California Governor Gavin Newsom is using a new “dark woke” approach to counter President Trump on social media that seems to be getting positive poll results.
Brad Pearce sums up Newsom’s tactics and labels him “America’s Alcibiades”:
Newsom is already doing what he can to raise his profile in advance of a widely anticipated Presidential run. Currently, one form this has taken is a podcast where he engages with people ranging from Charlie Kirk to Tim Walz about a variety of topics, most notably trying to strike a conciliatory note with the young male voters the Democrats have been bleeding. He also has his aids running a “Press Release” account where they try to emulate Trump’s language and behavior, a gimmick which has gotten mixed reviews. Most significantly, Gavin Newsom is backing an ambitious initiative to temporarily suspend California’s non-partisan Congressional districting commission in favor of partisan redistricting through 2030 which he claims would offset Texas’s mid-session redistricting scheme- this is seen as an enormous political gamble but that assumes someone who feels shame and is unable to win by losing.
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Skeptics abound about if any of this work. They note the disastrous response to the LA wildfires at the beginning of this year. They say that no one wants to “Make America California” given its extreme cost of living, extraordinary rate of homelessness, unbelievable red tape, constant dysfunction, and that as such California liberals are toxic to national politics.
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Others say that voters simply won’t go for a man who is so obviously sociopathic and clearly lacks core beliefs. These criticisms misunderstand both Gavin Newsom and electoral democracy itself. Most successful politicians may have some form of personality disorder, as half of their job is blowing smoke up your ass, but Newsom’s obvious sociopathy and genuine shamelessness are enormous political assets that cannot be taught. Newsom seems to live by the immortal words of George Costanza, “And remember, it’s not a lie if you believe it.”
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Newsom has no baggage because he simply doesn’t care, he will just tell you that you are wrong with some rapidly produced semi-relevant key words or statistics. … Gavin Newsom thrives at a task which is arduous to any semi-normal person because he feeds off of selling people on himself all day while simultaneously having no emotional response to negative feedback. Here is a rare politician who enjoys the journey instead of just dreaming about the destination. I won’t belabor the comparison, but he really is an American Alcibiades– talented, good looking, self-aggrandizing, incapable of shame, and in it only for himself and the love of the game.
Pearce’s post also includes a handy pocket biography of Gavin Newsom for those who must know more about the man who would be POTUS.
All I ever needed to know about Gavin Newsom is covered in this 2018 LA Times piece about the “eight elite San Francisco families” who “funded Gavin Newsom’s political ascent.”
Gavin Newsom’s tactics seem to be serving him well in the preseason presidential primary polling by Emerson College:
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 1, 2025
And has him neck-and-neck with Vice-President J.D. Vance:
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 1, 2025
Some of Newsom’s growth since June seems to have come at the expense of hapless former Vice-President Kamala Harris, but most seems to have come from undecided voters.
Whatever the cause, Gavin Newsom is doing well enough that horse-race sportsbetters The Hill is ranking him #1 in the Dem primary:
Gavin Newsom has taken to trolling Trump on social media, often with postings that ape the president’s idiosyncratic and hyperbolic language.
In recent days, he has launched a line of merchandise in Trump’s signature red bearing slogans like “Newsom was right about everything” and declaring in all caps “Many people are saying this is the greatest merchandise ever made.”
Yet it’s not all fun and games. In a public conversation at a Politico forum late last week, he suggested Trump would run for an unconstitutional third term and called the president “simply the most destructive and damaging individual in my lifetime.”
The no-holds-barred approach appears to be paying off for Newsom.
The New York Times rewarded Gavin Newsom for his Trump parody merchandising with a breathless article, quoting multiple academics about what it all means:
The Patriot Shop is just the latest salvo in Mr. Newsom’s ongoing trolling of Trumpworld, which has also included using a feisty social media feed to taunt the president and his style of posting, complete with his use of ALL CAPS and idiosyncratic, sometimes perplexing, vernacular.
The governor’s online efforts have drawn anger and sometimes bewildered reactions from the right — “We get the joke,” said Dana Perino, a Fox News host, adding, “It’s just not funny” — but heaps of praise from more liberal commentators, who say it’s a sign of life in a Democratic Party that has been mired in finger-pointing and infighting since Kamala Harris’s loss in November.
