I just HATE it when in one breath someone attacks the traitor in the WH and the GOP

[Eliot Rosewater]

and then talks about how corrupt Hillary was or how Kamala or fill in the blank democrat just isnt quite right.

Fuck that.

[thbobby]

1. Morning Joe often does this false equivalence crap /nt

[Me.]

2. But Of Course

Comrade Trump has been a voting Dem all his life as MJ reminds us every other minute

[Proud liberal 80]

27. I doubt that he ever voted

May have giving money to Democrats, but that was to try to advance is own interest in a city and state dominated by Democrats

[karynnj]

3. Morning Joe bothers me less than supposedly neutral journalists when they do this - he is and was a

conservative Republican. So, you have a REPUBLICAN stating his President is corrupt .. and so is a Democrat. Not to mention, the " offences" of the Democrat do not measure up to Trump's offences. Where he actually may help us is when he treats any Democrat with some respect -- and he has done this. In some cases, for years.

[Trumpocalypse]

43. Of course

The media has been indulging in this false equivalence for years.

[Sophia4]

4. I love it when Republicans demonstrate just how partisan they are down deep where

it matters by attacking any and all Democrats for utterly no good reason.

We Democrats will pick our candidate, and we aren't going to give the Republicans several years in which to make up all kinds of absurd untruths about the candidate.

The Democrats we will pick from our so much, much, much better qualified and more patriotic than any Republican alive that we will win in 2020.

I have no doubt about this.

Keep the Republicans guessing. That should be our motto.

[bobbieinok]

7. It doesn't matter who dem candidate is. GOP will paint them as worst ever

1 (of several) reasons I supported Obama in 08 primary was that I knew GOP was lying in wait for HRC. I naively thought there was little except his being black that they could attack him on. And I thought even GOP wouldn't openly play on that field. Hah!!

They attacked his minister J Wright and by implication the patriotism of all blacks, especially black Christians.

Bottom line, GOP thinks any dem president is illegal and will attempt to destroy any dem candidate.

Remember how GOP did yrs of in-depth investigation of any potential 92 dem candidate? They had built up an arsenal to deploy almost at once after Bill's election.

[Sophia4]

9. Of course you are right.

But let's make it as difficult as possible for them.

They made Hillary walk over coals for years. That's how they stir up their base.

We should point out how they do this. We should point it out over and over.

We should ridicule them for it.

They go to such extremes that it won't be hard to make fun of them for it.

You are right. No matter who we nominate they will do this. But let's make them guess so that their strategy becomes easy to ridicule and transparent enough for even the biggest "conservative" fool to see.

[bobbieinok]

10. I think GOPers take an oath at birth to hate and despise all dems and never ever vote for one

Like in AL senate race when GOP voters openly said they'd vote for a known pedophile over a dem.

[R B Garr]

20. The Republicans also got PLENTY of help demonizing Hillary

from people who claim to be Democrats. That is what the crux of the Mueller indictments are about. Splitting the Democrats was the goal, partly through their own RT network where Democrats are regularly attacked so it gives all interested parties a chance to attack our Democrats with nonsense propaganda, such as calling Democrats corrupt for no legitimate reason or proof.

[Sophia4]

22. Nominating a candidate who has been constantly attacked for years, however

unfairly, is not a smart thing to do.

[R B Garr]

23. Unfairly attacking a candidate is also not a smart thing to do.

When you look at the results, the attacks on Hillary from within the party are why we have a Trump. Look at the Mueller indictments.

[Sophia4]

24. The Republicans investigated and investigated, and then Hillary hired some of the

same people for her foundation that she later hired for her campaign.

And that also invited a lot of criticism.

We need a candidate who is has not be investigated during the past 8 years, who has not been in the headlines associated with an investigation, however bogus, for the past 8 years. We need a candidate with charisma who is not so very controversial.

[R B Garr]

25. We need to not create groups called Busters who actively work against our

candidate. The reality is that those groups were created for the specific purpose of spreading distrust in Hillary. Much like you are doing now, actually. A constant and superficial drone of negativity and bias against her, such as your insistence that her Foundation is corrupt as if you believe all the negative press against her.

Investigations happen, like bank fraud investigations, for instance. Some FBI investigations are about bank fraud, but that never happened to the Clintons. We need a candidate who is not divisive. That is what is controversial, as evidenced by the Mueller indictments. The Russians targeted fringe groups to turn against Democrats, so let's not let them get away with that again.

[Sophia4]

35. We need a candidate who is not divisive.

Right. But we also need a candidate who draws enthusiastic support.

And always remember: Hillary won the popular vote.

