126 thoughts on “Thursday Night Bar Fight #7: All Hail the Chief!”

  1. Republican: Conor Friedersdorf. The bad is that he is under 35. The good is that it will be really interesting. I don’t agree with him on a lot of things. Other vote: Harry Andrew Blackmun. I always had a soft spot for Justice Blakmun.

    Democratic: John Rawls. I would like to see A Theory of Justice become actual practice.Report

  3. Areny you a bit early. One has to see the results of the midterm elections to make a reasonable selection. Some may win by not as much as expected or the alternative. (add also the elections this coming nov as well). Anyway IMHO its far to early to think about this, except if you have nothing else to worry about.Report

  4. Republican: Olympia Snowe. She’s qualified. For VP, Kim Wymen, Secretary of State in Washington. And I picked her because she was the only other female Republican candidate I could find on the National Federation of Republican Women who I thought I could tolerate.

    Democrat: Hillary Rodham Clinton, former Secretary of State, Senator, and First Lady. V.P. Elizabeth Warren.Report

    1. I’d certainly vote for Hillary and Elizabeth. He’ll, I’d even put Elizabeth at the top of the ticket but I suspect she’s too much of a genuine populist and anti-corporatist to win the election.Report

  5. whatever gets us a pay per view special of andrew jackson fighting genghis khan on the roof of the white house with sabers. even if the public hates the outcome (they’re both a-holes) all i gotta say is “i delivered the goods. jackson v. khan. suck it.”Report

  7. Republican: AM, of “I Have No Mouth and I must Scream” fame.

    Democrat: GLaDOS.

    Perhaps not the candidates America would ask for, but the ones she deserves.Report

    1. Excellent! I like these (count this as a vote). Surely what we deserve.

      I’d suggest Auto (WALL-E) as the VP with AM for the Republicans, and HAL as the VP with GLaDOS for the Democrats.Report

    1. I’d like to see Teddy Roosevelt run, but I have no idea which party (neither?) he could run in. His position on inheritance taxes would make the GOP nomination impossible, I think.Report

      1. Just about everything about Teddy Roosevelt would rub the modern GOP raw. One reason to pick him.

        I was considering Margaret Sanger for the Dems.Report

  9. GOP: Rand Paul and Justin Amash.

    Democrats: Ron Wyden and Jim Webb. Replacing Wyden with Feingold would be okay.Report

  12. “Movie Stars Who Never Ran for Public Office, But Were Well Known as X”

    GOP – John Wayne / Charlton Heston
    DNC – Gregory Peck / Clark GableReport

  13. R’s:

    Pres.: Captain Ahab
    VP: Foghorn Leghorn

    Ahab has a clear and powerful vision about what needs to be done and is single minded in his pursuit. A “decider.” He has a strong background in management, having run a high stakes, very succesful operation, travelling the world, gaining foreign policy experience, while running a business employing primarily of minorities. He is a great leader who everyone naturally wants to follow him. Moreover, the GOP is not pro-animal rights and is very pro-capital punishment for criminals. So they may gravitate to Ahab’s pro-capital punishment for whale’s stance.

    Foghorn Leghorn is less principled, but will win the talk-radio crowd in the primaries. Invincible in the veep debate and great on Sunday talk shows. Also has southern charm that the New Englander, protestant Ahab lacks.

    D’s

    Pres: Frodo Baggins
    VP: Mary Poppins

    Small town, rural background is very appealing. Wounded in combat. Is very soft on criminals and liberal with punishment, as seen in his sparing Gollum. Democrats will see him as someone who is finally above seeking political power and dominion over others, someone who is morally pure and above partisanship, (not like Obama or Kennedy, not at all) only to eventually realize he too does everything out of selfish, calculating desire for the ring of power, too. (But not until his second term.)

    Mary Poppins is the nanny state Democrat that we all yearn for. Her experience in education is a massive win for the D’s. Friend of working class and will bring the chimney sweep unions along with her. Could appeal to single moms. (Small problem with citizenship, but no more so than George Washington.)

    Libertarians:

    Pres: Don Quixote
    VP: Mr. Rogers

    Nothing is more quixotic than libertarianism.

    Mr. Rogers will help voters feel safe that the libertarians’ more radical policy solutions won’t be so scary.Report

  14. Bill Pullman’s President character from ID4. My man wiped out aliens, flee a jet, and gave a damn good speech. Who cares what his positions are?Report

  15. Or historical Jesus… Cons like his social policies, Libs his expnomic ones, he’ll get the Jewish vote, Cristian vote, and he’s a PoC.Report

    1. Nah, Jesus was *really* hard on divorce (the only excuse being the *woman* screwing around), and hard on the ‘job creators’ having a special link to the Divine. He also gave away free healthcare, and said nothing about homosexuality.Report

  16. okay this seems fun. Note this will largely be a selection of ideological avatars.