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Mr. Newsom admits the gag may eventually become tired, but he seems tickled by the prank, telling a crowd in Sacramento on Wednesday night that he would be rolling out even more products on the ballot campaign’s website, possibly including “a Trump corruption coin.”“I’ve quite enjoyed myself,” Mr. Newsom said at an event sponsored by Politico, adding that his goal was “putting the mirror up to the absurdity of all of this.”
One advertised item seemingly giving the governor particular joy was a signed $100 Bible, which Mr. Newsom and his site said had already sold out, though the Campaign for Democracy — his PAC, which is running the merch site — declined to say exactly how many Bibles it had sold, if any. (Mr. Trump did, in fact, sell his own “God Bless the USA” Bibles last year.)
At the same time, the governor seems quite serious about the bigger mission to “wake up” the opposition to Mr. Trump.
“I’m sick and tired of Democrats being on the losing end in this country and our democracy being on the losing end,” he said. “We’ve got to fight fire with fire.”
Gavin Newsom has also benefitted from battling Trump’s deployment of military and National Guard to Los Angeles in the courts.
I updated on that legal battle a few weeks back, focusing on two words: Posse Comitatus.
Gavin Newsom has also positioned himself on the “Abundance” side of the homelessness issue:
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 1, 2025
As one would expect, this won plaudits from Abundance bro Derek Thompson:
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 1, 2025
Netflix co-founder and Democratic megadonor Reed Hastings has given $2 million to help California redraw its House maps in the latest indication of the campaign’s outsize stakes.
Hastings is a stalwart supporter of Democratic causes and an ally of Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has championed the push to counter Texas’ GOP gerrymander with a new map designed to oust California Republicans. He also spent $3 million to help Newsom beat back a recall attempt in 2021.
Mr. Newsom’s administration has raised and spent tens of billions of dollars on programs to bring homeless people into housing and to emphasize treatment. But his move on Monday marks a tougher approach to one of the more visible aspects of the homelessness crisis. The governor has created a template for a local ordinance that municipalities can adopt to outlaw encampments and clear existing ones.
California is home to about half of the nation’s unsheltered homeless population, a visible byproduct of the temperate climate and the state’s brutal housing crisis. Last year, a record 187,000 people were homeless in the state…
Mr. Newsom cannot force cities to pass his model ban, but its issuance coincides with the release of more than $3 billion in state-controlled housing funds that local officials can use to put his template in place. And though it’s not a mandate, the call to outlaw encampments statewide by one of the best-known Democrats in the country suggests a shift in the party’s approach to homelessness.
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The Newsom administration seized on the Supreme Court ruling swiftly, ordering state agencies to begin humanely clearing encampments from state parks and freeway underpasses, and urging cities to do the same in local jurisdictions.Some did, addressing encampments with varying degrees of compassion and aggression.
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“There are no more excuses,” Governor Newsom said in a statement accompanying the ordinance. “Local leaders asked for resources — we delivered the largest state investment in history. They asked for legal clarity — the courts delivered. Now, we’re giving them a model they can put to work immediately, with urgency and humanity, to resolve encampments and connect people to shelter, housing and care.”
Gavin Newsom new approach to social media and his ations the issues drew criticism from the left:
Really the most important thing about Newsom to me is that he personally robbed and displaced homeless people for a photo op https://t.co/YdG0EpHdrT pic.twitter.com/iYeSrppOQ6
— Bryce Greene (@TheGreeneBJ) August 20, 2025
The World Socialist Web Site had a more specific critique:
Newsom insisted the strategy represented a “California-led” approach, one that avoids Trump’s federal militarization of urban policing. Yet this distinction is entirely cosmetic. Rather than rejecting the deployment of armed forces against working-class neighborhoods, Newsom has preemptively normalized it at the state level. “We’re working with local law enforcement, not overriding them,” he declared.
The reality is that this represents a major expansion of policing powers, redirecting state resources into paramilitary-style operations. Despite boasting about “falling crime rates” across California, Newsom is doubling down on “law-and-order” policies—a transparent attempt to preempt Trump’s propaganda and deflect Republican attacks. The message to the ruling class is unmistakable: California Democrats are prepared to be just as “serious on safety” as the fascistic Trump administration in Washington.
On Friday, Newsom unveiled the State Action for Facilitation on Encampments (SAFE) Task Force, a multi-agency initiative to dismantle homeless encampments across California’s ten largest cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Oakland, and Fresno.