Our candidate has to win states like Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania as well as California, New York, New Hampshire and Oregon. Presidential elections are decided in the swing states, the states that relied for jobs on manufacturing prior to our trade agreements. At least until we end the electoral college and let all voters decide them, it's the voters in those states that have the power.

[R B Garr]

39. We need to not help the GOP by spreading untruths and contrived

criticisms against Democrats and our nominee. You should update your biases to reflect current news and the current state of affairs regarding how our election was hacked by those who targeted gullible people into believing that Democrats were the same as Republicans and other complete lies, actually. You should read the margin of voters who believed Stein was the "peace candidate." Do you know anyone who would believe such a laughable thing?? We need to call out the frauds instead of propping them up, which ultimately helps the GOP in those states you mention.

You keep bringing up the electoral college, which really just shows the absurdity of the corruption claims. It is the system we have and has no place in criticizing Democrats. I believe some used the electoral college as an excuse to not vote for Hillary...? At least, I'm pretty sure that was one of the reasons. We need to not actively campaign against our own nominee. We need to call out people who encourage people to vote third party by continuously and intentionally maligning Democrats.

[R B Garr]

28. What is not a smart thing to do is to join in with the Republicans who attack

our candidate. That is what is not smart.

You should read the Mueller indictments. You keep parroting the same primary biases against Hillary that the Russian's used, but the investigation has moved way, way beyond those superficial and false memes. You should join the current news cycles which explain how the negativity you keep bringing up about her were used against Democrats to help Republicans. We need to talk about current news and not keep bringing up the primary attacks used against her.

[Wwcd]

30. She was more than qualified. It wouldn't have mattered which Dem candidate we ran.

They would have done the same to anyone but Putin's choice.

Hillary still beat out both her Primary & General opponants by millions.

Seems the populace knew her truth & knew the lies were just that.

When I think of all the many methods they used to interfere in 2016, it is a fantasy to think that anyone else would have beaten Trump.

[Wwcd]

31. Doesn't matter. She had well earned her right to lead this nation.

The louder they beat that anti-Hillary drum, the stronger she stood in the face of it all.
Why? It wasn't for the glamor or publicity.
She did it because she was asked to by the populace of her Party.

She was well aware what she was up against.
She is thusly admired around the world, and there's a reason for that.

Other countries are far more aware of how easily they can fall to threats like Putin. They do not take their govt nor their freedom for granted as many here in the US do.

Hillary Clinton was the firewall between a free society & fascism.

Anyone who didn't respect that needs to study the fragility of democracies.

We have Trump as a stand in for a Putin presidency.

Those who played a role in destroying her also played a role in destroying this nation.

It wasn't Hillary herself that Putin, Trump & her "other"adversaries needed to destroy, It Was What She Stood For.

We have Trump and our govt & our nation is now being sliced up between the biggest international crime syndicate.
What we have always honored & relied on to live our lives in a free society is being removed.

It wasn't Hillary they hated, It Was What She Stood For.

But in our society they had to re-create Hillary's image to the voters. They needed to give voters a reason to hate HER, because they couldn't have won had they told the truth about her.

It is unfortunate that people bought the lie of fascists before they actually researched the truth of the one candidate who could have held that firewall between a free society & fascism.

This national disaster rests on the shoulders, for generations, of those who chose the big orchestrated lie over the truth.

[SidDithers]

5. Seeing lots of that from the knobs at Our Revolution...nt

Sid

[pangaia]

6. "Eliot" it is all about clicks and $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

We all know that....

[Wwcd]

29. That's where the bots came into play. "Most popular" &

"Most liked" = most bot clicks.

They produce polls 'in favor of'.., and keep the most liked pages at the top of search engines.

Same way they are engineered to move negative propaganda to the top of search engines.

Without the constant propping up by bot 'likes', we'd have a far better, fully functioning govt in America today.
This was the purpose of bots. They knew they'd never get enough real people to convince voters so they had to create bots to hit the "like" key.

The duping of America was intentional & orchestrated with an assist from our foreign enemys thru money & media.

If you truly love this country, this threat should send chills.

[Botany]

8. That Pavlovian Response is the result of decades of right wing propaganda and psychic warfare.

It is no accident. This nation needs lots of time on the couch in order to understand what
has happened to it. However some are lost for good .... like the car I passed in S.W. PA
a few weeks ago ..... NRA, Hill for Prison, MAGA stuff, lock her up, and something like "That
Bitch and Benghazi" stickers on it.

The republicans all knew they had zero about Hillary and her emails but they talked about it anyway.

