As a South Carolinian, I can tell you that Haley was a terrible governor... she is all about the almighty dollar and her own advancement. She is a disrespectful liar, plain and simple.
The only thing she really has going for her is that she can play those big businessmen - both here and abroad, they seem to adore her.
As with Hillary, do you think that that mass of patriarchal humanity countenance a woman as their leader? I don't believe they are ready to let go of what they believe is their power.
I did read about him switching from ex45 to her, but still I don't think that will really matter. Ever hopeful I am right in my thinking, but I will continue to strongly support my democratic people.
While I appreciate Jay’s analysis, and the Koch endorsement does indeed change things significantly for Haley, I still think it’s HIGHLY unlikely that she’ll get the nomination.
With the clear patriarchy of MAGA “thinking” (ugh, I just threw up in my mouth a little bit after I wrote the words “MAGA” and “thinking” in the same sentence...), further exacerbated by the ascendancy of Christian Nationalism in the GOP, the Right nominating a women is less and less likely than it would have been only a few years ago.
I think you’re correct, Theresa, in what you’ve pointed out.
Exactly what I was thinking. Undoubtedly not have as tough a time as Obama had, but a woman making decisions? What is she thinking coming out of the kitchen? I've always wondered why any women vote for Republicans, tripley so with Trump.
I came to comment on the same thing - with all the blatant misogyny, and 'masculinity' and 'long live the patriarchy' displays, increasing lately, I'd be surprised if enough Rs would vote for a woman to make a difference. If they have to hold their nose to vote, I wonder which will stink worse to them - a female president or a felon president?
(I'd bet a few American dollars that our first female president will be voted in by Ds, not Rs)
The Koch Club loves a female token who shows all the "bad" women who want their rights who is boss. Nikki has even been known to toss some scare tactics about Kamala into her repertoire. (Hillary advocated for other women and thus was a "bad" woman.)
I would be more concerned if it were Nicholas Haley instead of Nikki Haley. I doubt the country as a whole is ready for a female president but I'm sure the Republican Party (if you can still call them that) is definitely not ready.
I read as much as I could stomach. I didn't learn anything new about her. She is the same power seeking woman who is willing to do or say anything to get power. She is transactional in all her relationships and I can find nothing admirable about her. I can't ever take anyone seriously who supported Trump and thought he loved this country and wanted to do good by it as she said. That is truly delusional. Maybe she is smart, maybe she is just devious but she refuses to disown a man who did such horrible things to this country because she still needs him to get elected. She can't possibly think Trump would ever choose her for VP after she managed to get the Koch endorsement away from him. Whatever will be will be but I can't imagine the country run by this horrible woman.
This just got me thinking…any Democratic candidate has to attack the GOP on Social Security, Medicare, etc. The message has to be, “What is your monthly retirement check? Imagine if it takes a 10-15 percent hit, or even more, right away? Can you make ends meet?” This was once a third-rail issue. Now, it’s a Republican talking point even for Nikki Haley.
The GOP are counting on those fetuses to grow into low wage workers to pay pennies on the dollar to the shrunk remnants of the Social Security Trust Fund for any elderly that are grandfathered into the payment system. Not that they’ll live that long when original Medicare is canceled, replaced with claim denying private Medicare Disadvantage Plans.
HA! And to do so if they have shelter and food and adequate medical care to even go to term to then grow into workers at which point they may need transportation.
There has certainly been a shift, a non- Feng Shui rearrangement of the Republican contender pool, with one Nikki Haley bobbing somewhat more visibly amidst the discordant waves.
But, as you say, It's all on a relative spectrum of awful. Nikki is only, by all normative standards, extra awful, not Trump level awful.
Does this mean we should be grateful and that all of our disgruntled progressives should disingenuously anoint her in hemp?
Awful is still awful.