The task force represents a significant escalation of Newsom’s campaign of criminalization and repression against the poor. It builds directly on his signature policy of violent sweeps, infamously showcased last year when Newsom personally staged a publicity stunt, when he was filmed assisting police as they tore down encampments and destroyed the belongings of homeless residents.
David Sirota’s Lever News has documented many other times when Gavin Newsom worked for the big money.
Like the driverless vehicle tech lobby:
After autonomous vehicle interests spent at least a quarter of a million dollars on lobbying and treated two senior gubernatorial aides to a bougie dinner, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) vetoed a bill Friday night that would have banned self-driving trucks from operating in the state without a safety operator aboard.
The veto delivered a massive win to Big Tech and a major blow to labor unions and road safety advocates, since backers of the bill say the rapid rise of driverless trucks may jeopardize trucking jobs and make public roadways more dangerous.
Newsom’s veto is the latest successful lobbying effort for the growing autonomous vehicle industry in the influential, Democratic-led state.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) vetoed a bill that overwhelmingly passed both chambers of the California legislature and would have delivered rules and transparency to the state’s burgeoning and largely unregulated cryptocurrency industry.
The move came after the crypto industry spent more than $400,000 on lobbying efforts and representatives from the Bay Area tech giant Salesforce lobbied Newsom directly on blockchain technology and other industry matters and treated him to a swanky dinner, according to lobbying disclosures.
Gavin Newsom also played Hamlet, or should I say Barack Obama, by publicly supporting single payer healthcare, then waffling on it at a critical time which ensured the California legislature never passed single payer legislation.
Gavin Newsom is currently claiming he has reached a deal that will enable Uber and Lyft drivers to unionize, but forgive me if I wait to see the fine print.
Time will tell if Gavin Newsom becomes the Democratic presidential nominee and if his blend of cosmetic “Dark Woke” social media trolling, Centrist policies, and mirroring of Trump’s authoritarianism even as he decries it will be a palatable mix in on the national stage.
Readers can make up their own mind about Gavin Newsom, but my views of the man were set many years ago by the above-referenced 2018 LA Times profile of the man and his moneyed backers:
San Francisco society’s “first families” — whose names grace museum galleries, charity ball invitations and hospital wards — settled on Newsom, 50, as their favored candidate two decades ago, said Willie Brown, former state Assembly speaker and former mayor of the city.
“He came from their world, and that’s why they embraced him without hesitancy and over and above everybody else,” said Brown, who is a mentor to Newsom. “They didn’t need to interview him. They knew what he stood for.”
— Nat Wilson Turner (@natwilsonturner) September 1, 2025
Those numbers have gone way up since 2018, and Gavin Newsom may have made superficial stylistic and policy changes, but cats don’t change their stripes, and like any honest politician, Gavin Newsom stays bought.
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The ad about toenail fungus that appeared when I dropped into comment about my homestate Governor seems really apropos.
You should have included some of the videos of Gavin Goodhair talking so everyone can see how he’s deadeyed, like a shark.
you could also have posted this scurrilous rumor, if only so I can ask people who is numbered here besides Newsom https://www.crazydaysandnights.net/2025/01/blind-items-revealed-1.html
Yikes, that’s simultaneously beneath me and over my pay grade. LOL. thanks for reading.
I am a Dem. You may color me profoundly unimpressed to the core of my being.
I will absolutely vote for JD Vance long before I ever would Gavin Newsom. At this point, I do not think my mind is even remotely changeable.
The reasons are legion.
I live in an area of the country where the big blue Democratic Californians have moved in and taken over. They are some of the most horrible people I have ever met. Give me the red state immigrants as neighbors any day. The arrogance and condescension toward the natives is just overwhelming. It is the absolute incarnation of the worst of the PMC and the degreed experts. “Nice state you have here – it has been great for a long time – but now you are doing it our way – if you don’t like it – move, you rubes.” I have sat through town council meeting after another, and that is exactly their attitude. I have visited SF and LA many times over the past few years and it is shocking that they are part of the same country I live in. I really do not think the Dems realize the extreme animus that the rest of the country has towards California – as in why would I want him to be given free reign to do to the rest of the country what he has done for California? All the GOP has to do is put up a few webcams in LA and SF and have the video streams in their ads. He may be lucky to get 5 states.
