Patterico's Pontifications

10/24/2020

Weekend Open Thread

Filed under: General — Dana @ 9:29 am



[guest post by Dana]

Here are a few news items to discuss. Feel free to share anything you might think would be of interest to readers. Please include links.

First news item

What a difference a surge makes:

“I don’t like to be authoritarian from the federal government, but at the local level, if governors and others essentially mandate the use of masks when you have an outbreak, I think that would be very important,” Fauci told Alabama Sen. Doug Jones during a Facebook live event in July.

Until now.

“Well, if people are not wearing masks, then maybe we should be mandating it,” Fauci told CNN’s Erin Burnett Friday…Covid-19 has been worsening across the United States, with cases rising in 32 states Friday and holding steady in 17 more. The University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation said the country was entering a winter surge as new infections passed 75,000 in a single day on Friday and more than 800 deaths were reported.

Mask mandates may be tricky to enforce, but it might be time to call for them, Fauci said.
“There’s going to be a difficulty enforcing it, but if everyone agrees that this is something that’s important and they mandate it and everybody pulls together and says, you know, we’re going to mandate it but let’s just do it, I think that would be a great idea to have everybody do it uniformly,” he said.

Related:

Second news item

This is terrible and wrong. Always, always more speech:

While free speech is a worthy cause, this isn’t an issue for its defense because this was not an attack on free speech. Instead, it is an act of intolerance.

Let’s not make excuses: The magazine had to have known that there would be a response to their illustrations. Everybody knows that you will get bitten if you poke the bear. The editorial staff at Charlie Hebdo fancied themselves iconoclasts looking to provoke, not to criticize.

We have to acknowledge that this was defamatory action. We should condemn brutality while also condemning the activities that caused it.

It is not okay to be intolerant. We cannot correct two wrongs with another wrong…

Free speech is a right that Charlie Hebdo abused. Violence is never the answer, and you don’t take a pen to a gunfight, but you also don’t spit in the face of a revered figure, no matter your beliefs.

Breaking the will of the terrorists:

Cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad were projected onto government buildings in France as part of a tribute to history teacher Samuel Paty, who was murdered by an Islamist terrorist last week.

The controversial depictions from the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo were displayed onto town halls in Montpellier and Toulouse for several hours on Wednesday evening, following an official memorial attended by Paty’s family and President Emmanuel Macron in Paris.

Paty was beheaded while walking home on Friday evening, just days after he showed Charlie Hebdo’s caricatures of Mohammad to pupils in a class about freedom of expression…“Samuel Paty on Friday became the face of the Republic, of our desire to break the will of the terrorists… and to live as a community of free citizens in our country.”

Third news item

Trying to expand their customer base, I guess:

Fourth news item

No matter where one stands on immigration, this is just cruel and heartbreaking:

The parents of 545 migrant children who were separated under US border policy cannot be located, a court filing and US rights group revealed Tuesday.

The separations were carried out in relation to US President Donald Trump’s “zero tolerance” policy toward migrants who illegally crossed the border.

“Through our litigation, we just reported to the court that the parents of 545 kids — forcibly separated by the Trump administration’s cruel family separation practice — still cannot be found,” the American Civil Liberties Union tweeted.

Fifth news item

Here we go:

Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump threatened to sue the Lincoln Project over billboards the anti-Trump Republican PAC put up in Times Square criticizing the couple’s response to the coronavirus.

In a letter, Trump family lawyer Marc Kasowitz rebuked the group for putting up a billboard of Ivanka Trump smiling and gesturing toward the coronavirus death tolls for New Yorkers and Americans — 33,000 and 221,000, respectively. The letter also mentioned a billboard of Kushner, featured next to the Trump display, in which he appears next to a quote saying, “[New Yorkers] are going to suffer and that’s their problem.”

Sixth news item

They’re coming out of the woodwork now:

Police in western Ohio have reportedly caught wind of a plan among an unspecified group of people to go to Gov. Mike DeWine’s home to arrest him for “tyranny.” Local news station WTOL reports that the Piqua Police Department received a report on Oct. 16 from a man who said he got a phone call from another man seeking to recruit him to arrest DeWine. The plan, which resembles an alleged kidnapping plot against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer earlier this month, apparently hit a wall after the man who received the call refused to join in and went to the police instead.

Seventh news item

Because not everyone thinks alike, even if they have similar skin tones:

Due to the power of identity politics, this critique is viewed as more credible and authentic coming from a person who is not white. But I do not speak for black people. Among those who believe in universal humanism, on the left and the right, none of us should be playing this identitarian game of claiming to speak on behalf of this or that racial group. Everyone, regardless of their racial or ethnic background, should be able to say what they believe to be true and challenge those they believe are wrong in a free and open way.

One of the central flaws of so-called anti-racist activism today is its prioritisation of what is termed ‘lived experience’ over empirical evidence. Lived experience, as it is understood by left identitarians, is not merely a retelling of events. It is the suggestion that your ‘positionality’ (where you stand in relation to dynamics of power and privilege) determines the authenticity and importance of your interpretation of a given situation. This shift has not led to better dialogue and understanding about race, gender and sexuality. It has led, rather, to the creation of new hierarchies determining who can and cannot speak on certain subjects, and whose voice is worthy of being heard.

Eighth news item

Eh, I think it’s called a lie:

Former Vice President Joe Biden claimed that he “never said I oppose fracking” when pressed by President Donald Trump on the issue during Thursday night’s presidential debate.

“You said it on tape,” Trump replied.

