affairs is not acceptable: schools that are not working, people who don’t have jobs, and, consequently, young men killing each other because they don’t see anything better for themselves.”

Landrieu and a largely African American team of law-enforcement officials, sociologists, and government reformers have tried to solve this problem in diverse ways. Under the rubric of a program called nola for Life, they are experimenting with new and comprehensive methods of diverting young black men from the path of self-destruction.

Interview with Atlantic journalist on you tube:




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Landrieu
He is a Leo, a Jones-cusp Boomer, born Aug 16, 1960. His Sun is aligned with the powerful Jupiter-Uranus trine, similar to the charts of Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Eric Garcetti, LA Mayor, has only a 7-7 score.

-- is he related 2 their Senator? Mary Landrieu l think is her name (she's female)

[Marypoza]

(05-01-2017, 11:53 PM)Ragnarök_62 Wrote:

(05-01-2017, 11:23 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: <snip>
Also need to look at GOP challengers. They may push us into a contested GOP primary.

If not successful with that or if losing a contested primary look for an Independent Conservative run outwith the GOP.

I'm sure that will happen, and the challenge could be stiff. The rub is, none have a better horoscope score than The Donald to actually win. Except for a few unlikely choices, including her daughter! And Pataki, who already was rejected by the GOP; and, just barely, Carly Fiorina, who still hasn't enough recognition, and as sharp as she is, would not offer much in the way of a positive alternative to Drump. But then, few Republican or conservative candidates would.

I'll use the Rags Election Sane Platform TM as an indicator.

1. 1 point for economic nationalism.
2. 1 point for ignoring PC.
3. 1 point for upholding / expanding safety nets.
4. 1 point for sane foreign policy.
5. 1 point for upholding civil rights
6. 1 point for smacking the MIC.
7. 1 point for smacking party poopers. [Supports BATF, DEA, etc. ]

With the RESP score, Sanders and then Warren are the top 2 picks.

-- Bernie's everybody's top pick, except 4 the dumassclowns @ the DNC

[Eric the Green]

(11-12-2018, 11:11 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(05-01-2017, 03:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Mitch Landrieu, who gained notice for the removal of confederate statues as Mayor of New Orleans, has a surprisingly good 15-2 score. That's even better than McAuliffe (11-2), although McAuliffe's score would rise to about the same if he was born before sunrise. He is known as an expert in mediation.

Mayor of New Orleans is not exactly a strong platform from which to run for president, though.

The Atlantic article on Landrieu and NO crime problem.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...es/399386/

Landrieu, who is 55, is bald and tank-like in build. His physical appearance would be intimidating, except that his face is open and nearly perfectly round. He is also pathologically gregarious, a retail politician of almost Bill Clinton–level dexterity, and he has a Clinton-like need to be heard, and to be liked. He is also prolix and self-winding: once he becomes fixed on a subject, the words come in torrents.

“This is absolutely not the state of nature,” he said to me. “It’s treated like it is, but this is a lie. We’ve got to figure out as a nation that the current state of affairs is not acceptable: schools that are not working, people who don’t have jobs, and, consequently, young men killing each other because they don’t see anything better for themselves.”

Landrieu and a largely African American team of law-enforcement officials, sociologists, and government reformers have tried to solve this problem in diverse ways. Under the rubric of a program called nola for Life, they are experimenting with new and comprehensive methods of diverting young black men from the path of self-destruction.

Interview with Atlantic journalist on you tube:




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Landrieu
He is a Leo, a Jones-cusp Boomer, born Aug 16, 1960. His Sun is aligned with the powerful Jupiter-Uranus trine, similar to the charts of Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Eric Garcetti, LA Mayor, has only a 7-7 score.

-- is he related 2 their Senator? Mary Landrieu l think is her name (she's female)

I think he is her son, iirc. According to my latest check, his score is up to 16-2. I still don't know his birthtime though, so minor adjustments could still happen when and if I do.

Chris Murphy is down to 8-3 or worse. Joe Biden rose to 14-7 to tie Bernie. Latest scoop at http://philosopherswheel.com/presidentialelections.html

[Marypoza]

(11-14-2018, 12:43 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(11-12-2018, 11:11 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(05-01-2017, 03:19 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Mitch Landrieu, who gained notice for the removal of confederate statues as Mayor of New Orleans, has a surprisingly good 15-2 score. That's even better than McAuliffe (11-2), although McAuliffe's score would rise to about the same if he was born before sunrise. He is known as an expert in mediation.

Mayor of New Orleans is not exactly a strong platform from which to run for president, though.