The “abundance” crap is really par for the course though for modern Dems. I grew up in an area of the country where “prosperity gospel teaching” was everywhere. This came up in the comments a few days ago – but there is not a scintilla of difference between this abundance thing and the prosperity gospel schtick. Unfortunately, I saw all my life the destruction it causes to followers in the middle and working class. I have to say – I did not ever remotely have in my forecast the Dem Party falling back on Oral Roberts as a spiritual adviser. It is absolutely hysterical – but it will be absolutely tragic for the country.
He started his 10 year homeless plan what is it 18 years ago now. He has not even achieved zero results – we have profoundly negative results and this is after tens of billions of dollars thrown down the black hole. The tourist areas in some locations in both LA and SF are literal cesspools. I thought it was all a lie – then I visited. And it just keeps getting worse.
He is a family member of Nancy Pelosi. That in and of itself is enough for me to look the other way in horror.
My Democratic family members that have gone on are literally rolling in their graves that this is what has become of their party.
I hadn’t connected “Abundance” to prosperity gospel, but you’re right! It’s the same old Calvinist claim that them what is doing well must be favored by God, because they obviously are.
I had previously noted that prosperity gospel tracks exactly with Ayn Rand and Anton LeVay’s Satanic Bible.
Yep. What most people don’t get at first is that, when you actually read the New Testament Synoptic Gospels, it becomes clear that Jesus was a theologically based communist. A reading of the extant histories of the First Century Christain communities shows this to have been more or less effectuated. Then the upper echelons of the Church went and sold out to the Empire.
I need to go into the ‘Room of Books’ and find my copy of the sermons of Jonathan Edwards. He would have fit right into today’s upper echelons of Society.
How about; “Deplorables in the Hands of an Angry State.”
Stay as safe as you can.
Abundance is a sneaky infection in our culture. It can undermine pretty much any ideology. Not quite as distressing as the televangelists convincing people with little to send it and more to get closer to God (and the “blessings” will flow), but a few years ago I knew more than a few Buddhists who chanted for success. And that wasn’t limited to one teacher or group.
The sad part of this to me is that the Democrats realize that the voters want better in their lives, but instead of taking a public good, rising tide raises all boats point of view they play on that desire and adopt this smoke screen of a rigged system providing abundance to only a few.
>>>The “abundance” crap is really par for the course though for modern Dems. I grew up in an area of the country where “prosperity gospel teaching” was everywhere. This came up in the comments a few days ago – but there is not a scintilla of difference between this abundance thing and the prosperity gospel schtick. Unfortunately, I saw all my life the destruction it causes to followers in the middle and working class. I have to say – I did not ever remotely have in my forecast the Dem Party falling back on Oral Roberts as a spiritual adviser. It is absolutely hysterical – but it will be absolutely tragic for the country.
A soulless version of Christianity for soulless people. But the reference to the prosperity gospel is great. Like much else in America, it cannot fail, it can only be failed.
IM Doc are you sure they are Demoncrats? Where we live every house that goes on the market in our neighborhood over the past five years or so was purchased by a Californian – all Republicans (Trump yard signs and all) and they all act exactly like you describe.
I think the John Birch Society was founded in Southern California. It certainly found a home there especially in Orange County. Really, I haven’t seen that much of a difference between California Democrats and Republicans. Just look at how the ruling families of San Francisco destroyed the city of my birth. They infest the Democratic Party and they decided to destroy the Port of San Francisco, Destroying all the manufacturing, repair facilities, warehouses, and all the other related businesses in shipping, which destroyed the unions and left a large part of the city to be sold and developed. Then there are all the other businesses and industries that have effectively been encouraged to leave the city. The Financial District has been slowly melting away and Market Street has been decaying for decades. Back in the 1960s, instigators of all this had been planning on having higher education and research replace all the lost industries and jobs. Or in the South Bay and East Bay where much of the manufacturing, farming, ranching (or all those fruit orchards whose scents I can still smell) were likewise destroyed often for more housing and the tech industry, but of course chip production has also gone overseas.
The point of my rant is that regardless of political parties, and the Bay Area has been Democrat for decades, the results are always the same. Industry, especially any kind of manufacturing, or any thing union friendly, or even anything friendly to small and medium businesses are crushed, and any development favors baronial mansions, luxury apartments, and freeway.
