The Frankish Reich

Well, that's not speculation. Official Trump Campaign announcement: "Delegate Barron to make his political debut in Milwaukee!" Official Melania press release: No. He's not.

Obama did "lead" him off-stage. He didn't "help him off-stage." Joe tends to linger. He's not a vegetable. He's an old man. He shouldn't be president. Neither should the other guy. Romney or McCain or someone normal vs. Biden, I'm voting for them. Not. For. Nutcase. Trump. What's so hard to understand about that?

What on earth does that have to do with the weird veil of secrecy over Barron? Kid's 18. What, he can't say what he plans to do starting ... next month? I'm not talking about an in-depth sit-down with George Stephanopoulos. But maybe an ordinary announcement? That's why there's weird/stupid speculation about him.

I think Peter Spiliakos needs to look up the meaning of "epistemic." Duped by Biden? No! He's old. Too old. I've said it a million times. I thought the idea of the Trump Right was that Biden wasn't running the country anyway. Obama was. Remember? That's why he never left DC. So I should care about precisely how old man addled Biden is because ... why? I mean, it's Obama Term 4, isn't it?

I think the weird interest in Barron comes from how sheltered the Trumps have kept him. I was wondering about the Obama girls, so I did a quick search. In May 2016, they announced that Malia was accepted at Harvard but would be taking a gap year. That's kind of the normal timeline for deciding on colleges. So why nothing on Barron? My guess: he's caught up in a Donald-Melania dispute. We saw that when Melania vetoed him attending the Republican convention.

Ooh, interesting one. Dead cap hit is huge ($23 million?) so he'd really have to look washed in preseason. But I wouldn't rule it out. No pushback here on Milano. Of course we all hope he'll be at least 90% of the pre-injury guy. But it was so brutal that we just don't know yet.

Massages by James does not actually know what "Marxist" means. Meanwhile, the party of "alternative facts" stands ready to school us on the Orwellian use of language.

Hey, libs of TikTok ... check out how you spell the feminine form of fiancee

The economy was doing well, but the border? Umm, no. That was not "managed." https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/cbp-enforcement-statistics-fy2019 1,148 aliens apprehended at the border, and obviously a lot of got-aways too. COVID actually helped Trump here. At first the numbers went down as all countries shut down (including the US ... no pull of jobs = fewer entrants), then when they started up again Trump used Title 42 to return illegal entrants based on his declared COVID public health emergency. So Trump will tell you "I got the border under control," which was thanks to COVID. And then he'll tell you "the economy was great until COVID hit." But never both at the same time.

That chip is hilarious. I bet he took a mulligan.

This was (to me at least) the most effective argument Trump made on Thursday. I say "argument" meaning "reasoned criticism" here, not just unfounded assertions. He stated, correctly, that Biden fired no one, held no one accountable for the fiasco that was the Afghanistan withdrawal. Trump is quite correctly criticized for firing people willy-nilly, but there is also a fair point that never firing anyone, no matter how bad they botched something, also shows poor management skills. I really don't like Newsome, but he would have put up a fight and called Trump out on some really out-there claims. His little mock debate (the first debate of the 2028 cycle?) with Ron DeSantis was pretty entertaining with both men showing good sparring skills.

Oh, you're right. And it's the classic "both sides." What the Bush 43 campaign did to Kerry ("Swiftboating") counts too, even though Kerry did no doubt embellish. He still did serve in Vietnam which is more than GWB did.

Yes, but the Trump team is trying hard to erase any actual policy from his official platform. https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-campaign-memo-signals-plans-reduce-national-gop/story?id=111547663 Abortion is, of course, the big one. But think about the debate. As ineloquent (is that a word? I'm using it because it sounds so ... gentle) as Biden was, we know his prescription for saving social security: eliminate the income ceiling on social security withholding. Did Trump answer the question? Of course not. And he won't. Ever. In 2020 Trump's Republican Convention just re-adopted the 2016 platform. They won't even do that this time. It's "vote for me, I'm Trump, only I can fix it," details to follow, like that long-promised replacement to Obamacare, the plan to end the Russia-Ukraine War even before he's elected, the plan to make Mexico pay for the wall, etc.

Correct. That was shameful. I voted for him. If only the Republican Party hadn't surrendered to Trumpism a mere 4 years later we'd be in a different world today.

Yes, I do think they were far-fetched. I think questions about the debate format were fair, since that format was presumably mostly at the Biden team's urging. It backfired bigly. If they had been allowed to interrupt each other we probably would have had the shouting match of 2020, in which Trump tends to come off worse (and which doesn't give Biden enough quiet time to get confused)

Yep. Sleepy vs. Crazy. Just like it was 4 years ago.

Funny. I flipped through the "liberal" MSM Sunday "public affairs" shows (Meet the Press, Face the Nation, etc) and they were all full of discussion of the debate, including the worst clips. Maybe you want to review your comments from last Wednesday when you said that the post-debate narrative was already written and that they'd say Biden was more presidential? That Jake Tapper would go out of his way to skewer Trump? Jake was a lapdog, not even directing Trump to answer the question that was asked.

Exactly. I'm not ready to write him off yet, but sooner or later that potential has to turn into actual production.

So everyone was wrong when they said the Dems wanted Trump (not DeSantis, not Haley, not whomever) to win the nomination? I'm just stating the obvious. Generic Dem right now > Biden.

For once Irv is 100% correct. This is what every Trumper wants.

There's a difference between seeing something and looking for something.

Once again, the far right exhibiting a perverse fascination with all things LGBTQ. I have not seen these "horrific and disgusting" images. No social media feed pushes them out to me. I am not seeking them out. But hey, enjoy looking and enjoy your protesteth too much indignation.

Dawson Knox. There was a question before last season: which player will have a breakout season in 2023? I said Knox. I was wrong. That contract has turned into a liability.

Here's the transcript. Not surprisingly given his, umm, lackluster performance, he corrected himself: TAPPER: Let’s turn now to the issue of immigration and border security. President Biden, a record number of migrants have illegally crossed the southern border on your watch, overwhelming border states and overburdening cities such as New York and Chicago, and in some cases causing real safety and security concerns. Given that, why should voters trust you to solve this crisis? BIDEN: Because we worked very hard to get a bipartisan agreement that not only changed all of that, it made sure that we are in a situation where you had no circumstance where they could come across the border with the number of border police there are now. We significantly increased the number of asylum officers. Significantly – by the way, the Border Patrol endorsed me, endorsed my position.

Maga women with penises. Get with the program.