Facts First: It’s false that Biden never said he opposed fracking. In two Democratic primary debates, Biden made confusing remarks over fracking that his campaign had to clarify. In 2019, Biden said “we would make sure it’s eliminated” when asked about the future of coal and fracking; in 2020 he said he opposed “new fracking.

Just 10 days until the election.

Have a great weekend.

–Dana

335 Responses to “Weekend Open Thread”

  1. Good morning!

    Dana (6995e0)

  2. From the link: “Under the zero tolerance program, the US began separating children from their parents in May 2018, prompting a domestic and international outcry.“

    Assuming facts not in evidence.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  3. Go forth and cheer, you dumb sklits, her mom was a big R back in the day, albeit more of an Illinois Combine type perhaps (hometown DeKalb):

    https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/kaia-gerber-gets-her-wisdom-163001996.html

    urbanleftbehind (0ef459)

  4. Fauci’s a constitutional scholar now. Time for another smack down from Rand Paul.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  5. Trump campaign spokesperson says parents of separated children don’t want them back
    The Trump campaign’s communications director asserted on Friday that the reason some migrant families separated by the administration at the U.S. border have not been reunited is because the parents do not want their children back.
    ……..
    Speaking on CNN’s “New Day,” Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said that while “it’s a regrettable situation, certainly,” the work of unifying these families with their loved ones is more complicated for Department of Homeland Security officials than has been portrayed publicly.

    “The fact is it’s not as simple as you make it sound or Joe Biden made it sound on the stage last night to locate the parents who are in other countries,” Murtaugh said. “And when they do locate them, it has been DHS’ experience that in many cases the parents do not want the children returned.”
    ………
    However the preference of the parents of the hundreds of children at issue is unknown, as they have not yet been successfully contacted by the court-appointed steering committee tasked with the effort.
    ……..

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  6. Trump struggles to lift glass of water during ‘60 Minutes’ interview
    ……..
    For the second time in a few months, Trump struggled to lift a glass of water during his contentious interview with Lesley Stahl.

    Midway through the 38-minute sit-down, the president picked up a glass of water with his right hand. Instead of simply sipping the water, Trump needed his left hand to hold the glass steady and bring it to his lips to drink.
    ……..

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  7. Federal Agency Secretly Offered FBI Documents On Trump Officials, Senate Report Says

    Republicans say GSA violated the terms of its agreement with the Trump campaign to destroy campaign and transition records at the beginning of Donald Trump’s term. They also said the GSA’s actions “called into question” its role as a “neutral services provider” to presidential campaigns.

    “At bottom, the GSA and the FBI undermined the transition process by preserving Trump transition team records contrary to the terms of the memorandum of understanding, hiding that fact from the Trump transition team, and refusing to provide the team with copies of its own records,” the report says.

    It is unclear why GSA officials would have thought to contact the FBI regarding Flynn records. At the time the officials reached out to the FBI, it was not publicly known that the bureau was investigating Flynn and others on the Trump campaign.

    https://dailycaller.com/2020/10/23/general-services-administration-fbi-michael-flynn/

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  8. Forbes Estimates China Paid Trump At Least $5.4 Million Since He Took Office, Via Mysterious Trump Tower Lease
    President Donald Trump, who declared “I don’t make money from China” in Thursday night’s presidential debate, has in fact collected millions of dollars from government-owned entities in China since he took office. Forbes estimates that at least $5.4 million has flowed into the president’s business from a lease agreement involving a state-owned bank in Trump Tower.

    The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China signed a lease for space in 2008, years before the president took office, paying about $1.9 million in annual rent. Trump is well-aware of the deal. “I’ll show you the Industrial Bank of China,” he told three Forbes journalists touring Trump Tower in 2015. “I have the best tenants in the world in this building.”

    ……. That put him in an unusual position, given that government-owned entities in China hold at least 70% of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. Suddenly, a routine real estate deal became a conduit for a foreign superpower to pay the president of the United States.
    ………

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  9. Putting up a CNN piece calling his words ‘confusing’ to explain Biden’s lie on his previous positions on fossil fuels and fracking is nowhere near as effective as putting up the collection of videos where he states his views.

    https://twitter.com/realDailyWire/status/1319466804993880064?s=20
    __

    And The Lincoln Project putting up a billboard in Times Square about Virus deaths in NY and the USA and having anyone’s picture on it but Gov. Cuomo tells you everything you need to know about The Lincoln Project.

    __ _

    One thing we learned this week is that there are a lot of people saying you MUST listen to their views on illegal border crossings who also think that talk about ‘Coyotes’ and the human smuggling business means four-legend animals.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  10. No matter where one stands on immigration, this is just cruel and heartbreaking:…

    Heartbreaking indeed. Parents that don’t want their children:

    Geoff Bennett
    @GeoffRBennett
    · Oct 21
    White House spox Brian Morgenstern — asked about the report that lawyers can’t find the parents of 545 migrant children separated under Trump — falsely claims: “Many of them have declined to accept their children back…It’s not for lack of effort on the administration’s part.”

    ###########

    Chase Jennings
    @SpoxDHS
    ·
    Oct 21
    This narrative has been dispelled. In the current litigation, for example, out of the parents of 485 children whom Plaintiffs’ counsel has been able to contact, they’ve yet to identify a single family that wants their child reunited with them in their country of origin.