And since the Governator’s reign (Arnold Schwarzenegger), it has been a one party state under Democratic Party’s misrule and corruption. And Governor Goodhair is a native son of the party with all that implies. I don’t think we will ever know what happened to the twenty-four billion dollar he “spent” on homelessness. For that amount of money, he could have built apartments for every homeless person out there.
The state is trapped between a deeply corrupt and incompetent ruling party and an opposition party that is truly unserious about winning elections and governing, forget about offering alternatives. Both parties are happy with slurping off donations and supporting their base with government largesse.
Those tens of billions of dollars no doubt went places where they were seen as profoundly positive results.
Just not for homeless people.
Newsom is not a blood relation/family member of Nancy Pelosi. He was temporarily “linked” because his aunt (the sister of Newsom’s father) married Ron Pelosi, the brother of Nancy’s husband Paul. That marriage lasted 17 years and ended in divorce when Newsom was 10 years old.
https://thedispatch.com/article/is-gavin-newsom-the-nephew-of-nancy-pelosi/
Come on, man.
“Come on, man.” Joe Biden
The key to being a liked Californian is to be an intrastate equity refuge and move to the hinterlands where nobody is gonna knock on ya for being from the Golden State of mind, although it varies, as here I am in Godzone… surrounded by religiosity in spades, mostly of the fervent far right evang flava.
You still see Bircher signs here on occasion that now seem redundant as we’ve essentially gotten out of the UN, haven’t we?
Don’t forget the KKK government in Bakersfield back in the 1920s. The place has “form.”
Here’s a video with Gavin in classic glassy eyed form.
I’m a Californian and no fan of Newsom.
But don’t girls and women deserve single-sex spaces and sports? Isn’t it wrong to have men in women’s prisons? Why should we not tell kids who buy into gender (regressive, reductive, sex-role stereotypes) that it’s okay to dress and act as you please, as long as no one else gets hurt, and that it won’t change your sex? That females and males need not be restricted sexist stereotype nonsense?
“Gender identity” is just 1950s sexism on steroids. Men as a group are a threat to women in our sex-segregated spaces. Anyone’s free to believe in some metaphysical gender identity, but it’s no reason to change language, laws, and policies.
It’s not hateful or right-wing to say that humans can’t change sex. As a vegan climate-crisis activist, I’m really, really sick of having to fight battles I waged against sexism as a mere lass some 50 years ago.
Transgender ideology can be seen as a method of control and to create a group identity. It also creates division in the liberal side.
If you go against this ideology, you are a bigot. If you have any questions or doubts, you are a bigot. Being nuanced means being a bigot. And bigots get ostracized. Of course, the bigots are the old school liberals, the independent thinkers, the ones who are not that biddable. The ones who remember the past and can compare it to today.
This means that the new generation of liberals aren’t very liberal, and have no history, knowledge, or understanding of being liberal is except for blindly following the herd. It also not only destroys the effectiveness of liberalism, it destroys it as an ideology being tarred by transgenderism and DEI, defended by hateful, unthinking, uninformed, scolds.
I do wonder just where, how, and when all this arose.
Sadly, this “new and improved ‘Dark Woke'” political theatre is yet another tired retread of the eternally losing proposition that the Democrat Party has espoused for years now, that the Narrative is All.
In an even more disheartening manner, this “Homeless Cleansing” program is an example of the concept of the provision of, as Influencer Emeritus Lambert framed it, “concrete and material benefits for the public” in reverse. The poor and less fortunate are being actively punished for their crimes of being, yes, poor and less fortunate. Just when you think that the iron grip of Calvinism on the American society has relaxed, some new example of the doctrine of “The Elect” comes to fruition in the public sphere.
Stay safe.
…And who might your alternative choice be, for heaven’s sake, to be the Democratic
candidate?
One cannot rightly choose when there is nothing to choose between.
A Jack Russell terrier?
Oh hi, TINA. Wouldn’t be a discussion of neoliberals if you didn’t come to the party.
Jim Jones would be my choice. He would lead them to where they all deserve to go.
They fact that Democrats fanatically guzzle any kool-aid distributed by their leadership is the best indicator that he is the man for the job, surely.
Ambrose Bierce. He is a war veteran, reporter, essayist, and all around iconoclast. He is well versed from personal experience in the politics of our Southern Neighbours. He is also headquartered in San Francisco.