Let's unify so we don't have to hedge our bets and play patty cake with Awful
At this point I really don't think any republican president would be survivable, she would still pardon the J6 insurrectionists, and pardon trump. She would very likely institute the 2025 Heritage Foundation plan, and destroy the independence of government workers by replacing them with loyalists. But, a large wrinkle looms over her if she gets the nomination; would the maga/qanon follow her and dump trump? Nor likely. Or, even worse for her, would trump switch to an independent run?
At the end of the day all this would be unnecessary if the media would report honestly on the improving economy, and how President Biden's policies have helped Americans; instead of how old he is.
I really don’t know what she would do, but she would be under a great deal of pressure to put the Heritage Project 2025 plan into place. But her big backers might not like it.
She has already reacted positively to the program, which is likely as close as she'll come to endorsing it while a candidate. Not sure why her backers wouldn't like it? No more non-partisan reports on climate change, vaccines, budget, tax cuts, jobs reports, etc.; plus a fully weaponized DOJ and FBI.
Yes, agreed. I wonder why Jay thinks her backers wouldn't agree? It is only portraying the long-term goals of Republicans for decades in an aggressive and actionable plan.
1. Donald somehow doesn’t win the GOP nomination and Nikki does.
2. Donald spends months telling his supporters how rigged the primary was and that they shouldn’t support Nikki. OR He launches an Independent bid from prison.
3. On Election Day, either MAGA doesn’t show up because Nikki stands for all the stuff they hate that made them turn to Donald in the first place OR They show up and vote for Donald.
All of this nonsense is just that, nonsense. Donald will either be the GOP nominee or his voters won’t show up. Why do we keep discussing this? Nikki is literally more anathema to MAGA than we libs are. She has zero chance. But, sure, keep throwing money her way. lol.
MAGA racist/anti-women voters won't support woman-of-color Haley. Full stop. Her governorship in SC (when we owned a home there) was weird. After her, SC swung extremely far RW under Henry McMaster, who was her Lt. Gov. She is not trustworthy, wearing the same squishy shoes as Graham and Scott. Slime, all of them.
Oh don’t get me wrong, I think she’s absolutely gross. I’m just laying out the reality of the situation. And as she tries to present herself as a moderate on issues like social security and abortion, people need to keep pointing out where she actually stands.
Please don't normalize Haley. She is as cruel and extreme as the rest of them. She defended child separation policy before the world at the UN. She has all but promised to pardon Trump, no matter the extent of his crimes and endangering of national security. There is no 'normal' Republican Party.
Haley is by no means normal, unless you accept that the Overton window has moved, and then the “new normal” is where we are, like it or not. I’m not quite there, but I see the country ready to shift that window rightward.
Republican positions on major issues, like gun violence, abortion, tax policy, Medicare, infrastructure, immigration are not popular. The country isn't buying what they're selling. The people are getting locked out of participating by an anti-democracy party - hostile to our basic rights.
Haley told us who she was when she came out in support of Moms for Liberty. I read The Heritage Foundation had spoken with DeSantis and Ramaswamy about Project 2025. If she is climbing in the polls then you can be assured they will also discuss Project 2025 with her. She may not invoke the Insurrection Act on her first day like trump claimed he would do but I believe she would still undermine our democracy.
Thank the MSM for Haley's couple of ticks up in polling, now only 40+ points in arrears v. tRump. "Horse-racing" a distant 2nd-place finish...what fun for bored reporters.
Jeff Tiedrich termed the Haley-DeSantis "contest" the Shit Bowl, and I can't improve upon that characterization.
Well, Jay, his prolific vulgarities - usually well-placed - are his main draw, as so many of his readers admit...but I surely take your point about linking to Jeff's writings, as a surfeit of f-bombs can well put off your readers.
I've been concerned about a Haley presidency for some time. There was a time I sort of liked her (not that I can imagine ever voting for a Republican these days under any circumstance), but she's turned into such a chameleon, even by political standards, that I wouldn't trust her to run a toll booth, much less the U.S. executive branch.