    “This narrative has been dispelled on numerous occasions. DHS has taken every step to facilitate the reunification of these families where the parents wanted such reunification to occur. The simple fact is this: after contact has been made with the parents to reunite them with their children, many parents have refused. In the current litigation, for example, out of the parents of 485 children whom Plaintiffs’ counsel has been able to contact, they have yet to identify a single family that wants their child reunited with them in their country of origin. The result is that the children remain in the U.S. while the parents remain in their home country. The reunification process is a whole-of-Government approach involving CBP, ICE, and HHS.”

    https://mobile.twitter.com/SpoxDHS/status/1319002790899965954

    Maybe the plaintiffs will release their actual findings and clear this up.

    BuDuh (bc7703)

  11. Dana, your 2nd news item calls to mind how then-candidate Trump cast similar victim-blaming shade on Pam Geller.

    urbanleftbehind (0ef459)

  12. “There will be no separate peace between Israel and the Arab world, I want to make that very clear with all of you.

    I’ve heard several prominent politicians in Israel sometimes saying, ‘Well, the Arab world is in a different place now. We just have to reach out to them. We can work some things with the Arab world and we’ll deal with the Palestinians,’

    No. No, no, and no.” John Kerry 2016
    _

    These are the people Biden/Harris want to put back in charge of foreign policy.
    _

    Somewhat related:

    Rep. Sam Graves
    @RepSamGraves
    ·
    BREAKING: This morning, Sudan became the THIRD Arab country to sign a peace deal with Israel in the last few weeks. Before 2020, only two such deals had been agreed to in the last 72 years.
    __ _

    Hillel Neuer
    @HillelNeuer
    ·
    HUGE: Flag of Sudan Sudan to make peace with Flag of Israel Israel.

    Same country that was allied with Iran & Hamas, and which in 1967 hosted the Arab League summit that declared the Khartoum three No’s: “No peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel, no negotiations with it.”
    __ _

    Benjamin Haddad
    @benjaminhaddad

    No regional explosion after the Jerusalem embassy move. No escalation after Soleimani. Separate Israel-Arab peace deals without an agreement on Palestine.

    Sept 15: Trump hosts historic peace deal ceremony with Israel, the UAE & Bahrain.

    Oct 14: Emails show Joe Biden met with son Hunter’s Ukrainian business associate & was set to receive money from China

    Oct 16: Debate commission announces foreign policy will no longer be a topic
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  13. Trump Sons Hint At 2024 Runs As President’s Polling Looks Dire
    …….
    Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son who helps run the Trump Organization as an executive vice president and has been one of his father’s most active surrogates this year, posted a photo of a “Don Jr. 2024” flag to instagram.
    ……..
    Eric Trump, also an executive vice president at the Trump Organization and a Trump campaign surrogate, liked a tweet on Saturday reading “Eric Trump 2024,” a move some commentators recognized as roughly equivalent to his brother’s instagram post.
    ………
    48%. That’s the share of Americans who had an unfavorable view of Donald Trump Jr. in a YouGov/Economist poll in March, compared to just 36% who expressed a favorable view – though he has 71% favorability among Republicans. Eric Trump was less known in the poll, with a 32% favorability and 43% unfavorability overall and 64% favorability among Republicans.
    ……..

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  14. “ This narrative has been dispelled. In the current litigation, for example, out of the parents of 485 children whom Plaintiffs’ counsel has been able to contact, they’ve yet to identify a single family that wants their child reunited with them in their country of origin.”
    __ _

    You can’t fix an anchor baby if they’re not in the target area.

    This Yahoo piece is specious and an embarrassment to anyone who promotes it. It’s getting a lot of play of course…..
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  15. Hate to say it, but Trump’s COVID tweet is right. Watch – when Biden is elected, the media fear machine will wind down. Schools will reopen, with journalists hailing studies from months before that show kids really don’t spread COVID that much. Biden will be hailed as the man who defeated COVID simply by being elected, much like Obama’s election itself lowered ocean levels…

    Hoi Polloi (92d467)

  16. @12-
    Making Sudan Great Again.

    I wonder how this will cost American taxpayers.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  17. I’ve heard several prominent politicians in Israel sometimes saying, ‘Well, the Arab world is in a different place now. We just have to reach out to them. We can work some things with the Arab world and we’ll deal with the Palestinians,’

    No. No, no, and no.” John Kerry 2016

    John Kerry is an idiot. An Iranian proxy masked as a “serious” statesmen.

    Biden and Harris will do their best to unravel the Arab-Israeli peace negotiations. After they bow to Tehran and get their marching orders, of course.

    Hoi Polloi (92d467)

  18. Speaks volumes that now Sudan has signed up to recognize Israel and long sought progress toward peace continues to break out in the Middle East– where the U.S. has poured billions and billions of dollars for decades– fresh American generations merely shrug indiffently. Oy Vey! The world is moving on.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  19. Trump campaign flouted agreement to follow health guidelines at rally, documents show

    In the days leading up to the Sept. 30 event in Duluth, Minn., local officials had privately pressed the campaign to abide by state public health guidelines aimed at slowing the spread of the novel coronavirus, documents show. In response, the campaign signed an agreement pledging to follow those rules, limiting attendance to 250 people.

    On the day of the rally, however, Trump supporters flooded onto the tarmac at Duluth International Airport. They stood shoulder to shoulder, many without masks.

    “We have been notified that the 250 person limit has been exceeded,” an airport representative emailed a campaign official late that afternoon. “This email serves as our notice of a contract violation and we are requesting you remedy the situation.”

    The warning went unheeded — and unanswered.

    Held two days before Trump was diagnosed with covid-19, the rally was attended by more than 2,500 people, airport officials estimated.

    It’s time for a president who believes in law and order – and keeping his word.