The Atlantic article on Landrieu and NO crime problem.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...es/399386/

Landrieu, who is 55, is bald and tank-like in build. His physical appearance would be intimidating, except that his face is open and nearly perfectly round. He is also pathologically gregarious, a retail politician of almost Bill Clinton–level dexterity, and he has a Clinton-like need to be heard, and to be liked. He is also prolix and self-winding: once he becomes fixed on a subject, the words come in torrents.

“This is absolutely not the state of nature,” he said to me. “It’s treated like it is, but this is a lie. We’ve got to figure out as a nation that the current state of affairs is not acceptable: schools that are not working, people who don’t have jobs, and, consequently, young men killing each other because they don’t see anything better for themselves.”

Landrieu and a largely African American team of law-enforcement officials, sociologists, and government reformers have tried to solve this problem in diverse ways. Under the rubric of a program called nola for Life, they are experimenting with new and comprehensive methods of diverting young black men from the path of self-destruction.

Interview with Atlantic journalist on you tube:




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitch_Landrieu
He is a Leo, a Jones-cusp Boomer, born Aug 16, 1960. His Sun is aligned with the powerful Jupiter-Uranus trine, similar to the charts of Donald Trump and Bill Clinton.

Eric Garcetti, LA Mayor, has only a 7-7 score.

-- is he related 2 their Senator? Mary Landrieu l think is her name (she's female)

I think he is her son, iirc. According to my latest check, his score is up to 16-2. I still don't know his birthtime though, so minor adjustments could still happen when and if I do.

Chris Murphy is down to 8-3 or worse. Joe Biden rose to 14-7 to tie Bernie. Latest scoop at http://philosopherswheel.com/presidentialelections.html

-- well Bernie was an obscure Senator from VT when he stepped up to the presidential plate. Now he's the most well liked politician in the country. If Mitch is a Berniecrat & runs on that platform, his q-factor coukd skyrocket & he could be a contender. He'd have 2 do something about the sleaze factor, Louisana pols are notoriously sleazy

[jleagans]

What's Nikki Haley's score? She's my pick to Primary the hell out of Trump and actually be able to win the General.

[Eric the Green]

(11-15-2018, 06:57 PM)jleagans Wrote: What's Nikki Haley's score?  She's my pick to Primary the hell out of Trump and actually be able to win the General.

Good question. She seems capable, but her score is a dismal 8-15. So far as I can see, no-one who is likely to run has a better score than Trump among Republicans.

http://philosopherswheel.com/presidentialelections.html

[David Horn]

We have at least another 12 months for Robert Mueller and the House Intelligence committee investigations to create an earthquake (or not) before we can really talk about any of this.

[jleagans]

(11-15-2018, 08:02 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(11-15-2018, 06:57 PM)jleagans Wrote: What's Nikki Haley's score?  She's my pick to Primary the hell out of Trump and actually be able to win the General.

Good question. She seems capable, but her score is a dismal 8-15. So far as I can see, no-one who is likely to run has a better score than Trump among Republicans.

http://philosopherswheel.com/presidentialelections.html

I've got to say those scores are insanely convincing.  Even the very limited bad ones have obvious explanations.  Polk's 22-2 is incredible, I think of him as probably 6 or 7th best president all time but could see sound arguments for him in the top 5, if he had served in a more important era he would have killed it.

[jleagans]

Ok here's some more:

Connor Lamb
Mark Zuckerberg
Ben Shapiro
Beto O'Roarke
Anastacia Ocasio Cortez

Bloomberg's score looks decent enough.

I tried to go through your link and figure the math on my own and failed lol

[Eric the Green]

(11-16-2018, 12:58 PM)jleagans Wrote: Ok here's some more:

Conor Lamb
Mark Zuckerberg
Ben Shapiro
Beto O'Rourke
Anastasia Ocasio Cortez

Bloomberg's score looks decent enough.

I tried to go through your link and figure the math on my own and failed lol

Nice try!

I have all those figured already.

Conor Lamb 10-17
Mark Zuckerberg 12-9
Ben Shapiro 4-14
Beto O'Rourke 11-26
Anastasia Ocasio Cortez 13-19

[Eric the Green]

Is Mike Pence Making His Move?
from Daily Kos

As many have noted, Trump seems thoroughly disinterested in even performing the basics of the job as President since the midterm shellacking by Democrats. Reports are that he has become even more isolated and angry, perhaps driven by having to finally confront a reality different from his own version of it.