But American voters have proven that my opinion doesn't mean much. I'm pretty sure that if she finds her way to the nomination, she'll smoke Biden in the general election, and God knows what will happen to the Supreme Court then. We may be looking at generations upon generations of Republican rule unless the American people finally riot in the streets over the vast inequalities that will only continue to grow as the right builds up ever more steam.
Maybe, just maybe, she'd surprise us and considers herself a trojan horse. She's certainly proven fickle enough for that to be a possibility. But I wouldn't bet a nation on that dim possibility.
Jay, I am curious about your assertion that if Trump is convicted before the election, he will lose votes. His message, his demeanor, his personality - all are so far removed from any consideration of decorum, civility, or ethical considerations that I can't imagine a criminal conviction will matter much at all to any voter who doesn't already believe it would be catastrophic to put him back in the White House, regardless of his legal status.
This is based upon polling done in August. It’s the most recent I’ve seen on it. 45 percent of Republicans polled said they would not support him if he is convicted of a felony. 35 percent said they would. The rest are undecided. Even a 10 percent loss would be too much in a close race.
I have actually talked to people who seriously don't care if he's convicted, they will vote for him anyway. When asked why the answer was "because he's trump". Not because they think he's a good candidate or makes a great president, just because he's trump. Yep, tell me you're in a cult without telling me you're in a cult.
Yup. That is what is, to me, the scariest thing about Trump. He's such an obvious, bumbling, fool in most ways, but he is genius at luring moths to his flame. Rationally, I understand the psychology of how this works, but emotionally, I just can't wrap my head around it. It's terrifying in its insidiousness.
@Jay, you wrote: "On the bright side, Haley would still be far better than either Trump or DeSantis on the question of democracy and the value of Western alliances. The U.S. would not tumble into an unrecognizable dystopian state under a Haley administration, at least not rapidly. So among the possible futures out there, a “President Haley” is survivable, especially were the Democrats to regain the House and have a strong say over budgets and oversight."
Her proposal that is far too much like Trump's Project 2025 in which she says that she will put a limit of 5 years' service on "bureaucrats" by which she seems to mean civil servants is extreme. Does she propose to hire and train enough people and at what cost to serve a growing and diverse and aging population? How is that remotely acceptable? IS that survivable?
And about her 5" heels and able to run in them: feh! She must not know the hazard of airplane evacuations in heels like that. She'd endanger all of us.
As a South Carolinian, I can tell you that Haley was a terrible governor... she is all about the almighty dollar and her own advancement. She is a disrespectful liar, plain and simple.
The only thing she really has going for her is that she can play those big businessmen - both here and abroad, they seem to adore her.
Is that what this country wants?
I guess those were the qualities the Koch Network were looking for.
If she gets respectful numbers in the primary, then those are TFG votes does not get and it does not look as good as it did in 2016 (I hope).
She seems to say whatever is advantageous to her at any given moment in time. Who knows what she really thinks.
💯
Completely agree
But probably more than "I am your retribution" meaning I am MY retribution.
As with Hillary, do you think that that mass of patriarchal humanity countenance a woman as their leader? I don't believe they are ready to let go of what they believe is their power.
Yes, I agree but now she's grown a Koch!
As George Takei would say, "Ohhhhhh, my."
I did read about him switching from ex45 to her, but still I don't think that will really matter. Ever hopeful I am right in my thinking, but I will continue to strongly support my democratic people.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Well played, Nanny. Well played.
While I appreciate Jay’s analysis, and the Koch endorsement does indeed change things significantly for Haley, I still think it’s HIGHLY unlikely that she’ll get the nomination.
With the clear patriarchy of MAGA “thinking” (ugh, I just threw up in my mouth a little bit after I wrote the words “MAGA” and “thinking” in the same sentence...), further exacerbated by the ascendancy of Christian Nationalism in the GOP, the Right nominating a women is less and less likely than it would have been only a few years ago.
