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Politics - News Analysis

The Far Right Has Picked Who They Want Trump to Choose as His Running Mate, and It’s a Democrat (A Bad One)

The 2024 presidential election is already off to a crazy start, with Donald Trump, the only criminally indicted, sexual abuser and defamer president in U.S. history running for the top job, but if you throw in Roger Stone, the president’s friend, and former adviser, things get even nuttier.

That’s because Stone has been exhorting the qualities of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., America’s top anti-vaxxer, saying Trump should pick him as his vice presidential running mate, Vice News reports.

Stone has a storied political career, having worked on 13 presidential campaigns, including those for Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and of course, Trump, and he’s now saying he’s never seen a reaction like the one he’s receiving since proposing the Trump-Kennedy “dream ticket for 2024” last week.

“In the 44 years I’ve been active in American politics, I’ve got nothing that resembles the reaction to the outside-the-box idea that I put forward on my Substack last week,” Stone said in a video last weekend titled The Growing Interest in a Trump/RFK Jr. Ticket in 2024.”

In his Substack blog, published last week, Stone details the reasons why he believes that Kennedy, who is, ironically, a Democrat, would be a good running mate for Trump.

Stone notes that some of Kennedy’s commentary on foreign policy mirror those of an America First politician and asserted the Democrats would likely do their best to keep Kennedy off the ballot and “kneecap” him just as they purportedly did with Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2020, “but for different reasons.”

He’s also acquainted with Kennedy and is well aware that Trump and Kennedy have vastly different views on key issues like gun control, climate change, and abortion, but the most significant issue might be their stance on vaccines. Trump was initially skeptical about their effectiveness but later touted his administration’s release of the COVID-19 vaccine, claiming it saved millions of lives during the pandemic.

Kennedy, however, is the nation’s most prominent anti-vaxxer and has used the pandemic to make a financial killing while at the same time boosting his profile. He is, in fact, the founder of the major anti-vaccine organization, Children’s Health Defense.

And Stone isn’t the only one who thinks a Trump/Kennedy ticket is just the thing. Other far-right nutters and some extremist platforms are touting the idea of Trump choosing RFK Jr. as his running mate ever since Kennedy announced his plans to seek the Democratic nomination in March.

Right-wingnuts are stumbling all over themselves about this on The Donald, a pro-Trump message board where much of the planning for the January 6 2021 attack on the Capitol was planned out.

“Trump with a Dem VP would blow normies f*cking minds!” one member wrote.

Many made note of Kennedy’s anti-gun and pro-abortion stance but were still more than willing to back him.

“I would take him for the fact that he fought the establishment and would ensure a massive victory, as the Democrats’ message is such garbage and many people are sick of the garbage candidates they force on them,” another member wrote.

Others, however, thought Trump should pick Republican Kari Lake, who failed in her bid to become Governor of Arizona, and perhaps stick Kennedy in another position in the administration, such as Attorney General or head of the Department of Justice.

But in one really cockamamie message, one reader said Trump’s inability to admit when he’s wrong could create problems for a possible Trump/Kennedy ticket.

“Trump would have to renounce his support for the Covid bioweapon jabs before RFK Jr would consider ar un on the same ticket,” that person wrote. “But Trump has shown repeatedly that he doesn’t not have the character to admit he is wrong about anything.”

The reader did have a point about that, but vaccines as bioweapons? C’mon!

The idea of a Republican choosing a Democratic running mate may seem like tough odds, but Stone writes that it’s not unprecedented. Former President Abraham Lincoln picked Democrat Andrew Johnson as his running mate in 1864. He admitted however, things didn’t go well for Lincoln.

“This of course did not work out very well, because it ended up essentially inviting the assassination of Abraham Lincoln,” Stone wrote, adding: “We don’t wish that, of course, on Donald Trump.”

True. What we wish instead (at least me, anyway) is that there were more indictments awaiting Trump for all the misdeeds he committed as president. That, I could definitely deal with. That, and if the Democrats would ever grow some cojones and really pick a left-wing candidate.

That’s a lovely thought.

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