2020 Presidential Election

[Skeptic Ginger]

60 Minutes did a piece on the Lincoln Project. Meet the people behind some of the best political ads ever. It's worth only 13 minutes of your time.



BTW, Stahl is 78. Shows what makeup and good living can do.

That was excellent—gives me hope.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Trump Tweets

I keep reading Fake News stories that my campaign is running low on money. Not true, & if it were so, I would put up money myself. The fact is that we have much more money than we had 4 years ago, where we spent much less money than Crooked Hillary, and still easily won, 306-223!

....Much of the money we have spent is on our ground game, said to be the best ever put together. I’ll let you know how good it is on November 3rd. Very expensive to do, but opportunity could be BIG! I will spend additional money if we are not spending enough!

The silent majority spending. Really, we have money, you just can't see it.

 

[bonzombiekitty]

Someone on reddit posted this and I think he/she makes a good point:

[...] if we outright ignore the fact that THE POLLS LOOK MUCH WORSE FOR TRUMP THAN THEY DID LAST TIME, we open ourselves up to people dismissing a Trump victory as "another failing of the polls", when the truth would be almost guaranteed to be much more nefarious than that.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

This is actually more or less true.

On Sept 30th, the Trump campaign had over 300 field offices, the Biden campaign ... none.
Whether it matters a lot is another question.
And whether "most of the money spent" goes to the ground game, or to legal expenses and (directly or indirectly) Trump's pocket is also not clear.

And obviously Trump can't deny that Biden has out raised him significantly in August, and most probably also in September (both campaign have yet to release their September figures).

All is not what it seems.

There's a reason for that: Thie Hill March 2020: Biden campaign staff to work from home amid coronavirus outbreak

 

[acbytesla]

I think a really big one is the “dislike” factor. Clinton was really disliked by a lot of people, and importantly, by a far larger number of “independents” than Biden is. I am also assuming that the Greens will have far fewer votes this year as people rally to Biden to get Trump out.

[Anecdote warning]I do know a few American far lefties in Japan and they were staunchly anti-Clinton while complaining that too many people were supporting Trump (“hello! He can’t win if you all vote Clinton!”). This year they seem much more to be selectively praising bits they like that Biden has said, and saying that once the election has happened, then they can start holding Biden to account, but that in the meantime, they have to get the racist, authoritarian clown out of the White House.

So there *do* seem to be some tangible differences this year.

I find it funny that people disliked Hillary. As if they really had a good reason to dislike her. I do think the zGOP did a good job of demonizing her and unlike Bill, she never had that instinctual jovial quality.

I agree with your assessment though. Unlike with Clinton, there hasn't been this made up cloud over Biden's head like there was with Hillary. You know, like emails.

 

[bonzombiekitty]

I find it funny that people disliked Hillary. As if they really had a good reason to dislike her.

She has lady parts. That's enough.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

*Shrugs* Deal with it. Either we're too naive about Trump's chances or we're not taking him seriously enough. Either way we get the same grief.

You're crying 3 weeks before it's happened. Have you packed your bags yet to leave this disaster of a country, going somewhere democracy still thrives?

I'm surprised no one is claiming Trump will declare Martial Law. That's what they said about both Nixon and GW.

I'm going to continue going with: this country is not turning into a banana republic. There are enough people who don't want to see that happen and are not (or no longer) fooled by Trump's con job.

You seem to be forgetting, Trump is utterly incompetent. He's fired so many people there is no one left. That group of cultists who follow him around is also not smart enough to pull it off.

The imaginary scenario of a bunch of state legislators who are going to join forces with Trump to steal the election is imaginary. Every day more of them see the ship is sinking.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Every time you hear a Trump claim that the GOP will be providing far better Healthcare than the Democrats, at a far lower cost, ask yourself why they didn't do it during the years they had the majority in Congress and their man in the White House.

Heck, they haven't even presented a plan.

IMO, barring Trump cultists, is that Trump using those old promises he never carried through on is hurting him more than helping.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Trump Tweets

Join me Friday (10/16) in Ocala, Florida at the Ocala International Airport at 4:00pmE! #MAGA

Join me Friday (10/16) evening at 7:00pmE in Macon, Georgia at the Middle Georgia Regional Airport! #MAGA

Join me on Thursday afternoon (1:00pmE) in Greenville, North Carolina at the Pitt-Greenville Airport! #MAGA

Join me tomorrow tonight (Wednesday) in Iowa, at the Des Moines International Airport!

Join me tonight at 7:00pmE in Johnstown, Pennsylvania at the John Murtha Johnstown-Cambria County Airport! #MAGA

Sounds weak in a couple of ways. No venue scheduled, pretend it's so you can hold the event outside. You don't have to travel anywhere except out of the airplane, thus you can pretend to be recovered when in reality you are still short of breath. And if you angle the cameras just right, the crowd can look larger than it is.

