The thinking is that as an independent he’ll receive more votes than as a Democrat, as people who don’t like the Democratic party but dislike the Republicans more will vote for him in addition to all Democrats who would never vote for the Republican candidate.

The Republicans thought so too, which is why they ran a spoiler candidate on the Democratic primary ticket.

All of these shenanigans are happening because FPTP voting is absolute trash and should be gotten rid of immediately if not sooner.

they still need to award a participation trophy to someone on their team.

That’s not it. The point was for her to win and drop out so there wouldn’t be a Democrat on the ballot at all to dillute the vote. If she hadn’t won, there would be a Republican plant running on the Democratic ticket.

There are plenty of bad things to castigate the Democratic party for; we don’t need to invent them.

In most places in the US, the assessed value of homes that have been owned for more than a decade is significantly less than the market value of a home.

The property tax burden therefore falls more on new home buyers rather than existing home owners. Eliminating the tax on the first portion of assessed value would make this existing imbalance worse, especially if the same amount of tax needed to be raised.

It’s a tricky problem.

A refund based on assessed median home value would tend to penalize new home buyers over existing home owners, even if the existing home owner has a house that would sell for higher. Property tax assessments rarely keep up with home valuation.

A facade, even.

Like an old Western set. All front wall, nothing in the back.

This is slightly incorrect. Congress can pass a law forming a body which can then determine if the president is unable to perform their duties and invoke section 4 of the 25th amendment.

Passing such a law would almost certainly require a veto override, and even then, Congress would still need a two thirds majority of both houses to make section four stick.

This bill’s primary purpose is to force Republicans to be on record that they are just fine with whatever unhinged things Trump is doing. Just like the war powers bills.