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2022 Senate Elections

Ghost of LL

By Ghost of LL
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Zonahorn
Zonahorn
Bama Chick
Bama Chick

That “majority” has been remembered as something that never actually existed. Let's clear that all up, shall we? Starting January 2009, at the beginning of the 111th Congress, in the month that Bara

Pescado_Rojo
Pescado_Rojo

I'd pay good money to watch Big John Fetterman beat Steve Bannon to death with Roger Stone. 

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RDCanecutter

RDCanecutter 26447

Posted
Posted
35 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

 

Fetterman is crushing him.  I'm sad that this style of trollish politics is what we've come to, but here we are, and he's good at it.  Just got this email from his campaign.

 

Subject: My new idea to troll Dr. Oz

 

 

 

votado.

Now I look forward to trollish robo-calls from Fetterman.

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Gil Bang

Gil Bang 25964

Posted
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2 minutes ago, kevwun said:

What is with the basement stuff?  Is that really the best Oz's campaign has come up with?

They're echoing Trump's insults about Biden.  Fetterman had a stroke, and has cut back on appearances since. 

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TwiceHorn

TwiceHorn 31495

Posted
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On 7/19/2022 at 11:13 AM, Horn Dog said:

I plan on putting a "Praise Jesus"  sticker right next to a "Praise Satan" sticker on my car as protection.  I figure this covers about 97% of people most likely to randomly walk up to my car and try to kill me.

*Hail Satan

Or theyll see right through you.

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StassneyHorn

StassneyHorn 6609

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Posted (edited)

JD Vance has been actively working to lose his race. Tim Ryan just needs to keep doing his thing. Last Midterms, Sherrod Brown won by a bigger margin in the Senate than Mike DeWine won the gubernatorial race. Votes are absolutely there in Ohio

Edited by StassneyHorn
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The Dog

The Dog 44060

Posted
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19 minutes ago, StassneyHorn said:

JD Vance has been actively working to lose his race. Tim Ryan just needs to keep doing his thing. Last Midterms, Sherrod Brown won by a bigger margin in the Senate than Mike DeWine won the gubernatorial race. Votes are absolutely there in Ohio

He's just not campaigning at all and is in debt from his primary campaign. He's one of the rare Trump endorsements that got him over the finish line first in the primary. 

I saw this article from Daily Beast about how concerned the GOP is about him: https://www.thedailybeast.com/inside-the-gop-freakout-over-jd-vances-senate-campaign (soft paywall so spoilered below)

Spoiler

When J.D. Vance took the stage at a conservative conference last week, it should have prompted sighs of relief from Republicans hoping to see the Ohio GOP’s U.S. Senate nominee hit the campaign trail harder.

There was just one problem: the stage Vance took was in Israel, 6,000 miles away from Ohio.

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The spectacle of Vance gushing in Tel Aviv about Israel’s high birth rates—to a friendly audience stocked with plenty of conservatives but almost certainly no Ohio voters—seemed to distill for some Republicans everything that’s wrong with his campaign right now.

Back in the Buckeye State, many are still waiting for Vance to show up, as the most critical phase of the campaign season draws near.

Bill Cunningham, a fixture on conservative talk radio airwaves in Cincinnati for decades, told The Daily Beast that voters, party activists, and even statewide officials are telling him that Vance has been phoning it in. Vance is allegedly missing from many of the county fairs, party meetings, and campaign stops where candidates in this state are expected to be.

“The Republican faithful are telling me,” Cunningham said, “they can't find J.D. Vance with a search warrant.”

Others say it’s not just that they don’t see Vance—the anti-Trump literary celeb turned MAGA firebrand—pounding the pavement in Ohio. Privately, some aren’t even getting calls back from him, or his campaign, to discuss how they can help.

That group includes campaign donors whom Vance literally cannot afford to lose. The candidate’s fundraising has been anemic, and because he’s carrying debt from the bruising primary, Vance is in the unenviable position of asking donors to pay off those debts.

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One GOP source in state politics said Vance’s lack of followup with some important donors in the state has been disappointing. “When the fundraising numbers came out, it’s full-on panic now,” they said.