    Dem Ticket

    Pres-FDR. I dont think either the right or left has ever really gotten over the new deal. I want to see it re fought with it’s creator at the helm. knew how to deal. being in the chair is probably going to be his biggest deficit running today.
    VP-John Adams. As the only president from the Federalist party stood for a strong federal gov and a federal bank, both things i like. As your vp is your attack dog also works well(did sign alien and sedition acts, proof positive he was willing to kick you inna fork to win) Very good lawyer as well.

    Rep Ticket.
    Pres-Ronald Reagan. Largely the same reason as FDR above. Is to a great deal workable social conservatism made form. flexible when working with congressional democrats proves willingness to compromise. never seemed entirely without empathy when talking to people different then him. also willing to kick a dog to win, much like adams
    VP-Adam Smith. Would represent the business wing better then anyone else on the planet. given time to catch up i could see him having a very politically winning economics platform.

    Green Party
    flip a coin on pres and vp.
    Jacques-Yves Cousteau
    Jane Goodall
    They both love the planet and the beasts of field and stream.

    Libertarian Party
    same coin flip
    Ayn Rand- represents a good chunk of libertarian belief. why not
    James Hanley or Roger, wherever wants it. both have good principles and very good at breaking complex ideas down into small enough bits that even nulls could understand.

    As a Side note i love the bar fights. mad Kudos tod

    THIS POST IS O.G. DUDE!Report

    1. VP-Adam Smith. Would represent the business wing better then anyone else on the planet. given time to catch up i could see him having a very politically winning economics platform.

      I don’t think big business would like Smith at all.Report

      1. I just said business. Reagan cover the corporate wing. smith covers smaller business and the monetary concerns of regular people. something the republican party could use yes?Report

      2. What was that phrase about people involved in a trade never meeting (even to party) without plotting to screw over the general public?

        And he was in favor of good public schools and good public infrastructure.Report

        1. People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public.

          And yes I did do that from memory.Report

  17. Dick Morris-Kathy Shaidle

    oh and this scares me more then anything on the planet. The taki link was like poison to my skull.Report

  18. The ticket I’d want to win would probably be Havelock Vetinari / Adam Smith. But I don’t know how I would fit that into your party system.Report

  19. Democrats: FDR and Woodrow Wilson.
    Republicans: Moses and Saint Paul.

    This on Mencken’s theory that democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. Also in this scenario, I’m converting my life’s savings to Bitcoins.Report

  20. Can I just nominate all the French peasants from the Revolution? They’d work on both sides. They will leave the country in a bit of a mess, but it’s nothing we couldn’t fix and I don’t think we’d end up with a Emperor.Report

    1. We would end up with two things above all others, and as a virtual certainty:

      1. Price controls on wheat.
      2. The Catholic Church is now the official religion of the state, and no one is allowed to be anything other than Catholic.

      Given the choice, I’d sooner have an emperor.Report

        1. I wouldn’t have termed the Parisians peasants. If we chose Parisians, and if we picked the right political moment, we would get price controls on bread and a compulsory Cult of the Supreme Being.

          Again a bad deal, for similar reasons.Report

            1. The French Revolution did all kinds of good things. The trouble is that later on it often undid them too, or else replaced them with something worse.

              The French Revolution ended:

              – the monarchy, of course
              – the privileges of the French nobility
              – entails and quitrents (technically part of the above, but very important)
              – the system of censorship
              – the peasants’ forced labor and other feudal obligations
              – the sale of offices and hereditary succession to them

              The French Revolution established:

              – France’s first representative legislature
              – the metric system
              – protections for the freedoms of conscience, petition, assembly, and property ownership
              – the right of divorce
              – civic equality for Jews
              – a republican tradition that endures in France to this day

              Quite good work, in all. But, as I said, that same revolution later took away or radically altered a lot of these things for the worse.Report

      2. “The Catholic Church is now the official religion of the state, and no one is allowed to be anything other than Catholic.”

        You must have had a different French Revolution in your world, then.Report

        1. Beginning in 1793, the French peasantry revolted against the Jacobins in the capitol, and in favor of both the monarchy and the Church. The revolt in the Vendée was among the most bloody episodes of the entire era, and it is well known to anyone who has more than a saw-it-on-television knowledge of the French Revolution.

          But hey, I’m sure it feels good to talk at me like I’m an idiot. I hope you enjoyed it while it lasted.Report

    2. Whaaaaaa…?

      I thought I turned in my liberal card with my GMO post. Additionally, a new argument I’ve structured around abortion *might* make me pro-life.

