You know what would be interesting? If McConnell is resigned to the GOP being the minority party in 2020. He might just do everything he can to ensure a Trump loss for the good of the GOP so that his faction remains in control.

Sounds like wishful thinking on your part.

Reminds me of Goom's initial take on Trump back in 2015/early 2016: "Trump is just a stooge put to the forefront by the RNC to act as a lightning rod and soak up media scrutiny so that the heavy hitters (like JEB!) could keep their powder dry." A far too contrived take in gross violation of Occam's razor.


The assumption where your theory falls apart is that 78 year old McConnell would put the long-term interests of "his" ideological wing of the party (stopping Trumpism from hollowing out the party) over his personal legacy (staying Senate majority leader for as along as possible). If the GOP loses the Senate this election, and its by more than one or two seats, chances are high that they wont win it back before McConnell is in his mid or even late 80s.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Oct 21 2020 11:14pm

I mean, McConnell doesn't necessarily line up with my views either so it's not wishful thinking. I could just see him doing something like that though. McConnell's legacy is already sealed: he completely transformed the courts over the past 12 years.

Will this be enough for a man with such great ambitions?

Also, think about it: even if they are secretly against Trumpism, McConnell and his faction of the GOP are also against the Democratic agenda. With a 54-46 Democrat Senate, a ton of items from the liberal agenda could be passed. I just think that that's too high of a price to pay just to get a repudiation of Trumpism.

A much more realistic assumption, imho, is that McConnell hopes for the following scenario: Trump loses the presidential race by 5-6 points, so he's gone and it wasnt thaaat close - but that his caucus can at the same time cut its losses so that they either retain control of the Senate, or its 50:50 or 51:49. In this scenario, it is feasible to retake it immediately in a Biden midterm in 2022, and/or very likely to win control after the lopsided pro-R senate map comes up again in 2024. For this scenario to materialize, Trump needs to overperform his current polls. At this point, with Trump so far down in the polls and a real danger of the bottom completely falling out, it just makes no sense to take unpopular stances to sink him even further.

The whole goddamn world understands that the democrats have been weaponizing the corona crisis from the get go

and it may also hurt downballot democrats if they dont. double edged sword for sure, but its not as simple as just good for trump. theres even ways to frame it politically as trump bending the knee.

The Democrats were begging for absurd things so this is a strong possibility.

Those voters who care about whether Trump bent the knee or not are Trump voters anyway. Swing voters dont care about a childish fight for supremacy between two drooling septuagenarians, they care about politicians doing what's right for the American people.

its not strictly that simple. democrats who only lean slightly democrat might not view a Pelosi-Trump deal favorably unless they can be at least partially convinced it wasn't an entirely pro-Trump deal. they might not need to think Trump bent over, but if its a small concession from both sides they could be affected.

in any case this effect is minor, its not massive vote swinging stuff.

Conservative donors spending more in Senate than anything, and Trump is spending much more per dollar raised now than this time last year.

Bad news bears for the fas.




Nah. McConnell is poising himself to be the most powerful Republican in the government after this election.

He's blasted the president for not condemning white supremacy, he told him not to reach a deal with Pelosi because it would be bad for GOP senate retention, and a few other open criticisms that suggest he is focused on after Trump.

This post was edited by Skinned on Oct 22 2020 11:36am