I think you’re correct, Theresa, in what you’ve pointed out.
And for a very different take on the Koch endorsement and whether it truly changes anything (spoiler alert: it doesn’t), check out Chris Cillizza’s latest article: https://open.substack.com/pub/chriscillizza/p/did-the-republican-race-just-fundamentally?r=1hynaw&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
Thank you, Vicki! I try to maintain my sense of humor, but there are days when it’s MUCH harder than others....
Exactly what I was thinking. Undoubtedly not have as tough a time as Obama had, but a woman making decisions? What is she thinking coming out of the kitchen? I've always wondered why any women vote for Republicans, tripley so with Trump.
I came to comment on the same thing - with all the blatant misogyny, and 'masculinity' and 'long live the patriarchy' displays, increasing lately, I'd be surprised if enough Rs would vote for a woman to make a difference. If they have to hold their nose to vote, I wonder which will stink worse to them - a female president or a felon president?
(I'd bet a few American dollars that our first female president will be voted in by Ds, not Rs)
The Koch Club loves a female token who shows all the "bad" women who want their rights who is boss. Nikki has even been known to toss some scare tactics about Kamala into her repertoire. (Hillary advocated for other women and thus was a "bad" woman.)
I would be more concerned if it were Nicholas Haley instead of Nikki Haley. I doubt the country as a whole is ready for a female president but I'm sure the Republican Party (if you can still call them that) is definitely not ready.
Good point. Agreed.
Thanks for the information. I was not aware of this.
Thanks for posting this link.
I read as much as I could stomach. I didn't learn anything new about her. She is the same power seeking woman who is willing to do or say anything to get power. She is transactional in all her relationships and I can find nothing admirable about her. I can't ever take anyone seriously who supported Trump and thought he loved this country and wanted to do good by it as she said. That is truly delusional. Maybe she is smart, maybe she is just devious but she refuses to disown a man who did such horrible things to this country because she still needs him to get elected. She can't possibly think Trump would ever choose her for VP after she managed to get the Koch endorsement away from him. Whatever will be will be but I can't imagine the country run by this horrible woman.
This just got me thinking…any Democratic candidate has to attack the GOP on Social Security, Medicare, etc. The message has to be, “What is your monthly retirement check? Imagine if it takes a 10-15 percent hit, or even more, right away? Can you make ends meet?” This was once a third-rail issue. Now, it’s a Republican talking point even for Nikki Haley.
Yes, because the GOP may save fetuses to become grandchildren but will the grand- and great-grandparents be without the means to live if that happens?
The GOP are counting on those fetuses to grow into low wage workers to pay pennies on the dollar to the shrunk remnants of the Social Security Trust Fund for any elderly that are grandfathered into the payment system. Not that they’ll live that long when original Medicare is canceled, replaced with claim denying private Medicare Disadvantage Plans.
HA! And to do so if they have shelter and food and adequate medical care to even go to term to then grow into workers at which point they may need transportation.
And Dems seem to be missing that important messaging that could wake up and change votes of boomers. Why is Dem messaging so often off track?
We made the mistake of not listening to New Yorkers about Trump until it was too late. Maybe listen to the folks in South Carolina this time.
There has certainly been a shift, a non- Feng Shui rearrangement of the Republican contender pool, with one Nikki Haley bobbing somewhat more visibly amidst the discordant waves.
But, as you say, It's all on a relative spectrum of awful. Nikki is only, by all normative standards, extra awful, not Trump level awful.
Does this mean we should be grateful and that all of our disgruntled progressives should disingenuously anoint her in hemp?
Awful is still awful.
