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USA Election Day 2022 Megathread

Tuesday November 8, 2022 is Election Day in the United States of America. In addition to Congressional "midterms" at the federal level, many state governors and other more local offices are up for grabs. Given how things shook out over Election Day 2020, things could get a little crazy.

...or, perhaps, not! But here's the Megathread for if they do. Talk about your local concerns, your national predictions, your suspicions re: election fraud and interference, how you plan to vote, anything election related is welcome here. Culture War thread rules apply, with the addition of Small-Scale Questions and election-related "Bare Links" allowed in this thread only (unfortunately, there will not be a subthread repository due to current technical limitations).

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I know I have my biases but this comes across as uniquely and desperately pathetic. I'm aware that "he begged me to help him" is a common Trump play, but it's at least usually levied towards people in a weaker position relative to him. It's weird to deploy this towards someone who had a much better election Tuesday than Trump did. Also, Low Energy Jeb and Little Marco were all scathing and catchy nicknames, but what the hell is DeSanctimonious supposed to mean??

I actually like Desanctimonious. It gestures towards a holier than thou attitude, a petty culture war tyrant who wants to tell you what to do.

I don't actually watch enough Desantis press conferences to know if it will work or not, I've been successfully avoiding TV news.

Too many syllables, and I can't tell who its supposed to resonate with.

Is there a large contingent of Rs that would nod in agreement with the 'sanctimonious' label? Sanctimonious about what, exactly? The things that they already broadly align with him on?

It would be more understandable if Trump was appealing to Democrats with that jab. But it's still nowhere near catchy enough. Disappointed.

Trump’s core supporters are the red tribe proles who view ‘Christian values’ as aspirational and more than a bit snooty. ‘Desanctimonious’ is a strange choice of words to appeal to construction workers, but casting Desantis as holier than thou is a reasonable if unconventional choice to speak to his core supporters.

Remember, the red tribe generally does not like holy rollers very much, although they fight endlessly over who counts as one. Calling Desantis(a wealthy Catholic who’s almost certain to contrast himself with trump by portraying himself as a social conservative who actually practices Christianity) a holy roller makes sense to appeal to Trump’s not-very-religious base.

It could still backfire, but it’s an at least reasonable choice of attacks.

That's the secret: Trump is going to switch parties and primary Biden from the left as a Democrat, then run against Desantis as a Democrat. Nobody will see it coming, which is why it will work.

But really, Trump's core constituents are lumpen proles and gutter conservatives. Conservative christians who live their values will hold their nose and vote for him, but they won't like it except to win. That's the target audience of this line.

That's the secret: Trump is going to switch parties and primary Biden from the left as a Democrat, then run against Desantis as a Democrat. Nobody will see it coming, which is why it will work.

Dear god, some perverse part of me wants to see this happen. Trump has flip-flopped his party identification before.

If anything conservative Christians will move more towards Desantis; he was, if anything, moderate.

That's exactly what I was trying to say, that DeSanctimonious is targeted at red tribe lumpen proles against the Ned Flanders evangelicals (who will prefer Desantis to Trump by nature).

Flanders would prefer Cruz or Hawley, honestly- Desantis is pretty moderate on culture war issues, he just prioritizes them. ‘Desanctimonious’ makes him more appealing to Flanders, I don’t know if it has much effect on lumpen proles at all.

It just doesn't seem to stick at all to me. If you were going to choose a group to call "sanctimonious" in our current political climate, it would have to be the woke, and if Desantis is known for anything these days it's for finding new ways to get the woke worked up.