Disclaimer: This is a Hillary Clinton appreciation thread, which means that most people who come here really like Hillary Clinton. Not just tolerate her because she’s the Democratic nominee, but actually like her. If you have criticisms, please be respectful.
If you missed any Saturday diaries or conversation, click here.
Some good diaries from Saturday and today:
teacherken: A quick look at the current status of the general election
Scan: Less Than 24 Hours After Dallas, Hillary Delivers One of the Most Important Speeches of the Election
DaisiesArePretty: Hillary Clinton Calls For National Standards On Police Use Of Deadly Force
TomP: Bernie Praises Hillary’s Health Care Plan Released Today as “a Significant Step Forward.”
WildLilac: Question: which of these people looks presidential & which looks like an opportunistic oaf?
TrueBlueMajority: The end of an era: Lin-Manuel Miranda leaving the Broadway cast of Hamilton tonight
Yesterday was better, in the sense that no new horrible tragedies occurred. Black Lives Matter demonstrations took place across the country, and while one well-known advocate, Deray Mckesson, was arrested by the Baton Rouge police, there were no reports of gun violence against civilians or police that I could find. Instead, thousands held demonstrations to protest police brutality.
Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton will be in Virginia today for a brunch and meet and greet. It’s unknown on which date her campaign event with Joe Biden will be rescheduled. Hopefully soon—I want to see some Hillary and Joe!
Significantly, on Tuesday July 12, Hillary Clinton will be in New Hampshire, where rumor has it that Bernie Sanders will endorse her. It appears as though negotiations between them have been largely successful:
Then later that day, Hillary will be headed for the Hamilton fundraising presentation, where Lin-Manuel Miranda will apparently appear with short hair, as he cut his long locks immediately after his last scheduled performance of the show on Saturday night:
On a more sobering note, D.R. Tucker at Washington Monthly notes that even if Hillary Clinton wins (most likely), in some ways, Americans have still lost, since Donald Trump’s candidacy has served to coarsen certain people’s attitudes about race, gender, and religion in this country.
Even if he loses in a landslide on November 8, Trump will have left our country in grave condition. He has already made us meaner, coarser, nastier, less tolerant, less civil, less American.
Remember when Trump said he could shoot somebody in the middle of Fifth Avenue and not lose any of his supporters? I fear that when he takes the stage at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland one week from now, we will see Trump at his most repellent, his most repulsive, his most repugnant–and he will still be revered by his fanbase. The question is, will the sight of Trump at his absolute worst finally awaken the moral conscience of the “moderate” Republican voters who still think Trump and Hillary Clinton are equally lacking in ethics, and who plan to abstain from voting on Election Day?
Finally, buzz on the street says that Hillary Clinton is leaning toward naming Tim Kaine as her vice president. I don’t know how reliable said buzz is, since it sounds as though she is waiting to see who Trump picks as his VP before making her final selection. If it is Tim Kaine, I could understand people’s disappointment that Hillary didn’t go with the truly bold pick of another woman (Elizabeth Warren) or someone non-white (Castro, Perez, Becerra, Booker). I remember feeling a similar disappointment when I heard that Obama had chosen Joe Biden as his VP. Yet Biden turned out to be a great partner for Obama, and I trust that Hillary knows what she’s doing with Tim Kaine. If she chooses him, I doubt it would be because she wanted to play it safe and didn’t want to offend centrist groups. Rather, I think it would have more to do with feeling like they could have a good partnership, and that she could trust him to run the country in the event she had to step down or away temporarily.
This is your open thread.