“It’s a code red,” said Ron Verb, a longtime talk radio host in Youngstown, who has been sounding the alarm about Vance on his show. “I think he’s running the worst campaign that you could possibly run.”

Meanwhile, Republicans begrudgingly admit that the Democratic nominee, Rep. Tim Ryan, is perhaps running the best possible campaign from a Democrat in this increasingly conservative state.

Ryan has raised a staggering $12 million for his campaign so far. And he is using that war chest to blanket Ohio airwaves with ads touting his blue collar bona fides, amplifying his professed desire to break with fellow Democrats on key issues, like inflation and crime. (Notably, Ryan has been a reliable Democratic vote during his two decades in Congress.)

With Vance largely absent on the airwaves and the campaign trail, Republicans fret that Ryan is successfully defining himself before Vance is—and that time is running out for the Republican to right the ship.

“Republicans are like, ‘Are you out of your fucking mind?’ This isn’t some fucking book tour, dude.”

A GOP source in state politics said it’s a “widespread trend” that Republicans officials are hearing in their networks about Ryan’s crossover appeal. “People who are Republicans are saying, ‘that Tim Ryan guy, he’s alright, I like the way he sounds,’” the GOP source said.

That’s why Vance’s mid-campaign venture to Israel especially rankled some Republicans. “Tim Ryan is talking about kitchen-table issues, and J.D. Vance is out there going to fucking CPAC in Israel,” said a veteran strategist with deep ties to the state. “Republicans are like, ‘Are you out of your fucking mind?’ This isn’t some fucking book tour, dude.”

Cunningham, the Cincinnati talk radio host, said he has been speaking regularly with Vance. He shared with The Daily Beast his advice to the candidate: “I told J.D., ‘This race is yours to lose, and at this point, you’re losing it.’ Your staff won’t tell you, but I just did.”

U.S. Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Ohio, greets supporters during a rally in support of the Bartlett Maritime project, a proposal to build a submarine service facility for the U.S. Navy.

Drew Angerer/Getty

In response to questions from The Daily Beast, Vance campaign spokesperson Taylor Van Kirk said Vance just wrapped up an eight-stop statewide tour focused on law enforcement and crime issues.

Van Kirk also noted that Vance just received the endorsement of the NFIB, the advocacy group for small businesses, calling the candidate an “unwavering champion for small businesses,” as opposed to Ryan, whom the Republican blames for inflation and anti-business policies.

Republicans say they would like to see more of that kind of rhetoric from Vance himself—less so tweets like one he sent on Friday, decrying the conviction of Trump ally Steve Bannon.

Holding the seat being vacated by retiring GOP Sen. Rob Portman should be one of the easiest things Republicans do in a midterm election year that is shaping up to be brutal for Democrats. Republicans are going all-in on flipping or holding seats in six states that President Joe Biden won in 2020; Ohio, which Trump carried easily in 2016 and 2020, was not supposed to be a priority.

In a statement to The Daily Beast, Ryan campaign spokesperson Jordan Fuja called Vance’s campaign effort an “insult to the people of this state.”

“Instead of meeting face-to-face with the people he claims he wants to represent, J.D. Vance has spent the better part of the last month hiding out at home or trying to get as much distance from Ohio as humanly possible,” Fuja said.

A lackluster campaign from Vance, of course, could still result in a comfortable win in November. Many Republicans simply don’t see a scenario in which Vance loses a state where Biden’s approval rating is 23 points below water, and some key figures in the party are professing no concerns with Vance’s campaign organization so far.

Alex Triantafilou, chairman of the GOP in Hamilton County in Cincinnati and its suburbs, told The Daily Beast on Thursday that he had just gotten off a Zoom call with Vance campaign officials and was encouraged by the briefing on their field operation.

Southwestern Ohio is where Vance’s support may run deepest—his hometown of Middletown is 40 miles north of Cincinnati—and Triantafilou said the candidate and his organization have been doing what they need to do in the area.

“I don’t think anyone is taking it for granted,” Triantafilou said. Though he added: “I cannot see Ohio delivering Joe Biden another vote. I just don’t see it happening.”