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it." J. Goebbles

[triron]

11. Cause there are so many 'suckers' in the US.

[Hortensis]

12. Yup. Yup. Yup.

Notably about what it would take to enlighten them. However, IF enough moderate conservatives have enough and peel away to reform a more centrist majority it should say something to the worst. It's very important to social conservatives to conform and to feel that they belong to a righteous, respectable majority, and a growing realization that they are not should have an effect. At whatever point it finally happens.

People like the Kochs are very unwise but not unclever. They know troubled times make people more conservative, and troubled times of adjustment to much less is just what they have in mind for most. Among the biggest threats Democrats pose to their plans are better times that calm people down and replace anxiety with hope.

[Botany]

13. Thanx to the non stop lies and propaganda we have 20 to 30% of Americans who still think that .....

..... Hillary is guilty of some kind of crime but the man who kept saying "crooked Hillary"
stole money from the widows of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars through his Trump University.
"Need a good job, with good pay, and you can stay home with your kids how about real estate
and you can learn about it at Trump U." That was their pitch.

[Eliot Rosewater]

14. You cant believe rump anymore, nobody can, they support him because he will harm

their enemies

women
POC
Latinos
Muslims

etc

They dont know or care if he is lying, stealing or a traitor, it simply does not matter to them as long as they can imprison or execute doctors and women.

[yurbud]

19. the same people who blame Hillary for Behghazi worshipped Bush after 9/11

and don't see the irony.

[yurbud]

15. There are two kinds of criticisms of Democratic politicians: made up shit from the right and

stuff from people who look at their record.

We need elected Democrats who are not going to bow to Wall Street on key economic, foreign policy, budget, and regulatory issues.

When we elect centrists who give away half the loaf before negotiations even start, it dampens voter enthusiasm for the next election, which gives the Republicans just enough of an edge to get in with gerrymandering, voter suppression, and election rigging with electronic voting machines.

We are in a situation politically like we were before the Civil War and another Franklin Pierce or James Buchanan is not going to put a knife once and for all into the party that is killing the middle and working class.

You cannot insult people into voting for your candidate and that certainly doesn't erase their record.

[Eliot Rosewater]

16. Nope

[yurbud]

18. so there is no legitimate criticism?

[R B Garr]

33. But much of the so-called criticism was also a ruse for endless attacks

meant to build a brand and a household name on the backs of others. We need candidates who are not divisive. Endless criticisms with no proof are corrupt in themselves. You should read the Mueller indictments about how the Russian's targeted gullible people who believed all the lies in the name of "legitimate criticism."

[yurbud]

40. folks inside the beltway think the only definition of "corruption" is the legal one they wrote

to let themselves off the hook to serve their big donors and enrich themselves more easily.

The rest of us might not know the letter of the law, but when politicians enact policies that the vast majority of their constituents and/or voter base don't want, it's not hard to connect the dots.

[R B Garr]

42. This sounds contrived again, at least about claiming

who gets to own the definition of corruption and who gets to call people corrupt with no proof or consequences. For instance, some people might think corruption is an FBI bank fraud investigation, or funneling $500,000 to a daughter’s business. That certainly fits your narrow definition of “enriching themselves”. Also, any politician can promise the moon but then never deliver on those promises — another form of corruption.

If you want to call others corrupt, then you should have clean hands, it seems. Look what we’ve learned about Trump. Everything he accuses of others is actually what he is guilty of.

[yurbud]

45. I won't argue that Trump's not corrupt. The only problem with him

is cataloging all the ways.

[Trumpocalypse]

44. Sorry but the time for those ideological litmus tests are past.

We are now fighting for our country and our democracy. We can no longer afford to demand purity from Democratic candidates as the price of our support.

[yurbud]

46. We wouldn't be in this crisis if Democrats had cleaned up their act before or during Obama time

It may well be possible to win a blue wave with business compliant Democrats in 2018 and maybe even 2020, but it will be a short lived victory if they continue with business as usual, giving the Republicans an opening to come back meaner, uglier, and more willing to eviscerate democracy to stay in power.

"Centrists" are keeping the GOP alive by doing a half-assed job instead of putting a stake in Reaganomics.

[Trumpocalypse]

47. No it is the failure of the left to unify that has kept the GOP alive

by some demanding ideological purity. That gave us Nixon in 68, Bush in 2000 and Trump in 16.

[yurbud]

48. So Gore & Hillary were peaceniks like McGovern?

Or are you saying that having primaries at all is a demand for ideological purity?

Obama somehow survived having a primary opponent well into the summer before the fall election AND got elected.

Also, this crap about ideological purity too often comes from those who are unwilling to articulate their true ideology at all.