    Dave (1bb933)

  20. president donald has done more for israel than anybody since mr moses

    hes the most kosher person in the room

    Dave (1bb933)

  21. The Trump bois gotta wait 8 years like W, although a potted plant could probably turn Kamala Harris into a Jeopardy question shared by David Paterson, Eugene Sawyer and David Dinkins.

    urbanleftbehind (0ef459)

  22. The parents of 545 migrant children who were separated under US border policy cannot be located, a court filing and US rights group revealed Tuesday.

    I think that any parent of those children would do their damnedest to be found.

    But the speaker may have meant “Persons who claimed to be parents of 545 migrant children who were separated under US border policy cannot be located.” Perhaps those are 545 people who were using unaccompanied (or kidnapped) children as anchor props.

    It is fashionable to blame everything on the mean old ICE, but sometimes other people are being awful.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  23. “Under the zero tolerance program, the US began separating children from their parents in May 2018, prompting a domestic and international outcry.“

    Under the Obama-era program (and probably W as well), parents of children were kept together and held as a unit because of concern for the children. This encouraged people to bring children as anchors, in situations where mere adults woud be deported forthwith.

    Perhaps the children should have been deported with them. Maybe most were. But what would you do if you felt that the adults and the child were unrelated? If you deported them all, you would never find the actual parents. If you allowed them to all stay, you would be encouraging more of the same.

    I really wish this administration were not so jaw-droppingly stupid that they cannot explain themselves without resorting to lies, half-truths and idiot spokesmen. It’s hard to know when their responses range only from denial to blame.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  24. You can’t fix an anchor baby if they’re not in the target area.

    An anchor baby (e.g. Barron Trump) is a US citizen, one or both of whose parents are not, at the time the anchor baby is born.

    If Trump was putting innocent American children in cages to punish and/or terrorize their parents … wow.

    Dave (1bb933)

  25. Lou Dobbs. Is this racist, innumerate and bloody-minded hack still on the air? He’s an embarrassment to Fox.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  26. A resurgent virus attacks the heartland, just before the election.
    ……..
    This harrowing third surge, which led to a U.S. single-day record of more than 85,000 new cases Friday, is happening less than two weeks from Election Day, which will mark the end of a campaign dominated by the pandemic and President Trump’s much-criticized response to it.

    As of Friday evening, 15 states have added more cases in the past week than in any other seven-day stretch of the pandemic: Wisconsin, a battleground in the presidential election, Colorado, Kentucky, Illinois, Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, South Dakota, Montana, Arkansas, Alaska, Tennessee, Ohio, Indiana and North Dakota. And four states have added more deaths this week than in previous weeks: Wisconsin, Kentucky, South Dakota and Oklahoma.

    North Dakota leads the nation in coronavirus cases per capita. Illinois is averaging more than 4,100 new cases per day, up 85 percent from the average two weeks ago. And Pennsylvania, another battleground state, on Friday reported a record of 2,258 cases.
    …….
    Citing a rise in hospitalizations across the state, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment announced a strengthening of coronavirus restrictions in certain counties, capping gatherings at 10 people from no more than two separate households. For the third straight day, Colorado announced a new single-day cases record on Friday.

    Overnight, nearly 2,500 people were hospitalized in Illinois, the state’s top public health official, Dr. Ngozi Ezike, said in a news conference Friday afternoon. The mayor of Chicago, Lori E. Lightfoot, announced a curfew on nonessential businesses beginning at 10 p.m. on Friday.
    ……
    ……[P]ublic health officials warn that Americans are heading into a dangerous phase, as cooler weather forces people indoors, where the virus spreads easily. It could make for a grueling winter that tests the discipline of the many people who have grown weary of masks and of turning down invitations to see family and friends.
    ………
    President Trump’s response.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  27. @25: You twist part of a sentence out of its meaning, quickly build a strawman and the are shocked I would ever say such a thing. C’mon Dave, you can be intellectually honest most of the time.

    A baby used to game the system is an anchor regardless of other status.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  28. Also, it’s a child, but enjoy your strawbaby.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  29. @QAnon:

    I expect to hear that Biden’s people are intentionally spreading the disease. It’s kind of traditional that someone gets blamed for doing that in a plague.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  30. John Kerry is an idiot. An Iranian proxy masked as a “serious” statesmen.

    He’s tall, has lots of money and has a patrician nose to look down. How can he not be a statesman?

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  31. Trump Sons Hint At 2024 Runs As President’s Polling Looks Dire

    Lock them up.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  32. You twist part of a sentence out of its meaning, quickly build a strawman and the are shocked I would ever say such a thing. C’mon Dave, you can be intellectually honest most of the time.

    Anchor baby means something very specific, Kevin. You are the one guilty of using an inaccurate term to advance a misleading argument.

    I obviously don’t think many, if any, of the children orphaned by Trump’s policy are really American citizens.

    Dave (1bb933)

  33. Free speech is a right that Charlie Hebdo abused … [you] don’t spit in the face of a revered figure, no matter your beliefs.

    Do tell. Revered by whom? Lots and lots of people revered Thomas Jefferson until the things about Sally Hemmings were proved. Now about Robert E Lee? Or even Lincoln now? Dr King had faults and I’m sure that Mother Teresa had issues; can we not talk about them and how all people are flawed?

    The answer to bad speech is more speech. Go over to Instapundit and deride Trump and you’ll see what I mean.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  34. Is this racist, innumerate and bloody-minded hack still on the air? He’s an embarrassment to Fox.

    But he fits right in!

    Dave (1bb933)

  35. I would give Fauci the benefit of the doubt as to what he meant by “we”. He didn’t say “national”.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  36. I obviously don’t think many, if any, of the children orphaned by Trump’s policy are really American citizens.