What’s not to like?
Sadly, Ambrose Bierce died in 1914. Good writer though.
Well . . . that’s what free, legitimate and non-rigged primaries would be for. To see which DemParty wannabe-nominee can get the most primary-voters’ support. That’s why it would be a good thing if the DemParty were to have a non-rigged primary process.
Full of S**t.
Big
talkerLIAR, bad results.Doesn’t care what constituents want, just craves power.
Megalomaniac.
Train to nowhere is only tip tip of the dung heap.
LMAO…Twitter is not the real world
As a thesis-holder of: the only way out for anything left-of-center is to nuke itself and build atop the radioactive rubble….I thoroughly welcome dark woke.
I am ready for the bus to crash. Step on it Gavin!
Amen. I can’t see how things are going to get better unless the current political edifice self destructs. Their hold on the media is too strong
On the good side our western elites are doing a good job of destroying their own countries based on delusional thinking. Europe here, leads the way.
Amazing to be able to say it, but Newsom is actually worse — as a politician and policy maker — than Trump!
Not many governors can claim to have assisted killers and then stolen from the victims and survivors, but Newsom has actually done it. The series of scandals surrounding felon utility PG&E’s killing people to fund their stock buybacks and then trying to elude damages, and Newsom’s sponsorship of legislation to avoid further liability are well known in California.
This guy will let people kill you and destroy all your property, and then help them skip. He’s already done it. His will be the ultimate neoliberal presidency.
No doubt practicing for some Gaza-like real estate play in Taiwan or Venezuela…
My PMC friends love Governor Goodhair. He says bad things about Trump – and he’s good at it – that’s all that matters. When your life revolves around hating Trump, the person who does it best is the winner. They also think California is great and Gov Goodhair is responsible. On top of that, they will vote however Auntie Nancy and St.O tell them to vote and believe whatever Rachael and Jen tell them.
It will be fun to watch them twist their craniums into pretzels explaining how they once again lost an election. It will be the voters fault because party leadership can do no wrong. And of course all those stupid red neck hicks in the sticks who are too stupid to vote blue no matter who.
>>>They also think California is great and Gov Goodhair is responsible.
I have to ask just how do they define “great.”
It is a blue state with a blue governor – that’s all it takes. I know some in the Midwest who are talking about moving there to get away from all the Red Hat Trumpers. They don’t like being surrounded by all the dumb red neck hicks who are too stupid to vote blue. They hate them with a passion to the point they don’t even want to pass them on the street.
When it comes to the bad news about California, like the homeless, the costs of living etc., they think Gov Goodhair will fix it all. That is, IF, there is a problem at all because most of it is made up by Right Wing TV. These people live in their own version of reality but the rest of us are the dumbasses.
They also love the deep bench the democrats have. Pritzker, Mayo Pete, Kamala, “Big” Gretch Whitmer etc. I think they get tingles up their leg. Entertaining bunch…
::applause:: 👏 👏 👏
Not sure if you read any of the NC
horse-sport-bettingcommentariat last election cycle … but I knew Newsom would rise. Yves was a big Youngkin fan on the GOP side, but I think he is probably too cerebral, and not feral enough for the current epoch of GOP politics, where outrageous speech/behavior rules.But Newsom is purpose built for this meme-forward, goldfish-brain, cognitive-dissonance generation of Democrat liberals. And while there were sufficient dissenters to derail Harris, I think Newsom v Vance should work for Dems, because at the very least, he’s not as vapid as Harris is, and his good looks will (help) woo enough white midwestern moms back into the fold.
We’re almost there … a hop, skip and a jump away!
PS: What happened to Pritzker?! LOL
He didn’t even make the poll?! But #ButtItItch did?!
I am not a Newsom fan, but somebody needed to step up and engage in a Trumpian bumfight, and Newsom seems to be that guy.
Three years of bumfights is a lot. I hope people get tired of it and we can move on to something else, preferably without Trump or Newsom.
