Yup, as noted to a friend last night, they don’t mind lying outrageously about their agendas and their opponents’, so trying to outsmart them by seizing the inoffensive center will often not work out great.
At the first debate in 2012, Obama pointed out that Romney wanted to give rich people a huge tax cut, and Romney just said no that’s not true (it was true) and Obama lost the debate in devastating fashion.
Fortunately he recognized this was a mistake and came prepared in debates two and three to do what the whole point of these things is: make your opponents look small and ridiculous by contrast to your confidence and charm.
There are again implications here for the “seize the inoffensive policy center” theory of campaigning.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Brian Beutler

Brian Beutler Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @brianbeutler

9 Oct
It’s too long to screen grab, but the short version is @mattyglesias is wrong and I’m right. mailchi.mp/crooked.com/bi…
There's another facet to this argument that I didn't have space to get into, but it's about a different lesson from 2009-2010 that many people have somehow forgotten.
It's common to shorthand that stretch as the period where Democrats had a historic 60 vote supermajority. But what really happened is they had fewer than 60 votes, then they had 60, then they didn't again. And the reason It worked out that way is that an elderly senator died.
Read 6 tweets
6 Oct
Trump decides to outdo Hoover and intentionally inflict further damage on the country out of spite for rejecting him.
Trump is the decisive figure here but worth remembering that the broader GOP strategy all along has been to try to optimize stimulus to juice the economy until after the election, then pull the plug if Biden won anyhow. They undershot, and it’s on them as much as Trump.
Maybe Republicans panic, or maybe some other force will intervene. But the real nightmare isn’t waiting 4 more months for the rescue America needs. It’s McConnell keeps the Senate and completes Trump’s revenge. Absolutely can’t let that happen.
Read 4 tweets
5 Oct
We still don’t know when he last tested negative.
Charge headlong into COVID, ye faithful, it will leave you feeling powerful and rejuvenated, said the president.
Read 4 tweets
5 Oct
They are trying to conceal (and make it impossible to discover) how widely the president spread COVID-19.
The reason they are trying to cover up the number of people Trump infected with coronavirus is that it’s clearly a very large number, and that’s just counting the direct transmissions, not the people who will contract it turn.
in* turn
Read 13 tweets
4 Oct
Man this is painful.
Yesterday’s lying was necessary to prevent Trump from getting sicker, said the president’s doctor.
Watch for yourselves, starting at 0:20 - “didn’t want to give any information that might steer the course of illness in another direction.”
Read 5 tweets
3 Oct
Wait, did the doctor blow a coverup???
Trump needed to resign years ago, and then many more times since, but he needs to resign.
Read 7 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!