    Oh, since the post *I* wrote, that you comment appeared under, did not use that term, I see that you were responding to something other than my #24.

    I has said ” This encouraged people to bring children as anchors, in situations where mere adults would be deported forthwith.”

    Which I thought you were paraphrasing. My bad. Feel free to respond to what *I* wrote.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  37. But he fits right in!

    Actually they are not all deranged. Particularly not Fox Business.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  38. There’s something to be said for attacking corruption at its source, but why is the Lincoln Project wasting money on billboards in Times Square?

    A bid for “earned media” by making them a news story, I guess (with Team Orange obligingly taking the bait within hours…)?

    Dave (1bb933)

  39. Assuming facts not in evidence.

    It’s a fact that Sessions, who had to have done it with Trump’s blessing, made all immigration transgressions felonies under this “zero tolerance” policy, which effectively forced all children to be separated from their parents. The policy is immoral and evil.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  40. “An anchor baby (e.g. Barron Trump) is a US citizen, one or both of whose parents are not, at the time the anchor baby is born”
    _

    The child/baby is also an ‘anchor’ if it’s used to secure citizenship down the road for the child/baby plus the parents who:

    1) give it to a Coyote to smuggle in

    and/or

    2) refuse to be reunited with the baby/child if that means return to them outside the US.
    _

    harkin (97d6f1)

  41. Oh, since the post *I* wrote, that you comment appeared under, did not use that term, I see that you were responding to something other than my #24.

    Yes, I thought I was quoting harkin, but since you accused me of distorting your words, I figured he must have been quoting you, but didn’t go back to check.

    Dave (1bb933)

  42. The easy answer for The Lincoln Project is: “We look forward to this bully-lawsuit by Jared-Ivanka, especially the discovery phase. Bring it on.”

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  43. anchor baby
    [anchor baby]
    NOUN
    offensive
    anchor baby (noun) · anchor babies (plural noun)
    used to refer to a child born to a noncitizen mother in a country which has birthright citizenship, especially when viewed as providing an advantage to family members seeking to secure citizenship or legal residency.

    Dave (1bb933)

  44. “We look forward to this bully-lawsuit by Jared-Ivanka, especially the discovery phase. Bring it on.”

    It’s a pity they have to do it the old-fashioned way, and can’t just get the FSB to hack their iCloud accounts, but what could Nepotism Ken and Nepotism Barbie possibly have to hide?!

    Dave (1bb933)

  45. For those who prefer a one-stop shop, here’s the complete catalog of Trump’s worst cruelties, collusions, corruptions and crimes, all appropriately linked and categorized.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  46. National Republican Party Formally Backs QAnon Supporter

    After weeks of wavering, the national Republican party has formally thrown its support behind Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia Republican House candidate who is openly supportive of QAnon.

    The National Republican Congressional Committee donated $5,000 to Greene’s congressional campaign on September 25, according to campaign finance records—the maximum amount the committee can donate.

    The donation formalizes the GOP’s acceptance of Greene’s candidacy after top officials in the party had signaled hesitancy in backing her. Greene has not shied away from expressing her support for QAnon, a conspiracy theory that holds that President Donald Trump is engaged in a covert war against a pedophile-obsessive “cabal” that’s being fostered by the Democratic Party and other prominent cultural institutions. She has also pushed a variety of inflammatory conspiracies on various platforms, suggesting that blacks are “slaves” to the Democratic Party, that George Soros is actually a Nazi, and that Muslims do not belong in government.

    #ExGOP

    Dave (1bb933)

  47. thats just nitpicking mr paul

    Dave (1bb933)

  48. “especially when viewed as providing an advantage to family members seeking to secure citizenship or legal residency.”
    __ _

    IOW – with the same intended goal.

    Therefore they are ‘anchors’.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  49. More on Trump the “Philanthropist”.

    And according to his tax records, he has given back at least $130 million since 2005, his second year as a reality TV star.

    But the long-hidden tax records, obtained by The New York Times, show that Mr. Trump did not have to reach into his wallet for most of that giving. The vast bulk of his charitable tax deductions, $119.3 million worth, came from simply agreeing not to develop land — in several cases, after he had shelved development plans.

    In other words, Trump created nice permanent greenbelts around his Long Island estate. He was probably not going to get permit approval to develop, so he maximized the value of what he had while getting massive tax breaks, and it’s more than likely that he overvalued the “gift” to garner even more tax benefits.
    It’s called a charitable contribution as defined under the tax code, but it’s not so charitable to the betterment of his fellow man. And this.

    Of the $7.5 million in business and personal cash contributions reported to the Internal Revenue Service since 2005, more than 40 percent — $3.2 million — came starting in 2015, when Mr. Trump’s philanthropy fell under scrutiny after he announced his White House bid. In 2017, his first year in office, he declared $1.9 million in cash gifts. In 2014, by contrast, he contributed $81,499.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  50. It’s a fact that Sessions, who had to have done it with Trump’s blessing, made all immigration transgressions felonies under this “zero tolerance” policy, which effectively forced all children to be separated from their parents.

    BS, Montagu. Under the IIRIRA, repeat transgressions were always felonies. Nothing changed, except that Trump finally enforced the rule of law at the border.

    And, you don’t know they are their parents. Bush and Obama incentivized the use of children as tickets to entry. You want to return to that.

    The policy is immoral and evil.

    It’s the law, but your usual sanctimonious grandstanding is noted.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  51. “….Bernie Sanders, an avowed socialist who became a darling of the Democratic party’s hard-left faction during the recent primaries, also spent years railing against illegal immigration and its effect on wages.