Let's unify so we don't have to hedge our bets and play patty cake with Awful
At this point I really don't think any republican president would be survivable, she would still pardon the J6 insurrectionists, and pardon trump. She would very likely institute the 2025 Heritage Foundation plan, and destroy the independence of government workers by replacing them with loyalists. But, a large wrinkle looms over her if she gets the nomination; would the maga/qanon follow her and dump trump? Nor likely. Or, even worse for her, would trump switch to an independent run?
At the end of the day all this would be unnecessary if the media would report honestly on the improving economy, and how President Biden's policies have helped Americans; instead of how old he is.
I really don’t know what she would do, but she would be under a great deal of pressure to put the Heritage Project 2025 plan into place. But her big backers might not like it.
She has already reacted positively to the program, which is likely as close as she'll come to endorsing it while a candidate. Not sure why her backers wouldn't like it? No more non-partisan reports on climate change, vaccines, budget, tax cuts, jobs reports, etc.; plus a fully weaponized DOJ and FBI.
Yes, agreed. I wonder why Jay thinks her backers wouldn't agree? It is only portraying the long-term goals of Republicans for decades in an aggressive and actionable plan.
And this is why I despise main stream media because they refuse to report the truth.
How would this work?
1. Donald somehow doesn’t win the GOP nomination and Nikki does.
2. Donald spends months telling his supporters how rigged the primary was and that they shouldn’t support Nikki. OR He launches an Independent bid from prison.
3. On Election Day, either MAGA doesn’t show up because Nikki stands for all the stuff they hate that made them turn to Donald in the first place OR They show up and vote for Donald.
All of this nonsense is just that, nonsense. Donald will either be the GOP nominee or his voters won’t show up. Why do we keep discussing this? Nikki is literally more anathema to MAGA than we libs are. She has zero chance. But, sure, keep throwing money her way. lol.
MAGA racist/anti-women voters won't support woman-of-color Haley. Full stop. Her governorship in SC (when we owned a home there) was weird. After her, SC swung extremely far RW under Henry McMaster, who was her Lt. Gov. She is not trustworthy, wearing the same squishy shoes as Graham and Scott. Slime, all of them.
Oh don’t get me wrong, I think she’s absolutely gross. I’m just laying out the reality of the situation. And as she tries to present herself as a moderate on issues like social security and abortion, people need to keep pointing out where she actually stands.
Think tfg was pissed about losing to Biden, how would he react to losing to Nikki. Fun to watch though.
Great points, especially at #2. He'd never accept a Nikki win.
He would go off the rails.
At least we’d get the grievance part of the electoral process out of the way before November?
¯\_( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)_/¯
You would hope so, but I suspect he'll be complaining all the way through his sentencing.
He will complain in his last foul breath.
At that point, however, the Justice system will hopefully be well within its rights to shut him up. 🤞
Yes, always fun to watch a grown ass man melt down in public on a daily basis.
Please don't normalize Haley. She is as cruel and extreme as the rest of them. She defended child separation policy before the world at the UN. She has all but promised to pardon Trump, no matter the extent of his crimes and endangering of national security. There is no 'normal' Republican Party.
Haley is by no means normal, unless you accept that the Overton window has moved, and then the “new normal” is where we are, like it or not. I’m not quite there, but I see the country ready to shift that window rightward.
Republican positions on major issues, like gun violence, abortion, tax policy, Medicare, infrastructure, immigration are not popular. The country isn't buying what they're selling. The people are getting locked out of participating by an anti-democracy party - hostile to our basic rights.
🤬
Laughed when I heard NPR describe this as adding grass roots support to Haley. Billionaires are not usually referred to that way.
But I guess the 'grass roots' was the support network she'd gain from the network.
Haley told us who she was when she came out in support of Moms for Liberty. I read The Heritage Foundation had spoken with DeSantis and Ramaswamy about Project 2025. If she is climbing in the polls then you can be assured they will also discuss Project 2025 with her. She may not invoke the Insurrection Act on her first day like trump claimed he would do but I believe she would still undermine our democracy.
The GOP racist base will never vote for a woman. Of color.
