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Barack Obama has moved the Betfair market – politicalbetting.com
Barack Obama has moved the Betfair market – politicalbetting.com
Breaking news: Former president Barack Obama has told allies in recent days that President Biden’s path to victory has greatly diminished and he thinks the president needs to seriously consider the viability of his candidacy. https://t.co/4bw9LiMTTJ
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53ZuE4V5Jc0
Presented by Matt Chorley who iirc has been signed up by the BBC now. It is where I spent much of election night. Its budget of £2.50 meant there were no gimmicks like the main channels.
Why not Rishi? He seem much happier now he's not being held hostage.
Has he explicitly refused?
Otherwise, Rishi is the current leader and remains so until he resigns or is replaced.
He's not going to be the nominee.
And if he is, he'll lose.
Which is why he's not going to be the nominee.
Sadly, no value here.
The bigger problem is he won't win a second term.
The biggest problem is if he loses, he loses to Trump.
Ukraine, America and the world can't afford Trump to win again. So Biden has to go.
He is no longer acceptable under the circumstances.
This is the issue for the Dems , if they come out in force and say he should go and then he doesn’t they’re even more screwed.
How can you ask voters to back someone who you’ve stated isn’t fit for the job.
The love and respect many Dems have for Biden could quickly turn to anger if he refuses to see sense .
But given how often we disagree on things it seems a bit silly to argue about a point of agreement - being Trump v Harris is looking increasingly likely.
Go Kamala ✊️
I think either Whitmer or Buttigeig would be good running mates for Harris.
This team would do well against Dozy Donald and Vapid Vance.
I'd assess him as 50/50 to hold the nomination right now (he is stubborn, holds all the delegates and the only clear alternative doesn't poll very well) and, if is the nominee, he has about a 35% chance of winning the general. Let's add an 85% chance he survives, healthwise, to make the inauguration on top - if he does win.
So, his odds to be Next President on Betfair should be at worst (let's round up) at about 7.
I just managed to buy at 19. That's value.
Like the probability of Rishi's Conservatives getting a majority at the last election.
Totally agreed we need Kamala to win this. The world and Ukraine especially needs it.
Go Kamala. 🇺🇦
"We could spend several thousand words pulling apart all the other absurd nonsense in the document, pointing out staggeringly obvious flaws like pinning the whole plan on support for the SNP, which is currently electoral toxic waste leaking out of the sewers of a burning nuclear power station. But why bother when even the most basic building blocks are made out of poorly-set jelly?
Wings is, and all Yes supporters should be, absolutely grossly insulted by this mind-bogglingly cretinous idea. It isn’t just stupid, it’s offensively, galactically stupid.
It’s laughing openly in your face. It’s pissing in your pocket and telling you it’s raining. It’s the dust from the dregs of the scrapings from the bottom of the barrel, a hopefully-last desperate attempt at grifting from a “grassroots” organisation that struggled to put 1500 people on the streets on a nice sunny day this April even when led by the First Minister and with the full backing of the Scottish Government. "
https://wingsoverscotland.com/daydream-nation/#more-145934
I think I have him down as an undecided.
But a bit like the abdication crisis hangs over the monarchy in this country, Watergate hangs over the US, and I can’t see Biden wanting to join the club of two with Nixon.
You can't say you're too ill to be candidate but are ok to be POTUS.
But more importantly, the second he steps down it all becomes about ensuring Kamala wins to beat Trump. Kamala has a better chance of winning as the incumbent.
I mean, yeah, he's old and doddery as well - but that's a slightly separate thing.
It'll be tough enough to beat Trump now given how much this has been ballsed up.
Big client requires that I use one of their machines to access SAP which the current phase of the project I’m working on requires. So they ship me a laptop. From Spain. With a Spanish language keyboard.
Had to present a slide deck to corporate team so will use the thing (diplomacy - otherwise it’s purely for SAP and my company’s MacBook does the heavy lifting).