    More recently, he’s had to blur his message to accommodate the hyper-progressive nature of modern Democratic politics. But as recently as 2015, Bernie Sanders declared that open borders are “a Koch brothers proposal” that “would make everybody in America poorer. You’re doing away with the concept of a nation state, and I don’t think there’s any country in the world which believes in that.”

    In America, it’s black men who have often borne the impact that migrant workers have had on the wages of native workers. Since the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act in 1965, which opened America’s doors to more newcomers, the participation rate of adult black men has fallen steadily.

    As recently as 1975, it was still almost 80 percent. For the last decade, by contrast, it’s been below 70 percent. Meanwhile, the share of the workforce comprised of foreign-born workers has increased from five percent in 1970 to around 20 percent today, a share that exceeds the percentage of foreign-born individuals in the population-at-large.

    A 2003 Cornell University study found that it’s unskilled black Americans who’ve been most adversely affected by wage competition from immigrants, just as native-born white workers were underbid during the Great Migration. What I am describing here has nothing to do with racism or police brutality…….

    …… I’m not supposed to say this, but I will: Taking a knee to Black Lives Matter, or hauling down monuments, isn’t going to change any of this. Nor will corporate diversity policies, many of which are trumpeted on social media by the same conglomerates that are hiring low-cost labor in droves. What we need are policies—including trade and immigration policies—that help us carve up the economic pie in a way that sees all workers get their fair share, no matter what their ethnicity.”

    https://quillette.com/2020/10/24/what-divides-us-is-class-not-race/
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  52. @46.For those who prefer a one-stop shop, here’s the complete catalog of Biden’s worst cruelties, collusions, corruptions and crimes, all appropriately linked and categorized.

    It’s called the Congressional Record.

    FIFY.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  53. Among those who believe in universal humanism, on the left and the right, none of us should be playing this identitarian game of claiming to speak on behalf of this or that racial group.

    Considering the vast and multitudinous differences among the hundreds of millions of individuals identified by a particular race, it always strikes me as odd to hold that those differences don’t really matter and the only importance differences are those that supposedly distinguish one big chunk of humanity from another.

    These little girls don’t see things that way. (There are also these actual twins.)

    But the people who insist on a uniform “black” perspective seem to take for granted that white people will disagree sharply on many things — except that they’re assumed to be pretty much all racist at heart — so it’s also condescending. Unless it’s ploy to corral a large group together in opposition to another group, and turn the whole concept of unique individuality and person merit into just another form of racism.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  54. BS, Montagu. Under the IIRIRA, repeat transgressions were always felonies.

    That’s a slippery comment, beer. I said that Trump made all immigration transgressions felonies, which is a fact.

    Nielsen went on to explain that there is indeed something new, as we wrote in another article on this topic. Under a “zero tolerance policy” on illegal immigration announced by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in early April, the administration is now referring all illegal border crossings for criminal prosecution. By doing that, parents have been separated from their children, because children can’t be held in detention facilities for adults.

    And sure, calling a policy to deliberately separate children from their parents immoral and evil is “sanctimonious grandstanding”. Pffft.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  55. That’s a slippery comment, beer. I said that Trump made all immigration transgressions felonies, which is a fact.

    BS again, Montagu. You’re the one being slick. Immigration violations can be prosecuted criminally or civilly. Trump is enforcing them criminally, which is in accordance with the law. And re-entry has always been a felony. Illegal entry as a first offense is a misdemeanor and still is.

    Under federal law, people who illegally enter the U.S. or commit other violations of immigration law can face either civil or criminal sanctions. Civil immigration matters are heard in administrative courts run by the Department of Justice and can result in deportation. Criminal immigration matters are heard in federal trial courts and can result in incarceration prior to deportation. The executive branch has broad authority to decide how federal immigration law is enforced.

    https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/09/27/far-more-immigration-cases-are-being-prosecuted-criminally-under-trump-administration/

    But, I’m sure you’ll dredge your your usual lefty fact check BS again.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  56. Immigration violations can be prosecuted criminally or civilly. Trump is enforcing them criminally, which is in accordance with the law.

    You’re still being slippery, beer. Let’s recap.
    You quoted this from Dana’s link: “Under the zero tolerance program, the US began separating children from their parents in May 2018, prompting a domestic and international outcry.”
    That is a true statement. Criminalizing every illegal entry effectively separated parent and child.
    You said: “Assuming facts not in evidence,” which basically ignored the practical effect of the change in policy.
    And now you’re trying to defend your sh-tty argument by changing the subject with “in accordance with the law”. No one disputed that this change in policy violated the law. The issue is the policy itself.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  57. You said: “Assuming facts not in evidence,” which basically ignored the practical effect of the change in policy.

    No, Montagu. I bolded the relevant part in that comment: “from their parents.” You, like the reporter, have no idea if they are accompanied by their actual parents. Yet, you assume it as fact. BS on that, and BS on your sanctimony about it.

    Your BS about prosecutions is just icing on your BS layer cake.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  58. https://donsurber.blogspot.com/2020/10/today-in-trumpenfreude.html
    Whitman couldn’t run a Kool-Aid stand

    mg (8cbc69)

  59. Looks like coney-barrett gets on the supreme court as murkowski says yes. How many here think that ends the problem and we all live happily ever after as the slave holding conservative thought with the supreme court’s dred scott decision. AOC echoes Malcolm X “by any means necessary biden!” Base tells biden ok we are stuck with you ;but you better behave!

    asset (49d8a5)

  60. It’s a pity they have to do it the old-fashioned way, and can’t just get the FSB to hack their iCloud accounts, but what could Nepotism Ken and Nepotism Barbie possibly have to hide?!