      BUT OF COURSE I’LL TAKE THE NOMINATION! BRING ON THE HOOKERS!Report

  22. Democrats: Neil deGrasse Tyson and Carl Sagan. They would choose who would be on the top of the ticket. I’d hope that they would run as co-Presidents (guess we’d need an amendment for that, though). They’d pull the entire Green vote, as well.

    Republicans: Isaac Newton and Edward Teller. Teller wouldn’t stand for anyone else being at the top of the ticket, so he’d be the Pres candidate. Newton gets the theocons to vote and Teller gets the neocons to vote.

    Why? They’re scientists, and even a conservative scientist would be preferable to a politician (although, Teller is a bit frightening, I agree).

    Of course, I’m setting up a win for deGrasse Tyson/Sagan because I’m immensely biased.Report

  24. I would suggest Batman for the democrats.

    Pros: Tough on crime, fundraising edge and business experience, experienced at working with charities.
    Cons: very vulnerable to attacks from NRA on gun control issue.

    For Republicans I would suggest Horatio Hornblower
    Pros: Coming from the napolionic era he is very likely to be a strong social conservative, self made man with a military background.

    Cons: opposed to the death penalty and against flogging. May be seen as weak on terrorist interrogations by republicans.Report

  25. Democrats: Captain America for president. He’s got good foreign policy judgement (opposed the Vietnam War at high personal cost, unless I’m misremembering); obviously plenty of military experience; leadership role in the Avengers; raised by Irish immigrants in Manhattan in the ’30s so I’m assuming he’s an ardent new dealer; loved and respected nationwide.Report

  26. The Republican dream team: Ronald Reagan and Frederick Douglass.

    I think Democrats would be equally happy with Josiah Bartlet and Hillary Clinton on their ticket.Report

    1. I’ve got to say, in refreshing myself on Douglass, I’m starting to get the appeal of Ben Carson: a strong speaker, a self-made man, advocate for education, sobriety, and faith.Report

      2. This is like the “NYT doesn’t know what Easter is” nonsense. One guy put up the wrong graphic on a morning show. In the clip, none of the hosts got the name wrong, and I don’t know if the hosts can see the on-screen graphics (it varies on a lot of shows). At least in that clip, I didn’t hear “Frederick” or “Stephen”. So, what am I supposed to draw from your comment?Report

        1. Nothing much; it’s just exceptionally silly, even for cable news. Still, that was a specially constructed graphic. How many eyes must it have gone past on its way onto the air?Report

            1. I guess the only question I have then, is this..

              Would changing our name to The League of Oily Gladiators make any changes to readership?

              Got to consider the marketing angles….Report

    3. I feel so naive. I had no idea this, or she, was a thing. Is she supposed to be funny?

      That’s really a word that an adult uses in their blogpost headlines? I mean, I expect it on YouTube comments, but…Report

      2. I remember in the 70s when “faggot” was one of those Reserved For Us words, sorta like how black people use “nigger” — we can use it and don’t you breeders dare use it.

        But I can’t remember the last time I heard “faggot” used even within gay circles. I think it went out with disco, around that time. Have you heard it?Report

        1. I have heard gay friends use it. And there’s a current band (Deerhunter) with a gay frontman that named their first album Turn It Up, Faggot! in honor of some show heckling that they had received.Report

      3. “Beta-male f****t” is like “PC” in the sense of “evil librul not going out of your way to be an asshole”. (Like right there where I neither spelled the word out nor got mad because Jason get to use it and I don’t.)Report

      1. Oy vey. I read her prior installment, where she explains why she uses the term:

        In that much maligned “manosphere,” the term “beta male” is the most popular pejorative. Since it’s fresher and more accurate than “metrosexual,” I’ll be using that phrase henceforth, along with that unfairly neglected anachronism “faggotry.” It’s ideal for my purposes because it doesn’t necessarily mean “gay” so much as “gay-ish.” So I’m trying to bring that word back. Call it artisanal invective.

        Bleh.

        I’ll be paying about as much attention as I do to Ann Coulter then, which is to say none if I can help it.Report

        1. Speaking as a connoisseur of invective and cant, if you must recycle ancient vocabulary, it must pass three tests:

          1. The word or phrase must have once been used in common parlance as a euphemism or standard usage.

          2. It must be old enough for mean kids in the school yard to not know it.

          3. The usage must never be applied in the second person as a label.

          Take Negro, for example. Once it was the standard usage, even among black people. “Nigger” is merely an ignorant corruption of it and fails all three tests. So when I’m pushing in my little voodoo pin, tormenting some useless person, I use Negro to point out antiquated thinking about race-based issues.