I kinda get it … and maybe if Newsom weren’t actually angling to run, he could have ably served as a viable candidate’s meme-attack-dog or some such. But again, Dems are lost to cognitive dissonance. How can you bemoan petty, puerile Trump behavior on one hand, and then basically reduce yourself to “well if you can’t beat ’em …”? And also, complete diversion from actually talking +ve policy. But #natch for these Democrats …
Well, the best response to petty puerile Trump behavior is not to bemoan it or fainting-couch it or pearl-clutch it. The best response is to stoop to the challenge, meet it, beat it, and keep doing so till it stops working for the petty , puerile Trump. Or any other Republican. When it doesn’t work for anyone anymore, then we can move on to better people using better methods for better goals.
my theory is Pritzker is laying low on the national/polling game until after the midterms both so he can continue building up his “I will actually do a little bit instead of nothing” bona fides against the GOP (see the recent ICE vs Chicago stuff and IL state schools enshrining legal right to choice for women in school medical insurance programs) and so he can lose more weight before he has to start with the campaign ads. I think he has a better chance than Newsom tbh
> so he can lose more weight before he has to start with the campaign ads. I think he has a better chance than Newsom tbh
One hates to admit it, but this rings true. Dude’s a billionaire … look a Bezos’ re-sculpting over the years.
I WAS NEVER A YOUNGKIN FAN! How DARE you smear me like that!
Pointing out that he would make for a dark horse candidate due to his very thin political record (little baggage, a blank screen on which much could be projected), being very tall (the taller candidate usually wins) and his PE connections is analysis, not approval. The PE connections alone are deplorable yet make for very successful fundraising.
Sorry Yves! My choice of words was poooooooor :)
As you corrected: not a fan … of the man … but in terms of the
dark horse bettinganalysis, yes!Apologies!
What a way to start a week! Bold all caps from Yves.
More of a kick than caffeine.
Maybe this photo is somewhere in the links and comments, but I missed it. This is a campaign killer. Or should be.
Oops. Bad link. This one might work.
you might be right about that. His bio will definitely be a liability vs JD Vance
#Sell (on any KG -ve’s)
… respectfully of course … :)
Pics of Trump will #Billary didn’t hurt him once he switched sides. This is the goldfish-brain/who-cares? effect. Once certain things have vanished behind some rear-sitting event horizon, it’s as if they never happened. See also that Trump interview where she said that if he ever entered politics, he’d do so as a Republican because GOP voters were dumb.
We are truly on the worst timeline … LOL
Those curtains make me irrationally angry.
The U.S. is now a totalitarian oligarchy, not a democracy. The only people who will be allowed to run for office share the sole qualification of adjacency to Our Billionaire Overlords. Even Zohran Mamdani is the son of a wealthy Hollywood film director and an endowed professor at Columbia.
As for California, my former state’s condition is the result of a 32-year string of GOP governors leading down from Reagan (‘67-‘75) through Deukmejian (‘83-‘91), Wilson (‘91-‘99), and Schwarzenegger (‘03-‘11), with two 8-year interregnums of the always bizarre “fiscal conservative” Jerry Brown (‘75-‘83; ‘11-‘19). The level of ignorance about California politics is staggering.
During that period the state’s population doubled from 20 million to 40 million as a result of federal immigration policy, while most blue-collar jobs were offshored as a result of federal trade and fiscal policy under GOP and GOP-lite administrations as part of the post-Cold War “peace dividend.”
Like many dyslexics, Gavin has a terrific sense of what appeals to people. I’ll take the cat’s paw of Gordon Getty over the cat’s paw of Peter Thiel any day of the week.
Astute and concise. What choice is there, indeed.
Perhaps Charles Foster Kane will back a candidate.
I don’t really consider either cat’s paw a choice I care to endorse with my vote. It’s funny you don’t consider Jerry Brown a Democrat since he was Gavin Newsom’s mentor and role model.
For better or worse, Gavin’s role model and mentor was the same Willie Brown who also mentored Kamala Harris. Newsom’s S.F. high society connections are also not Silicon Valley or Hollywood adjacent and actually despise those places. Jerry Brown, or “The Mad Monk” as some of us knew him, couldn’t be more different from Gavin or from most Democrats. Jerry Brown was not Gavin’s mentor!
Jerry’s first iteration of “Governor Moonbeam” rode around in a plain-Jane Plymouth preaching “austerity” after Ronald Reagan’s governorship, while handing “Get Out of Jail Free” cards to homicidal maniacs (which got him the “liberal” label). After seeing the carnage wrought by his “justice reforms” as mayor of Oakland (‘99-‘07) Jerry came back as a mostly law-and-order AG (‘07-‘11) and Governor, liberal only in his opposition to the death penalty (which I share). In 2012 Brown rammed the severe PEPRA “pension reform” of CalPERS down the throats of the unions. Hardly a conventional Democrat like Newsom.