We’ll say nothing about the crippled Windows build they have installed on it. And poke a finger at a matte screen with about 5 nits of brightness. Which doesn’t matter if it’s docked. As they are in Madrid or Lyon. But less useful in the field. Which anywhere not in an office is…
Not sure grifting should be in his invective armoury either.
But that won't bother them at all if they can get some sycophantic burbling's from right wing media and some rich fools easily parted from their money. It's a grim prospect.
Besides his personal reluctance to leave the White House prematurely (in his eyes certainly) there is this question: would elevating Kamala Harris to the Presidency BEFORE the November election really HELP her win the White House for the next four years?
My guess is that it would NOT, which I realize is somewhat counter to what's now passing for prevailing wisdom, at least on PB.
Reason I think making KH POTUS prior to EDay would be counter-productive, is that it would come across as a cheap political trick to millions of voters, and NOT just Republicans and/or Trump fans.
Who might not care, or not much IF we were talking about a Senator or Governor. But President is a different order of magnitude to put it mildly.
Further note, that it's Trump's overt, constant, public disdain for politics as usual, and the usual suspect politicos (even if more rhetorical than sincere) is THE rocket fuel that has made DJT America's leading ANTI-politician.
IF Joe Biden wants to remain POTUS through January 2025, what exactly is the mechanism to remove him from office?
Note the provisions of Section 4 of Amendment XXV (Presidential succession & disability):
Section 4. Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.
Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.
SSI - Would NOT bet the farm on the above transpiring in 2024.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2024/jul/18/donald-trump-rnc-day-four-jd-vance-republicans-us-politics
https://x.com/mattwridley/status/1813976904971788725?s=61
Now the convention is functionally unbound by such pledges, it has collective power to nominate someone else even if Biden objects.
HOWEVER, unless he steps down as nominee of his own volition (sorta) THEN the resemblance to a political coup becomes VERY strong, certainly for many voters, and NOT all of them on the Trump GOP payroll.
Might just as well accuse Franklin Roosevelt of a "coup" against the pre-1932 Democratic Party (a view held Al Smith & many other Democrat politicos) which was also based on his vote-winning prowess.
I genuinely don’t get Windows. Then again I’ve been increasingly of that mindset for years
Say it ain't so, Joe, please
Say it ain't so
That's not what I wanna hear, Joe
And I got a right to know
Say it ain't so, Joe, please
Say it ain't so
I'm sure they telling us lies, Joe
Please tell us it ain't so
They told us our hero had played his trump card
He doesn't know how to go on
We're clinging to his charm and determined smile
But the good old days have gone
The image and the empire may be failing apart
The money has gotten scarce
One man's word held the country together
But the truth is getting fierce
Say it ain't so, Joe, please
Say it ain't so
We pinned our hopes on you, Joe
And they're ruining our show
Even fits in a reference to Trump.
from wiki -
When Jackson left the criminal court building in the custody of a sheriff after telling his story to the grand jury, he found several hundred youngsters, aged from 6 to 16, waiting for a glimpse of their idol. One child stepped up to the outfielder, and, grabbing his coat sleeve, said:
"It ain't true, is it, Joe?"
"Yes, kid, I'm afraid it is," Jackson replied. The boys opened a path for the ball player and stood in silence until he passed out of sight.
"Well, I'd never have thought it," sighed the lad.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoeless_Joe_Jackson#Black_Sox_Scandal
My betting position is informed by the fact I think he thinks he's the only one who can actually beat Trump.
If its mandatory, inconvenient ones the issue is the administrator not Windows.
'To stop illegal migration, we must also tackle it at source', PM says
https://x.com/ITVNewsPolitics/status/1813975991653699963
Of course this won't make a drop in the ocean.
And as with the Corbyn fever, or the Johnson fever, the key question isn't about government, or the Otherlot Party.
Political parties have one basic job to do, which is to ensure that their leader is fit to govern the nation, if the call comes. Not necessarily well, but with some minimal fitness. (I'd argue that Michael Foot would have been a rotten PM, with terrible ideas. But also that he was a substantial figure who would have been better at the job than Boris or Jez.)
