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  • Turns Out RFK Jr.’s Independent Bid Could Do Trump More Damage Than Biden

    Turns Out RFK Jr.’s Independent Bid Could Do Trump More Damage Than Biden

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    When Robert F. Kennedy Jr. first entered the Democratic presidential primary back in April, CBS News reported that his White House ambitions had been roused by Trump ally Steve Bannon. Bannon’s thinking, it seems, was that Kennedy would sow chaos in the Democratic Party and derail Biden’s nomination. But that theory could now backfire: On Monday, Kennedy, 69, is expected to abandon the Democratic primary to pursue the presidency as an independent—a move that could actually end up hurting Donald Trump more than Biden. 

    Internal polling from the Trump campaign suggests that a Kennedy third-party bid would sap more votes from the ex-president than Biden in a general election matchup, according to a Semafor report published Friday. “It’s single digits, but it’s enough where it counts to make a difference,” a person familiar with the data told the outlet. The Trump campaign, in turn, is reportedly readying a messaging onslaught against Kennedy, who, despite being a member of the most iconic family in Democratic politics, is running as a pro-gun anti-vaxxer whose platform aligns much more closely with conservative populism than Biden’s progressive liberalism. “We’re gonna be dropping napalm after napalm on his head reminding the public of his very liberal views, dating back to 2012,” another Trumpworld source told Semafor. “We have a lot of stuff on him.”

    That would mark a bald departure from the favorability Kennedy has had among conservatives throughout the race. Florida governor Ron DeSantis, a Republican presidential candidate, said in July that if elected he may “sic” Kennedy on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Food and Drug Administration. Also in July, Trump praised Kennedy as a “very smart person,” though he explicitly viewed Kennedy as a Biden antagonist. “He’s hit a little bit of a nerve. And a lot of Democrats I know want to vote for him,” Trump said. 

    That perception appears to be shifting. On Friday, a week after Kennedy’s plan for a third-party bid came to light, a conservative outlet published a story on Kennedy that had all the makings of a Republican opposition research file. Kennedy, the Daily Caller noted, condemned the NRA as a “terror group” in a 2018 tweet, and, according to a 2002 interview with The Des Moines Register, said that factory farms posed a greater threat to the US than Osama bin Laden, mere months after the September 11 attacks. “Kennedy also accused Charles and David Koch, major financiers of the conservative movement, in 2014 of treason and suggested they should be jailed for war crimes,” the post continued.

    It’s unclear if that story was connected to the Trump campaign’s alleged plot to dredge up Kennedy’s “very liberal views,” but it stands out when looking over the Daily Caller’s past coverage of Kennedy, which had largely been supportive. (In fact, Daily Caller cofounder Tucker Carlson has been among Kennedy’s most ardent defenders on the right.) 

    Kennedy himself has said that he would “take more votes from President Trump than [Biden]” in a three-way general election, as noted by Semafor. And polling has shown that he has higher favorability marks among Republicans than Democrats. Of course, that could change if Kennedy is suddenly seen as a threat by Republican voters or if Trump decides to wield his mudslinging prowess against him.

    The Trump campaign, for its part, has publicly suggested he is not a threat. “President Trump is leading by wide margins in every single poll—both nationally and statewide—in the primary and general elections,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in response to Semafor’s reporting. “The fact is that President Trump will beat Biden.” Meanwhile, according to the Associated Press, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Convention responded to Kennedy’s independent bid with an eye roll emoji.

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    Caleb Ecarma

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  • From RFK Jr.’s Shirtless Workout to Elon’s Cage Match: It’s Been a Big Week for Boys Spoiling for a Fight

    From RFK Jr.’s Shirtless Workout to Elon’s Cage Match: It’s Been a Big Week for Boys Spoiling for a Fight

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    Since time immemorial, men have loved to challenge each other to fights. In antiquity, they wrestled it out. In the Middle Ages, there was the joust. In the Industrial Age, we had our pistol duels. Times being remarkably online as they are now, men are challenging each other to debates. Occasionally, when, say, a Paul brother is involved, these debates still occur with fists in front of an audience, but by and large, “debate me” has become the “shall we settle this outside” of our times. It’s nice that modern men get to participate in a grand Western tradition, though also a little sad that we are in the umpteenth century of men toiling under the impression that shouting for a big, public fight is good instead of strange and small. Let’s look at some recent trends in the space of dudes challenging dudes.

    Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the 69-year-old son of Robert F. Kennedy and vocal anti-vaxxer, who once compared having the opportunity to take a COVID-19 vaccine to living in Hitler’s Germany, is saying, “Debate me!” to President Joe Biden, while shirtless (he later apologized for the Hitler comparison). Well, to put a real fine point on it, he’s doing incline reps sans shirt at Gold’s Gym in Venice Beach and tweeting that it’s all in preparation for a debate with Biden that is pretty certain to never, ever happen. Why? Well, he’d like to be the next Democratic president of these United States. Why would Mr. Kennedy operate under the impression that doing push-ups with his nips out will help his chances of becoming president of these United States? As we learned from the last long-shot failson to make it into the White House, it probably doesn’t hurt to put the pec in spectacle. (For the record, said previous long-shot failson has seriously divergent views on the relative benefits of physical activity.)

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    Speaking of spectacle, Elon Musk recently started starting something too. The owner of Tesla and Twitter last week responded to some guy’s post about Meta reportedly creating a Twitter-like product under its banner, with another commenter suggesting a cage match with Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO. 

    “I’m up for a cage match if he is lol,” Musk said. Sometimes he makes his little jokes and his reply guys say, “Yay,” and everyone else whose desk it crosses says, “It’s weird he didn’t get all this silly energy out at grade seven, but here we are I suppose.” 

    This could have been just another day of Musk saying stuff on the internet, but then Zuck replied by posting on Instagram, which is owned by Meta, “send me location.” A spokesperson for Meta told The Verge, “The story speaks for itself,” meaning it is not just two guys shitposting at each other. Unless you believe it is. Some real, clear messaging from the owners of two of the largest messaging platforms in human existence.

    The thing is, this makes a lot of sense—though maybe not in a way Elon or Zuck would like. If you, by hook or more likely by crook, reach an income that is a certain percentage of your lowest paid employee’s income, you should be automatically entered into a Hunger Games-style cage match for the benefit of everyone else’s entertainment. Listen, the fight can be on a yacht, if you like. It can be in Las Vegas, as this one is supposedly going to be. (Musk replied to Zuck’s call for a location with “Vegas Octagon.”) But you should have to commit your life to fighting other mega-elites with your fists.

    Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, disagrees with the wisdom of a fight in general. She insisted in a tweet that the “fight is canceled,” and later tried to appeal to her son’s self-perception as a guy who is funny by suggesting, “A verbal fight only. Three questions each. The funniest answers win. Who agrees?”

    Not me! I don’t agree, Ma Musk. Three questions isn’t going to do it. They must fight to the death. On this there can be no debate.

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    Kenzie Bryant

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