L.A. and San Francisco may be full of noisy limousine liberals who shape the views of the rest of the country about the state, but for 50 years California Governors have been skinflint austerians, mostly from the GOP. California’s infrastructure is crumbling because of lack of investment and the looney “privatization” campaigns imposed by the GOP (i.e. PG&E).
Everywhere on the global stage there’s the requirement of adjacency to or membership in some oligarchy.
All of them maneuvering for ways to consolidate their power. It’s a multi-polar oligarchy.
Always was
Newsome has great hair, good teeth and a distinctive voice.
He was raised by the Getty Family to be useful as an adult, which he has been to the wealthy and powerful.
He has no discernable morals or ethics and is overtly corrupt ( see his wife’s “Charity”).
He is quick on his feet ( perhaps compensating for his dyslexia) and can be charming.
Overall, one of the better potential Dem candidates.
Newsom and Pritzger are getting so much press lately
On this man vs JDV in 2028:
1. Good luck selling the glitzy California dude in the Mid-West
2. There still won’t be any policies that appeal to people. Abundance sounds like the crap it is, and must be a turn-off
3. Vance will eat him for lunch in a debate
4. The social media algorithms are controlled by the dark techlords
5. Vance would have the thumb put on the scale for him if…
6. …There are any elections at all.
Of all of these I think 2 is the killer.
7. The ideal JDV launch would be: a good response to the death of Donny, 6-12 months as Pres (juice some stuff to fool the rubes); trounce Newsom as incumbent with gravitas.
It’s Midwest, btw.
A sample of one: a friend, former California resident now living in Michigan, told me last week how much she loved what Newsom has been saying. This friend was an ardent HRC supporter and participant in DNC astroturfed demonstrations including the “No Kings.” If that’s a common reaction I’d say Newsom will do well with the Democratic base.
What about independents, and young people who voted for Trump?
I live in California in formerly John Birch territory. The biggest knock on Newsom, in my opinion, is his mishandling of energy policy. We pay high prices for gasoline relative to the rest of the country, with the possible exception of Hawaii. Oil refiners continue to flee the state. Prices spike whenever a refinery shuts down for maintenance.
Republicans eat up the “California is a hell hole” rhetoric but I think Newsom is more vulnerable on the cost of energy. “Do you want $5 gasoline, vote for Newsom” seems like a pretty good opposition line.
(IM Doc, California transplants have been hated in neighboring states for as long as memory serves. 30 years ago a friend in Montana warned me not to drive there in a car with CA plates. The issue was the differential in real estate prices and population, California transplants were driving up housing and land prices, and importantly, taxes. Local incomes could not afford those higher taxes and many people went bankrupt (my friend was a bankruptcy attorney)). This predates the current red/blue polarization.
I remember the saying from decades ago . . . ” Don’t Californicate Oregon.”
You can still get vintage bumper stickers from that period.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/153479691953
And some images.
https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images;_ylt=AwrNPPnPq7dopvAAohNXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMEc2VjA3Nj?p=don%27t+californicate+oregon+bumper+sticker&fr=sfp
they did anyway. then moved on to washington, now trying for idaho and montana
For California’s leftist reputation, it feels to me mostly from the socially liberal tilt and performative environmentalism. Reagan’s legacy and austerity have not been fundamentally reversed.
Always thought California’s original sin was Prop 13, changing how property taxes worked and bringing NIMBYism to a new level. Add on the entrenched car culture, California hit the limits of austerity and suburban sprawl earlier than other Sun Belt states.
I think Prop 13 mostly reduces housing turnover, as people hold on to lower property tax rates. Much as people have held on to mortgages at 3%. The counter to the austerity point is that while California does not have the highest tax burden, it is on the upper end. Lower property taxes led to taxes elsewhere, such as the Mello Roos supplemental property tax on newer developments. And relative to other states, the lower rate of property tax is offset by higher housing prices resulting in similar or higher absolute amount of tax. The burden is high enough to cause a number of people to sell and move to neighboring states, to the irritation of the people already there.
Again. The Weimar Democrats will not save you.
(Hopefully not antisemitic)