At the very least, however, Ohio is shaping up to be a tougher fight for Republicans than they had perhaps bargained for. That threatens to divert GOP dollars that are badly needed to flip seats in places like Arizona and Georgia—the last thing national Republicans need as they try to break the 50-50 split in the Senate and recapture the majority in the chamber.

With less than three months to go until early voting begins in the race, the exact scenario that some Vance-skeptical Republicans were worried about may be coming to fruition.

For much of the nasty, expensive primary, Vance was unable to gain an edge over—or even poll ahead of—a field of rivals that included a previous U.S. Senate nominee, two wealthy self-funding businessmen, and the former chair of the state GOP.

That changed when Vance landed the coveted endorsement of former President Donald Trump, which likely gave him the boost he needed. He ultimately won the nomination with just over 32 percent of the primary vote.

J.D. Vance speaks to supporters of former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally to benefit Pennsylvania Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, in May.

Jeff Swensen/Getty

But the Trump boost may have papered over the fundamental weaknesses in Vance’s operation. He has never been a strong fundraiser. Instead, an outside group largely funded by Vance’s mentor, tech billionaire Peter Thiel, spent millions through the primary to promote Vance and conduct voter outreach.

However, Vance cannot touch any of that money to directly fund his campaign operation. His most pressing problem now is that he’s not attracting enough donors: Vance’s latest federal campaign finance filing shows his campaign committee went broke after he won the primary. Further, the campaign is prioritizing donations to pay down Vance’s $700,000 in personal loans.

The campaign ended June $250,000 underwater, with more debt than cash on hand, and his joint fundraising committees are struggling to keep up. That has raised concerns and criticism that Vance’s fundraising struggles may reflect a lack of grassroots support and enthusiasm among the state’s Republican and independent voters.

“Ohio should be off the table—in early September—and Republicans should be on offense in other places,” said the veteran strategist. “It’s similar to the primary: Vance is going to need a bailout again, and it’s likely going to have to come from Thiel.”

Billionaire Peter Thiel has been backing Vance’s campaign.

Marco Bello/Getty

“It’s a real shame money needs to go to Ohio,” the strategist continued. “Any other candidate that would have emerged from the primary would have had a good opportunity to put away Tim Ryan by Labor Day."

Another longtime Republican strategist in the state told The Daily Beast that the campaign’s passive attitude in the primary won’t fly in the general election.

“It seems like a mix of not knowing what they are doing—they didn’t run much of a primary campaign and were functionally dead before Trump’s endorsement and Thiel’s money bailed them out at the last minute—and J.D. not seeming to want to do much, anyway. I think they are also just reading the environment and trying to play a ‘prevent defense’—keeping J.D.’s profile low, minimizing gaffes,” the strategist said.

Still, there are some signs that the Vance operation is working to make up for lost time. Verb, the talk radio host in Youngstown, said he is welcoming Vance onto his show next week. It’s an opportunity for the Republican candidate to court Ryan’s own constituents, who have sent him to Congress for two decades but are far more conservative now than they were before.

“I told him, you need to be on this program more often, because this is Tim Ryan’s home area, and you’re void here,” Verb said. “That’s perhaps why he’s coming on next week.”

Of course, the Republicans who are most harshly critical of Vance don’t want to see him lose. To the contrary: they want to see him hold this seat and defeat Ryan, whose attempt at persuading Trump voters is annoying and infuriating to many GOP loyalists.

“Tim Ryan is a fraud and a phony,” Verb said. “With all of that being said, he is running one of the most effective campaigns I’ve seen.”

Vance, Verb continued, “better get off his ass, figure out why he isn’t raising more money, why the Republican Party isn’t behind him raising money, and try to counter the ad campaign of Tim Ryan.”

 

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Js1

Js1 85372

Posted
Posted
32 minutes ago, Snake Diggity said:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/utah-senate-hopeful-evan-mcmullin-is-striving-to-make-a-gop-state-competitive-again-11658584801
 

Utah is odd because they are deeply conservative but they do not seem to like Trumpism.  I wouldn’t put money on McMullin but this race might actually be competitive.