Trump’s anger may be fueled by worry about what will happen to himself and his family now that Democrats have subpoena power in the House. In addition, it is clear that the Mueller investigation is closing in, perhaps more imminently on Don Jr. than Trump himself right now, but closing in nonetheless. So too are the other investigations into the apparent fraud at the Trump Foundation and the conspiracy to silence women before the election that are currently being pursued in New York, with the latter probably making his domestic life more difficult.

Moreover, the protection racket that Trump has surrounded himself with over the years has taken some enormous hits. Michael Cohen has left the fold and is apparently singing, as are principals with the National Enquirer. Manafort my still be resolute, but Gates, who probably knows everything Manafort knew, is talking. Roger Stone’s operation is increasingly under pressure and there are signs that some in that camp are beginning to fold. There even seems to be a small but growing concern within the Federalist Society that Trump’s shredding of the rule of law has gone too far.

As bad as all that is, there are little hints that the power players in the Republican party may be thinking they have gotten as much out of Trump as they could get. The legislative agenda is dead. They got massacred in the suburbs and only picked up a maximum of two Senate seats in what was the one of most friendly maps in history in last week’s midterms. The next two years portend investigations in multiple areas that will expose massive corruption not only with Trump and his family personally as well within his administration but also with various businesses that have been beneficiaries of that corruption. Those businesses are significant sectors of the party’s donor class.

Additionally, the conservative wing of the party, which is now about all that’s left, may be happy with the last two years of accomplishment but it has never really trusted Trump. With the Democrats now having power in the House, there is a genuine fear that Trump will compromise with the Democrats and squeeze the Republicans in the Senate in order to get a legislative win for himself for 2020. That was surely compounded by Trump’s abandonment of House Republicans before the election and his willingness to consider an infrastructure plan after it.

The party doesn’t need Trump to continue to eliminate regulation and pack the courts with Federalist Society hacks, which is probably about all that can be accomplished in the next two years unless Trump capitulates to Democrats. In fact, there is already someone itching to take that role.

Even in just the few days since the midterms, Mike Pence is using Trump’s disengagement to become a far more forceful figure than we’ve seen before. The Vice President has been active meeting foreign leaders over the last two years but he is now taking that role to a higher level. Pence will be filling in for Trump at both the APEC, ASEAN, and East Asia summits in Asia, the three most important meetings for that region. Pence made the most forceful statement to date from a US official condemning the state-sanctioned violence against the Rohingya minority in Myanmar directly to Aung San Suu Kyi. I doubt that is something we would have heard from Trump, considering his infatuation with authoritarian regimes and inherent racism.

Pence has often strayed off the Trump reservation in order to advance his own interests but has always managed to stay in Trump’s good graces. It is an open secret that Pence and his team have expressed the desire to be prepared for the 2020 election in case Trump did not survive and it appears that Pence has set up his own political operation to prepare for that potentiality. There are some who are already talking like that is a possibility. Jan Brewer, former Arizona governor, recently talked about Pence saying, “We really, really appreciate him leading our party in that respect. His mission is maybe a little bit different than the president, and he is not under attack 24/7 like the president is.” That sounds remarkably like an endorsement.

Back in early September, there was an anonymous op-ed in the NY Times that declared there were people within the Trump administration that were working to “thwart parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations”. At least some in the White House believed that the source of that op-ed was the Vice President’s office. Now the latest rumor is that Chief of Staff John Kelly is once again headed out the door and one of the most mentioned replacements is none other than Pence’s current Chief of Staff, Nick Ayers.

With Trump seemingly focused on simply surviving and reportedly also suffering from serious mental deterioration, it appears that Pence will more and more become the de-facto, behind the scenes leader of this administration. And if things deteriorate so badly that Republicans actually turn on Trump and impeach him, Pence will then be well-prepared to take over in a relatively smooth transition. Unfortunately, the country will have only swapped an autocrat for a theocrat.


My NOTE however: according to his horoscope score of 8-7, he's easier to beat! That would be the big plus! Even Elizabeth Warren might have a chance (although as I say in my video, those would be two candidates with the charisma of a wooden indian-- go Pocahontas!)

[Eric the Green]

(11-14-2018, 12:43 AM)Eric the Green Wrote:

(11-12-2018, 11:11 PM)Marypoza Wrote: -- is he related 2 their Senator? Mary Landrieu l think is her name (she's female)

I think he is her son, iirc. According to my latest check, his score is up to 16-2. I still don't know his birthtime though, so minor adjustments could still happen when and if I do.

Mitch Landrieu is the brother of Senator Mary Landrieu, and both are children of Moon Landrieu, also a former New Orleans mayor.