    No more than the Clintons ever did. But why get upset? If you assume, as I do, that they are all crooks and you should be looking at where they differ, you’ll never be surprised when the sleaze seeps out under the door.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  61. You, like the reporter, have no idea if they are accompanied by their actual parents.

    That’s still slippery, beer. You’re peddling discredited nonsense. There is a scarcely a fraction of those caught who were fake families. Quote:

    Customs and Border Protection did not say how many fraudulent claims were made in years past for comparison. And this year’s number is still a small fraction of apprehensions — 3,100 cases represents less than 0.5 percent of the total.

    And that 0.5% includes all fraudulent claims, such as young adults lying about their age, claiming to be minors.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  62. Salacious and untrustworthy, but within one of our post writer’s 8 topics:

    http://thegrio.com/2020/10/24/aubrey-oday-exposes-trump-family/

    urbanleftbehind (0ef459)

  63. And that 0.5% includes all fraudulent claims, such as young adults lying about their age, claiming to be minors.

    The 3,100 only represents those they’ve identified as fraudulent. You make it sound like they’ve processed all cases and 99.5% were confirmed legit, which is false. Slick, Montagu.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  64. So the fellas on the National Security Law Podcast made a good point: Texas accepts no late ballots and allows counting to start the day before the election.

    If they go for Biden — which is a real possibility — we might know that on Election Night. And that would probably make any path for Trump unattainable.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  65. Biden leads Trump in Texas by one point in the latest poll.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  66. The 3,100 only represents those they’ve identified as fraudulent. You make it sound like they’ve processed all cases and 99.5% were confirmed legit, which is false. Slick, Montagu.

    Noted, your reliance on speculation, not any facts, beer. Fearmongering is a Trumpian trait.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  67. So … looking at 538’s interactive oracle (h/t Dave), if Biden wins Texas, Trump is left with only the states where they keep chickens in the parlor (instead of the bedroom where they belong). Blow out!

    nk (1d9030)

  68. It would be nice to make Florida irrelevant in this election. Not as nice as making Trump irrelevant, but that over-built swamp has been getting on my nerves since 2000.

    nk (1d9030)

  69. Re Texas, it would be cool to tell Salena Zito and a certain dapper Yinzer to GFTs.

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  70. It really is about Russia, Russia, Russia.

    The Trump Organization reregistered the domain name TrumpTowerMoscow.com this June, internet records show, suggesting that contrary to President Trump’s claims, the company has not necessarily abandoned its pursuit of the lucrative real estate deal that figured prominently in multiple investigations into his connections with Russia.

    It’s been renewed every year of this presidency, and going back to 2008.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  71. Burgess Everett
    @burgessev

    Murkowski says she will vote against cloture on Barrett nomination.
    __ _

    Burgess Everett
    @burgessev

    NEWS: Murkowski will vote YES on Barrett’s final confirmation
    _ _

    Burgess Everett
    @burgessev
    ·
    “While I oppose the process that led us to this point, I do not hold it against her.”
    __ _

    Magda Teter Wear a Mask
    @magdateter
    ·
    There are no moderate Republicans. There are no moderate Republicans. There are no moderate Republicans.
    There are no moderate Republicans. There are no moderate Republicans. There are no moderate Republicans.

    __ _

    I’m thinking moderate Republicans are tired of immoderate Democrats.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  72. If they go for Biden — which is a real possibility — we might know that on Election Night. And that would probably make any path for Trump unattainable.

    Trump has to run the table on AZ, TX, GA, FL, NC, and OH. Then he has to either win PA or win both MI and WI, or win one of WI and MI and both NV and IA. He could maybe fudge this a bit by winning both “loose” CDs. If he loses FL he as to win everything else except one of NV or IA. He can also lose AX and win.

    If Biden takes TX, he has 270 votes without any other tossup state.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  73. Commie rag Jacobin magazine is mad because Twitter is blocking a link to their podcast.
    _

    The tweet with the link includes the words Marxist, socialist and Biden.

    https://twitter.com/sunraysunray/status/1320078487970041856?s=20
    __

    lol – those filters can be a bear.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)


  74. Steve Guest
    @SteveGuest
    ·
    👀👀

    Joe Biden brags about having “the most extensive and inclusive VOTER FRAUD organization in the history of American politics”

    https://twitter.com/SteveGuest/status/1320107370312323073?s=20

    __ _

    Not often I agree with Joe.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  75. If I look at the campaign Biden is running in his commercials — really the only things that many people see — he’s running a centrist campaign and his only mandate is to govern from the center.

    Note that Richard Nixon ran just such a campaign in 1968, a similarly fracked up year (in some respects rather worse than 2020) following the lie-filled administration of LBJ. After seeing a sign held up by a teenager, saying “Bring Us Together” he made it the theme of his campaign.

    And, in office Nixon, the old Cold Warrior partisan, governed from the center and won re-election handily. His fall was later, and for other reasons. Nixon implemented the Great society that Johnson had promised and of the 4 justices he appointed, 3 voted for Roe.

    This isn’t to say that Nixon was my ideal, just that he was an example of what followed a similar campaign in a similar time. The fact that there were Republicans and Democrats quite prepared to see this squish fail doesn’t change that.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  76. lol – those filters can be a bear.

    I’m sure that Trump, corrupt and supremacist also hit the filter. Right!?