This is a great lesson for dark red states - you don't run a Democrat and you run an independent who is not Trumpy as the de facto Dem, without the toxic label in deep red states.  McMullin would just be another Romney, but 2 Romneys is better than 1 Romney and 1 Mike Lee. 

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gmr548

gmr548 16580

Posted
Posted
JD Vance has been actively working to lose his race. Tim Ryan just needs to keep doing his thing. Last Midterms, Sherrod Brown won by a bigger margin in the Senate than Mike DeWine won the gubernatorial race. Votes are absolutely there in Ohio

Seriously. In still in “I’ll believe it when I see it” mode but new dumb shit Vance has said/done comes out seemingly daily and it’s a dogfight in recent polls - though the quality of the data is notgreatbob.gif
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atomheartbevo

atomheartbevo 89709

Posted
Posted
12 hours ago, StassneyHorn said:

JD Vance has been actively working to lose his race. Tim Ryan just needs to keep doing his thing. Last Midterms, Sherrod Brown won by a bigger margin in the Senate than Mike DeWine won the gubernatorial race. Votes are absolutely there in Ohio

10 hours ago, gmr548 said:

Seriously. In still in “I’ll believe it when I see it” mode but new dumb shit Vance has said/done comes out seemingly daily and it’s a dogfight in recent polls - though the quality of the data is notgreatbob.gif

I’m sure plenty of women are loving these comments he’s been making.

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StassneyHorn

StassneyHorn 6609

Posted
Posted (edited)
5 hours ago, Voldemort86 said:

Last cycle, I talked myself into believing that Lindsay Graham and Susan Collins could lose, but both of them crushed it. I’m not going to get excited about the Tim Ryan or McMullen thing yet, but they are nice little stories I guess.

I will always sunshine post. Tim Ryan today has more name recognition right now in Ohio than JD Vance who spent his short working man career in Silicon Valley. There’s a ton of blue collar resentment towards the guy even with Trumps endorsement. Plenty of Obama-loving in his past. Vance advanced barely with 34% of the vote. 

Romney has not endorsed Mike Lee. That is his state. He is a kingmaker there. That is devastating.

DNC should stand back and act only when the candidate asks.

 

Edited by StassneyHorn
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Voldemort86

Voldemort86 2259

Posted
Posted
54 minutes ago, StassneyHorn said:

I will always sunshine post. Tim Ryan today has more name recognition right now in Ohio than JD Vance who spent his short working man career in Silicon Valley. There’s a ton of blue collar resentment towards the guy even with Trumps endorsement. Plenty of Obama-loving in his past. Vance advanced barely with 34% of the vote. 

Romney has not endorsed Mike Lee. That is his state. He is a kingmaker there. That is devastating.

DNC should stand back and act only when the candidate asks.

 

I wish stuff like this mattered, but we’ve seen time and time again that it only seems to hurt democrats. Cal Cunningham would be a US senator right now if he could just keep his pants on. 
 

Fox News and the desire to “own the libs even if it causes great personal sacrifice to you” is a lot to overcome.  Lots of people get to the voting booth and vote R no matter what like they’ve been programmed to do. 

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HenryJames

HenryJames 66082

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Posted
1 hour ago, The Dog said:

Looks like Greitens - the dude who had to resign as governor due to a cheating scandal - is imploding. This is the dude who is accused of beating up his wife and kids and released the infamous "I'm hunting RINOs" ad. 

image.thumb.png.3c92306bd493188f5e1de8afb7a9f066.png

Affair and sexual assault allegationsEdit

In 2015, Greitens had an extramarital affair with his hairstylist.[156] She accused him of coercing her to perform oral sex, undressing, kissing and touching her without her consent, and threatening to release a nude photo of her if she told anyone about their encounter.[258]Greitens has said a 2018 report by the Missouri House Special Investigative Committee on Oversight, which concluded that the woman's accusations were credible, was discredited.[259] Greitens's ex-wife said in a sworn affidavit that he had admitted taking the pictures.[260]

