Open Thread – Fuck Iowa, Trump’s Boss in the Kremlin gets Bad News & Woosh Goes the Overton Window

I don’t see why we invest Iowans with the authority to pick who can and who can’t run for President. So I’ll vote for the Dem candidate who says “Fuck Iowa”. Or more to the point, I’d vote for a Dem primary candidate that says. “Yes, I’d like to win in Iowa, but Iowa is just a state like any other state. We are building a grassroots campaign in all 50 states. We want to win in every state.”

That said, it is good to see that Iowans are taking their responsibilities seriously.

… The Iowa caucuses remain 13 months away, but a pent-up demand for change in the White House is tangible among Democrats eager for the 2020 campaign to start in earnest. The throngs of voters bombarding events in Iowa are testament to something fearful for Republicans: The huge tide of Democratic voters who powered the party’s 2018 gains have not lost interest as attention turns to the 2020 presidential race…

Iowans cited a slew of reasons for their eagerness to begin the lengthy nomination process to settle on a leader to go up against President Trump. There were the tax cuts that one voter called “a waste of time and money”; the trade war with China depressing demand for exports and hurting farmers; the hostility toward immigrants, a labor pool heavily used on Iowa farms; the rolling back of environmental regulations that impact Iowa’s rivers; a foreign policy approach changing the country’s status in the world; and the general chaos and lack of civility in the White House…

I’m not a big Twitter guy, but Dave Weigel might be worth me looking into a subscription.

Vladimir Putin is not going to be happy with his prison bitch.

White House national security adviser John Bolton on Sunday outlined conditions for a U.S. troop departure from Syria that appeared to contradict President Trump’s insistence less than a month ago that the withdrawal would be immediate and without conditions.

Speaking during a visit to Israel, Bolton said that certain “objectives” must be achieved before a pullout could take place. “The timetable flows from the policy decisions that we need to implement.”