 

[JoeMorgue]

You're crying 3 weeks before it's happened. Have you packed your bags yet to leave this disaster of a country, going somewhere democracy still thrives?

I'm surprised no one is claiming Trump will declare Martial Law. That's what they said about both Nixon and GW.

I'm going to continue going with: this country is not turning into a banana republic. There are enough people who don't want to see that happen and are not (or no longer) fooled by Trump's con job.

You seem to be forgetting, Trump is utterly incompetent. He's fired so many people there is no one left. That group of cultists who follow him around is also not smart enough to pull it off.

The imaginary scenario of a bunch of state legislators who are going to join forces with Trump to steal the election is imaginary. Every day more of them see the ship is sinking.

I hear "LOL you're being dramatic" from the Trumpers enough.

I don't get why you pitch such a hissy fit over the idea that Trump is going to keep screwing with the election when A) he's been constantly escalating how much he's screwing with the election and B) he's openly admitting that's what he's doing.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I hear "LOL you're being dramatic" from the Trumpers enough.

I don't get why you pitch such a hissy fit over the idea that Trump is going to keep screwing with the election when A) he's been constantly escalating how much he's screwing with the election and B) he's openly admitting that's what he's doing.

I disagree with you and you call it a hissy fit?


I did not say Trump wasn't trying. I said he's incompetent and can't pull it off.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

*Shrugs* Deal with it. Either we're too naive about Trump's chances or we're not taking him seriously enough. Either way we get the same grief.

Isn't there a middle ground where we recognise that the chances of Biden winning the electoral college are very high, but that the same goes for the chances Trump&co will pull some sort of post-election shenanigans?

Again, all of us are aware 80-90% doesn't equal 100%, how corrupt and rotten the GOP has become over time, or what a terribly dishonest and petty person Trump is.

Nobody is posting updates from, say, FiveThirtyEight while jumping up and down, screaming that we won, the witcher* is dead, and pouring champagne into glasses. We all take this seriously. That's all I'm trying to say.

----------------------------
*I've been told a witcher is a male witch. I wish Rowling would've used the term for the Harry Potter books, except "yer a witcher, Harry" would've confused fans of the video game franchise of the same name

 

[JoeMorgue]

I did not say Trump wasn't trying. I said he's incompetent and can't pull it off.

Okay. He's "incompetented" he was out of an impeachment trial, every investigation thrown at him, and into 3 Justices on the Supreme Court.

He can "incompetent" his way into stealing an election (or making problems after the election or some other variation on the same general theme) just as easily.

 

[The Atheist]

She has lady parts. That's enough.

That's true, and I'm seeing the identical misogyny, from the same people, on the subject of Kamala Harris. And the GOP is about to enshrine Stockholm Barrett as a lifelong supreme court judge.

Makes me wonder how women ever got the vote in USA.

 

[acbytesla]

She has lady parts. That's enough.

I don't get misogyny. I like women.....A lot.

 

[Gulliver Foyle]

Nov 2nd.

Trump, or some Republican governors, delay the election with some pretext, SCOTUS rejects appeal by Dems in a 5-4 vote (Roberts joins the three liberals in dissenting).

And Barrett? She just gave this answer in the Senate:


Likely? No.
But something similar happened in season 5 of House of Cards, and this is a TV-presidency.

You'd think that as somebody going for the top constitutional court that Barrett would be bloody well able to answer a constitutional question.

 

[MarkCorrigan]

I don't get misogyny. I like women.....A lot.

The mysogynists would say they do too, but the difference is you like them as people, they like them as decorative objects.

Its vile really.

 

[bonzombiekitty]

I don't get misogyny. I like women.....A lot.

There's a difference between liking women and liking women *nudge nudge wink wink say no more*

 

[Stacyhs]

I find it funny that people disliked Hillary. As if they really had a good reason to dislike her. I do think the zGOP did a good job of demonizing her and unlike Bill, she never had that instinctual jovial quality.

I agree with your assessment though. Unlike with Clinton, there hasn't been this made up cloud over Biden's head like there was with Hillary. You know, like emails.

I never understood why some Dems disliked her. I understood why Repubs disliked her very well: she was a threat. A big threat. She's smart, strong, and politically savvy. They also hated her because she didn't know her place, especially as a Southern governor's wife in the 1980's, and then as a First Lady. She made a lot of enemies. Try as they might, investigation after investigation, to find something on her, the Republicans were frustrated. And every time, their hatred grew.

The fact she is a woman has a lot to do with it, no matter what some people say. Conservative, traditional men, especially if they are religious, tend to believe that women have a 'place' that is not quite on an equal basis to men.

 

[varwoche]

Data point: 538 this morning gives Biden an 87% chance to win.

Good yet still frightening. If they said there was a 13% chance of a large meteor hitting earth, I wouldn't feel too good about that.