By all means.....
Oh, but she identifies as white, remember? What trash she is...
watch Trump reference her as mongrel.
Taking bets on how long before we see someone from the right refer to her by her full name (Nimrata) rather than Nikki. I'm surprised no one has yet.
She has shown her tactic already by scaring Iowans about Kamala Harris.
Here's what I wrote in to the NYT Haley article:
Thank the MSM for Haley's couple of ticks up in polling, now only 40+ points in arrears v. tRump. "Horse-racing" a distant 2nd-place finish...what fun for bored reporters.
Jeff Tiedrich termed the Haley-DeSantis "contest" the Shit Bowl, and I can't improve upon that characterization.
I do wish Tiedrich would lay off the expletives, myself. I agree with him but feel uncomfortable sharing a lot of his takes.
Well, Jay, his prolific vulgarities - usually well-placed - are his main draw, as so many of his readers admit...but I surely take your point about linking to Jeff's writings, as a surfeit of f-bombs can well put off your readers.
I've been concerned about a Haley presidency for some time. There was a time I sort of liked her (not that I can imagine ever voting for a Republican these days under any circumstance), but she's turned into such a chameleon, even by political standards, that I wouldn't trust her to run a toll booth, much less the U.S. executive branch.
But American voters have proven that my opinion doesn't mean much. I'm pretty sure that if she finds her way to the nomination, she'll smoke Biden in the general election, and God knows what will happen to the Supreme Court then. We may be looking at generations upon generations of Republican rule unless the American people finally riot in the streets over the vast inequalities that will only continue to grow as the right builds up ever more steam.
Maybe, just maybe, she'd surprise us and considers herself a trojan horse. She's certainly proven fickle enough for that to be a possibility. But I wouldn't bet a nation on that dim possibility.
It’s unnerving either way, isn’t it.
Sometimes I just want to do this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQzPw3GVO8g&t=15s
Jay, I am curious about your assertion that if Trump is convicted before the election, he will lose votes. His message, his demeanor, his personality - all are so far removed from any consideration of decorum, civility, or ethical considerations that I can't imagine a criminal conviction will matter much at all to any voter who doesn't already believe it would be catastrophic to put him back in the White House, regardless of his legal status.
This is based upon polling done in August. It’s the most recent I’ve seen on it. 45 percent of Republicans polled said they would not support him if he is convicted of a felony. 35 percent said they would. The rest are undecided. Even a 10 percent loss would be too much in a close race.
Good to know. Thanks!
I have actually talked to people who seriously don't care if he's convicted, they will vote for him anyway. When asked why the answer was "because he's trump". Not because they think he's a good candidate or makes a great president, just because he's trump. Yep, tell me you're in a cult without telling me you're in a cult.
Yup. That is what is, to me, the scariest thing about Trump. He's such an obvious, bumbling, fool in most ways, but he is genius at luring moths to his flame. Rationally, I understand the psychology of how this works, but emotionally, I just can't wrap my head around it. It's terrifying in its insidiousness.
@Jay, you wrote: "On the bright side, Haley would still be far better than either Trump or DeSantis on the question of democracy and the value of Western alliances. The U.S. would not tumble into an unrecognizable dystopian state under a Haley administration, at least not rapidly. So among the possible futures out there, a “President Haley” is survivable, especially were the Democrats to regain the House and have a strong say over budgets and oversight."
Her proposal that is far too much like Trump's Project 2025 in which she says that she will put a limit of 5 years' service on "bureaucrats" by which she seems to mean civil servants is extreme. Does she propose to hire and train enough people and at what cost to serve a growing and diverse and aging population? How is that remotely acceptable? IS that survivable?
And about her 5" heels and able to run in them: feh! She must not know the hazard of airplane evacuations in heels like that. She'd endanger all of us.
Being better than Trump and DeSantis is a VERY low bar.... VERY....
Like bar on the floor low