Allegations of domestic abuseEdit

On April 11, 2020, Eric and Sheena Greitens announced they were ending their marriage.[261] Soon thereafter, Sheena Greitens said she had accepted a job as an associate professorof political science at the University of Texas at Austin Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. She focuses primarily on East Asia, American national security, and authoritarian politics and foreign policy.[262][263] In court filings for their 2022 child custody case, Sheena Greitens accused him, in a sworn affidavit, of physical abuse "such as cuffing our then-3-year-old son across the face at the dinner table" and said that, because of the abuse, "steps were taken to limit his access to firearms."[264] She said she has "photographic evidence" of the abuse injuries. Greitens's attorney has said the alleged injuries came from their son just "roughhousing with his brother."[260]

Greitens denied allegations of abuse, claiming that they are politically motivated and that leading Republicans helped his ex-wife write the affidavit.[265]

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The Dog

The Dog 44060

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Posted

This and Trump is taking all the money for himself and not sharing. It's hurting GOP candidates in what should be a wave election:

Quote

“Trump continues to be the party’s dominant fund-raiser and yet virtually none of the tens of millions of dollars he has raised has gone toward defeating Democrats. Instead, the money has funded his political team and retribution agenda”

 

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F250

F250 28777

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Posted

My first time in New Jersey I got into a small squabble with some dude that wouldn't let me use the gas pump. Didn't realize that was a thing in New Jersey, I thought he was trying to scam me.

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Js1

Js1 85372

Posted
Posted
6 minutes ago, Zonahorn said:

Man, the lack of national attention in Arizona is weird. I know we haven't had our primaries yet, but Republicans are putting up bat shit insane funded by Peter Thiel against senator Kelly right now.

fify.

Kelly is fucking awesome. 

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Voldemort86

Voldemort86 2259

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I’ve been saying it some recently, but it looks like republicans might be hurt by creepy toad and GOP mega donor Sheldon Adelson kicking the bucket.

the guy used to throw them at least $100-$150 million dollars per election cycle. Finding people to give and donate in that party is difficult because they don’t care about the greater good. The party is all about god, their gun, their bible, lower my taxes and leave me alone while they pretend that the whole world isn’t cratering and suffering around them.

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Gil Bang

Gil Bang 25964

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Posted
7 hours ago, F250 said:

My first time in New Jersey I got into a small squabble with some dude that wouldn't let me use the gas pump. Didn't realize that was a thing in New Jersey, I thought he was trying to scam me.

Oregon is that way too, IIRC.

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RDCanecutter

RDCanecutter 26447

Posted
Posted
6 hours ago, Zonahorn said:

Man, the lack of national attention in Arizona is weird. I know we haven't had our primaries yet, but Republicans are putting up nothing against senator Kelly right now.

I try to block Arizona out of my mind. And yes, I am from Alabama.

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RDCanecutter

RDCanecutter 26447

Posted
Posted
7 hours ago, F250 said:

My first time in New Jersey I got into a small squabble with some dude that wouldn't let me use the gas pump. Didn't realize that was a thing in New Jersey, I thought he was trying to scam me.

My first time there I wasn't sure if the dude was legit, but what the hell, he really wanted to pump that gas.

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F250

F250 28777

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12 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

My first time there I wasn't sure if the dude was legit, but what the hell, he really wanted to pump that gas.

I overreacted Bobby Hill style when the dude grabbed the gas pump handle from me.

King Of The Hill GIF

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StassneyHorn

StassneyHorn 6609

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Posted

Some of these AZ candidates are absolutely librool plants from the DNC and I approve. Heron Davis is either an awesome troll or has CTE from the NFL, with a QAnon influencer as campaign manager. Hell Kelly Cooper is cutting promos from the seat of his truck as a total fuck you to your face to the white sunglasses caucus. Kari Lake was going to drag brunches and shows posing for pictures and donating to Obama.

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B00M

B00M 6416

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Posted
12 hours ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

He's given his endorsement and maybe said something nice about them.

c5f3050a-b3d6-438a-8546-3d31975d78d4_tex

In general he's endorsed extreme candidates that can't win and the division in the republican voters, roughly a third want Trump to GTFO, is leading to a lack of campaign contributions? Maybe Trump fucks around and costs the Rs the senate they were supposed to take control of

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