How, in the name of all that is Yankee Doodle Dandy, have the Republican Party looked at Trump and thought "yes, we'll have some more of that, please?"
Note that Roosevelt's control over HIS party was so great, that he broke the previous glass ceiling against a Third Term - and a Fourth - by winning twice winning re-nomination (1940 & 1944) despite NEVER declaring himself a candidate; instead FDR was "drafted" both times.
In 1940 incidentally against the active opposition of his 1932 & 1936 campaign manager, Jim Farley, who as US Postmaster General (the biggest patronage department of federal govt before WW2) from 1933 to 1940 was effectively the "Party Chief" of the Democratic Party.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Farley
They have spent 4 years portraying her as a bumbling, cackling fool. Watch her recently and you’ll see an articulate and measured politician, if uncharismatic. But maybe people will give her a second look. They won’t give Biden that opportunity now - he’s a known quantity.
However, it's possible that FDR might have tried to break the glass even without WWII, as he was concerned that his likely Democratic replacements would NOT uphold his New Deal policies.
Note that, in addition to the looming threat of Hitler, which boosted FDR with many Democrats, Independents AND Republicans, another key factor in favor of his re-nomination in 1940 (and 1944) was belief by many Democratic politicos (including some who disdained him and his New Deal) that having Roosevelt at the top of the ticket was vital to the re-election & prospects of themselves and others in their organizations.
Rather similar methinks to current GOP calculus re: Trump . . . and also to the effort to replace Biden.
There is a similar thing here with Nigel Farage. He comes across as more coherant than Keir Starmer. IE Starmer is pumping £84 million in direct aid to developing countries to try and stop the small boats. It just seems to like a completely irrational policy, compared with a policy of preventing the boats from landing, or shipping the migrants off to Rwanda, etc.
Ultimately it seems likely to me that the coherant will triumph over the irrational, unfortunately.
I get that Wings’ schtick always involved a deal of howling into the void but that seems to be all there is now. Even his much desired aim of the downfall of Sturgeon was initiated by the Zelig of Scotpol Sean Clerkin, so he can’t even claim that.
Interdiction on smugglers routes particularly in the Sahel is one part of solving the issue.
Monday is less than 76 hours away. And he essentially did it less than 2 weeks ago when Clooney et al tried it.
https://x.com/sama/status/1813984333352649087
Sam Altman
towards intelligence too cheap to meter:
https://openai.com/index/gpt-4o-mini-advancing-cost-efficient-intelligence/
15 cents per million input tokens, 60 cents per million output tokens, MMLU of 82%, and fast.
most importantly, we think people will really, really like using the new model.
---
I've run some tests on my local stuff and the results are really very good. So gpt-4 has, effectively for my use-cases, become zero cost.
Different perspectives innit
This seems to me to be somewhat optimistic on a whole series of levels and not entirely connected with the world we live in. But hey, they are better at attacking the SNP than anyone else.
So glad we're no longer party to this shit:
https://www.thetimes.com/world/europe/article/ursula-von-der-leyen-wins-second-term-as-eu-chief-but-only-just-xkbpx875q
Am personally dubious that, had he lived, The Kingfish could have denied FDR re-nomination in 1936.
For what it's worth, was a student (sorta) decades ago at LSU, of T. Harry Williams, who wrote THE biography of Huey Long, based on extensive research including numerous oral interviews with people who played important roles both for & against him. Some revisionism since them, but not enough to displace T. Harry's opus.
Also knew a fellow, who was a young boy in Bogalusa, Louisiana when Huey came to town on a campaign tour. He remembered The Kingfish standing on a cotton bale to address the assembled crowd, mostly local farmers.
"See that man there?" his father said to him, "He's the only one who ever done a damn for folks like us."
ADDENDUM - Huey Long's political style and strategy was VERY similar to that now employed by Donald Trump.
Surely no one is falling for “Isolating with covid” at this point.