          There is a fourth rule: do not use specialised terms of art in common parlance within a given community. Case in point: I’ll never use the word “twink”. I’m not gay. Only makes the user look silly and condescending.Report

    5. As I said in the thread where this was first posted – they’re happily employing John Derbyshire, who even if he wasn’t a “race realist” would be creepy as hell due to his remarks about teenage girls as a writer on The Corner. I’ll take kimmi as a representative of a site I go too over him, Kook.Report

    6. As Jesse points out, insults from Taki’s are a badge of honor. It’s where Derbyshire sold his his “too explicitly racist even from National Review” piece, which was loudly cheered there.Report

      1. Taki’s is just Sad. It’s where contrarians go to die. An Elephant’s Graveyard of useless persons. Steve Sailer hasn’t been welcome in polite society in a decade at least. The Derb is everyone’s horrifying great-uncle, the elderly gent who reliably stinks up polite conversation with his political views at holiday meals. Gavin McInnes, now there’s a tuneful fart in a hurricane for yez: and now for your amusement and education, Gavin McInnes will eat a live mouse.Report

        1. Once Well-known Bloggers’ Graveyard for Reasons We Can’t Fathom = The Daily Caller

          Does Steve Sailer still comment on every single thread in the blogosphere ever? It seems like his output in that sense has dropped.

          Derbyshire’s story on how he found his wife in China always struck me as a little oddly told, but otherwise: http://www.johnderbyshire.com/FamilyAlbum/Marriage/page.html
          I was always surprised the NRO never ran him out of there for bashing GW Bush for tax cuts, being pro choice, pro Michael Schiavo, among a whole other slate of opinions.Report

  29. Ecch, it’s not just any one President and his Veep. The questions I’d ask are “Who can do business with Congress? Who can put the best Cabinet together?”

    Far and away, the most effective president in terms of sheer legislative results was Lyndon Johnson, who had the most effective vice president ever, Hubert Humphrey. These days, the role of Veep has expanded and rightly so: the job of POTUS is now too big for any one man to handle.

    LBJ’s great weakness was his ship of fools, his Cabinet. For some reason, he hung onto JFK’s cabinet and for far too long. They were the idiots who got him waist deep in Vietnam: Johnson kinda looked at that situation and said “Oh well, I’m a domestic policy sorta guy, surely Kennedy must have seen something I didn’t here, so I’ll go with McNamara’s opinions on this.” McNamara rode roughshod over the military, which had always seen Vietnam as a Tar Baby. Clark Clifford, LBJ’s second SecDef, was a far better man: he set in motion most of what we would understand today as nuclear arms reduction treaties.

    Who would I choose for President and Veep from folks running around today? In that fantasy football situation, I might as well ask “who do you think would be a good QB for Green Bay?” without giving this guy the personnel to keep him alive in the pocket — or running backs or compatible wide receivers.

    The best presidential timber in the yard right now is clearly Hillary Clinton. As for her Veep, I’d pick Mark Udall of Colorado.Report

  30. For the Dems:

    Pres: Hadrian – great foresight, excellent manager, pagan, knew how to handle the Levant (leave it be), and knew what to do with Christian zealots (feed to lions). Also, all the Roman emperors knew how worthless a Senate really is.

    Veep: Vaclav Havel – Everything a veep should be able to do, Havel could do it better. Drink with rock stars, write poetry, he could help keep Hadrian humble.

    For the Republicans:

    Pres: Joan of Arc: Because Jesus could never win the nomination and they need to make some inroads with women. Also, she tends to whack all problems with a sharp stick and really is a martyr.

    Veep: Winston Churchill – put that bust back where it belongs. Churchill would also help remind the Republican party who our actual eternal ally really is. And you know he could out Cheney Dick Cheney if it came to it.Report

        1. Exactly how much harm are these so-called “others” responsible for? I haven’t caught up on all of the books but it seems to me that the government was responsible for a lot more dead people and property damage than undocumented migrants were.Report

            1. Maribou told me about one scene in the show where Tywin walked in on some interrogations and started yelling about how they’re destroying skilled labor. She thought “They’re writing this guy especially for Jay.”Report

            2. Spoilers for book 5.

              Gur jubyr Ng Gur Jnyy cybg sebz Qentbaf vf nobhg Wba yrggvat va vyyrtny vzzvtenagf sebz orlbaq gur jnyy.Report

      2. Good point. He was definitely a border security enthusiast. It would have to help that he would be the first homosexual president, though.Report

  31. Republican: Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh (In your megacolon, you know they’re right.)

    Democratic: Chris Christie and Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Penn.) Christie can invite Springsteen to play at the inaugural, he get’s to give CPAC the mother of all neener-neener-neener’s and Murphy is an intriguing up-and-comer with a strong personal story.Report

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