Tag: democrats

The Official 2020 Democratic National Convention Drinking Game

Imagine a four-day Zoom meeting in which the likes of John Kasich, Michael Bloomberg, and Nancy Pelosi warn you for the fifty through sixty millionth times about the “existential threat” of Donald Trump, and you come close to envisioning both hell on earth and what we’re all in for this week with the Democratic Party’s Biden/Harris virtual coronation.

The alternative is to start drinking early.

The 2020 DNC represents the culmination of one of the most exhausting, repetitive, and depressing primary races America has seen. It was extreme both by number of candidates – the official count seems to be 29 – and by sheer quantity of identical-sounding rhetoric. The race from the start was itself like a giant drinking game, in which candidates were rewarded in polls for delivering the most pleasing versions of oft-repeated terms like “kids in cages,” “fascist,” “white supremacy,” and “this is not who we are.”

The stretch run of the primary, a clash between centrist Joe Biden and reform-minded Bernie Sanders that ostensibly represented a serious ideological split within the party, essentially came down to a battle of talking points, i.e. “this president” versus “corporations.”

“This president” ended up winning, and the upcoming DNC will reflect the relentless Trump-centric strategy of the victors (the same strategy the party deployed four years ago). It will be light on policy and heavy on market-tested barbs about Trumpian perfidy. A year ago, we’d have been drinking most to terms like “Ukraine” or “rule of law”; this year, it’ll be “post office” and “birtherism” (take two shots for creative variations like “neo-birtherism” or “birtherism redux”).

One point makes me nervous. This convention could obliterate the boozing public with a single word, previewed in about a thousand headlines when Kamala Harris was named Biden’s running mate last week:

Trump re-election complicated by historic VP pick

MSNBC

Why Kamala Harris is a historic VP pick for Joe Biden

BBC News

My favorite:

Reese Witherspoon shares heartfelt story in wake of Kamala Harris’ historic VP selection

ABC News

Turn on your TV to CNN or MSNBC right now. The odds aren’t bad – I’d put them at 7-2 – that the word “historic” is in the chyron. You will hear this word five thousand times, at minimum, per day of convention coverage. Out of respect for human life, you’ll therefore be asked to drink to “history” or “historic” only when uttered by actual convention speakers. I hope readers understand, without it being included on the list, that any mention of “Malarkey” is an automatic drink.

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President of Young Democrats of Maryland found dead

The president of the Young Democrats of Maryland was found dead in Washington, D.C., more than a week after he went missing in Maryland.

Prince George’s County police announced the death of Joseph Kitchen on Sunday night, a day after the department asked for the public’s help in locating him. Kitchen, 34, had been missing since Aug. 8, when he was last seen at Sandy Point State Park in Annapolis, Maryland, about 37 miles (60 kilometers) east of Washington.

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Democrats’ ‘War Game’ for Election Includes West Coast Secession, Possible Civil War

In one scenario, John Podesta — the former chair of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, and a leading figure in party circles — played former Vice President Joe Biden, and refused to concede the election.

The result: the threat of secession by the entire West Coast, followed by the possible intervention of the U.S. armed forces:

But conveniently, a group of former top government officials called the Transition Integrity Project actually gamed four possible scenarios, including one that doesn’t look that different from 2016: a big popular win for Mr. Biden, and a narrow electoral defeat, presumably reached after weeks of counting the votes in Pennsylvania. For their war game, they cast John Podesta, who was Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, in the role of Mr. Biden. They expected him, when the votes came in, to concede, just as Mrs. Clinton had.

But Mr. Podesta, playing Mr. Biden, shocked the organizers by saying he felt his party wouldn’t let him concede. Alleging voter suppression, he persuaded the governors of Wisconsin and Michigan to send pro-Biden electors to the Electoral College.

In that scenario, California, Oregon, and Washington then threatened to secede from the United States if Mr. Trump took office as planned. The House named Mr. Biden president; the Senate and White House stuck with Mr. Trump. At that point in the scenario, the nation stopped looking to the media for cues, and waited to see what the military would do.

Notably, on Election Night in 2016, Podesta publicly refused to concede the election to President Donald Trump.

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