Because who would win an election if they said, "I'll help you if it makes my big donors richer or at least doesn't piss them off. But if they ask me to screw you in the budget, or send your kid to an unnecessary war so those donors can get richer, I will. That's what I mean when I say, "I can get things done in Washington," or "I can make the tough decisions." But those decisions will pay off in the long run when I get a job as a lobbyist, corporate lawyer, consultant, CEO, or do-nothing board member when I leave office that will make me rich."

[Trumpocalypse]

49. Never said anything about not having primaries

so please don't put words in my mouth. Primaries are fine. But after the primary is over, we need to unite behind the nominee even if they weren't our first or even second choice. That's how we win elections.

[yurbud]

53. people did that. The problem is, you can't DEMAND enthusiasm...

Also, those who decry critics for demand "ideological purity" mostly seem to mean "We refuse to change our actions to fit the needs of our base and constituents because we will lose donors."

That is how you lose elections, get primaried, or even lose your party to some new upstart as happened to the Whigs who were too accommodating to the slave states.

I would prefer that the Democratic Party become more small D democratic because we don't have time to waste and their are major institutional obstacles to replacing one of the two major parties.

But if the centrist wing continues to put personal enrichment and concierge service to big donors ahead of what's good for the country, it will happen whether we like it or not.

[Trumpocalypse]

54. To quote Bill Maher

We need to tell the difference between an imperfect friend and a deadly enemy.

[yurbud]

58. Between elections is good time to tell your "friend" to quit stabbing you in the back and telling

you to be grateful because the other guy would have killed you.

[Trumpocalypse]

60. Between elections is a good time

but during elections we must unify to fight the common enemy.

[yurbud]

55. we will unify when you stop supporting republican calls for privatization, deregulation...

tax cuts and bailouts for the rich, and regime change in countries that don't bow to our banking and business interests, and ignore human rights abuses and aggression in countries that do obey like Saudi.

It is not enough that you support gay and abortion rights, and hug rather than lynch minorities and immigrants. You have to help the rest of us survive instead of throwing us into the meat grinder for your big donors.

[Trumpocalypse]

56. I never supported any of those things

Again you put words in my mouth.

But those are all ideological litmus tests which in the end only divide people.

[yurbud]

57. I was not talking about you as an individual but "centrist" elected officials track record

[yurbud]

59. that's what Dems have said for a couple of decades and why they win narrow margins at best

when demographically, the Republican Party should be deader than Jimmy Hoffa.

[Trumpocalypse]

61. Yes because the left didn't unify

and too many either stayed home or voted for Jill Stein or Nader or McCarthy, handing the election over to the GOP.

[AtomicKitten]

62. Democrats voted with the Republicans to gut Dodd-Frank.

A perfect example of your point. This did nothing to inspire the electorate's confidence that Democrats would be a firewall against bad policy.

Michael Bennet of Colorado

Tom Carper of Delaware

Chris Coons of Delaware

Joe Donnelly of Indiana

Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire

Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota

Doug Jones of Alabama

Tim Kaine of Virginia

Angus King of Maine (I)

Joe Manchin of West Virginia

Claire McCaskill of Missouri

Bill Nelson of Florida

Gary Peters of Michigan

Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire

Debbie Stabenow of Michigan

Jon Tester of Montana

Mark Warner of Virginia

[lpbk2713]

17. I usually doubt the sincerity of someone ...

when they say they voted for the lesser of two evils. It's like they had to toss a coin.

[Wwcd]

36. Same here. They were convinced to despise Hillary.

It didn't matter what she stood for in the face of fascism.
They chose to undermine a free society.
They failed to find out on their own who she was, and simply believed the 'likes' of bots.

Freedom or fascism.
That's what they should have been deciding.

[yurbud]

51. So...you think one candidate is completely evil and the other is perfect?

That's kind of childish isn't it?

[Gothmog]

21. Agreed

[onecent]

26. That is ALWAYS SO TRUE......

[ismnotwasm]

32. Some people just wont admit

How completely wrong there were, or how complicit in this horror they are.

[Wwcd]

37. + a million.

At this point they can forego the admission, just stop carrying the water for the Russia-Republican Party.

[BannonsLiver]

34. Almost as annoying as "What is the Democrats message?"

It's been plain as fucking day for decades you GD halfwits. Open your eyes.

[Wwcd]

38. Lol. Yup

The message is still as old & solid since the beginning.
It is a simple message of human rights.

Not real hard to remember.

[ismnotwasm]

41. Me too

I don’t listen to those fuckers, they have demonstrated little regard for actual facts

[BlueJac]

52. Bait and switch...

like always!