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  77. I will always wonder how different things might have been if somebody, anybody, just one time, had called Trump a “clown” during the 2016 Republican primary debates.

    nk (1d9030)

  78. A bit more info from NPR story from this morning on those separated kids & parents:

    https://www.npr.org/2020/10/24/927384388/parents-of-545-children-separated-at-u-s-mexico-border-have-not-been-located

    ColoComment (6c4dcd)

  79. This Is How The FBI Says A Network Of ‘Boogaloo Bois’ Sparked Violence And Death
    The young man came to the protest over the police killing of George Floyd wearing a tactical vest on his chest and a skull mask over his face. In grainy video footage captured outside of Minneapolis’ Third Police Precinct on the night of May 28, the man can be seen pulling out an AK-47 style rifle and blasting 13 shots into the police building. The shooting happened shortly before the structure was set ablaze.

    On Friday, federal officials issued a complaint against a 26-year-old Texan, Ivan Harrison Hunter, they say they have identified as the man in the video. Hunter faces one count of participating in a riot, with a sentence of up to five years in prison.
    …….
    But along with the charge, federal officials unsealed an affidavit accusing Hunter of being part of a loose nationwide network of violent extremists, known as Boogaloo Bois. The extremists connected and communicated through social media apps, including Facebook, to plot and glorify shocking violence, including killing a federal officer in Oakland and a scheme to supply Hamas with weapons to use against US soldiers.

    For example, just a few hours after allegedly shooting up the precinct, Hunter messaged an associate in California, Steven Carrillo.

    “ Boog,” Hunter wrote.

    “Did,” Carrillo responded.

    “Go for police buildings,” Hunter advised.

    “I did better lol,” Carrillo answered. Indeed, shortly before that exchange, according to authorities, Carrillo had shot and killed a Federal Protective Services officer, David Patrick Underwood, in Oakland.
    ……..
    The criminal complaint filed in court Friday reveals a network across the country whose members have been directly linked with deadly acts, hoping to incite even more violence across the nation. It also reveals the violent group of extremists used a variety of apps to communicate and network, yet continued to heavily rely on Facebook to not just connect with one another, but amplify their message over a network that expanded across the country, touching on Oakland, Minneapolis, Texas and across to North Carolina.
    ………
    According to court records, it was a May 26 Facebook post that prompted Hunter to drop everything, grab his AK-47-style rifle and make the 1,000-mile drive from Austin to Minneapolis, where protests over the killing of George Floyd by police had turned violent.

    “ I need a headcount,” the post read, asking Boogaloo Bois members across the country to respond.

    “72 hours out,” Hunter replied.

    The Facebook post Hunter responded to, authorities said, was posted by Michael Solomon, a 30-year-old who along with Benjamin Ryan Teeter are accused of trying to sell weapons to someone they believed was a member of Hamas……..
    …….
    Video obtained by the FBI shows someone wearing a skull mask over his head, glasses and a baseball cap firing into the police station that night while looters were inside the building. According to the indictment, Hunter was identified as the shooter by a “cooperating defendant.”
    ……
    The group of extremists continued to communicate through Facebook and other apps, and even reached out to each other as law enforcement tried to catch up to them.
    ……..
    “ Doing good shit out there,” Carrillo allegedly wrote to Hunter.

    “You too king!” he replied.
    …….
    Meanwhile on Facebook, Hunter publicly boasted of committing violent acts, claiming he had “burned police stations with black panthers in Minneapolis.”

    “Want something to change? Start risking felonies for what is good,” he wrote.
    ……..

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  80. From the director of Nursing Home Nightmare:

    https://deadspin.com/athletes-calls-for-voting-reform-were-justified-do-bet-1845473622

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  81. Why is comment 83 in moderation? It is linked to a legitimate news story?

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  82. Probably the sarc lefty slant of the website..I was only interested in linking to one photo in the piece (a crowded multi-link queue of early voters at Madison Square Garden), but had no good way to do it.

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  83. 84 – Was shipwreckedcrdews name attached?

    mg (8cbc69)

  84. Regarding Hunter Biden’s “laptop”, a few days ago it was TIME, then it was Salon, and today it’s Politico.

    According to Parnas, a Zlochevsky associate named Vitaly Pruss told Giuliani during the May 30th meeting that the Burisma founder had the allegedly derogatory information and was willing to give it to Giuliani if he could help the oligarch curry favor with the Justice Department.

    It’s not clear how Zlochevsky would have gotten the Hunter Biden material he was allegedly trying to leverage, or whether the material is the same as what was first published by the Post. But Parnas says Pruss suggested Hunter Biden’s devices were compromised on a trip he took to Kazakhstan with Hunter Biden in 2014.

    Pruss had been close with Hunter and his business partner Devon Archer in the past, Parnas said, helping them get the Burisma board seats and accompanying Biden on business trips. And he also served as Giuliani’s go-between for business in Ukraine for more than a decade.

    Parnas further alleges that Pruss told Giuliani during the meeting that Zlochevsky was not the only one with the information — the Russian security services had it, too, he said.

    It appears that the information on his hard drive is accurate, although it remains to be seen whether it’s been “salted” with fake entries or photos.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  85. I will always wonder how different things might have been if somebody, anybody, just one time, had called Trump a “clown” during the 2016 Republican primary debates.

    But, even then, they were reluctant to offend Trump’s supporters, planning on picking them up after he was eliminated. The path to beating Trump closed when neither Cruz or Kasich would bow out. It might even have closed when Rubio stayed in the race to try a “Hail Mary” in Florida, and trashing Cruz to do so.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  86. they’ve yet to identify a single family that wants their child reunited with them in their country of origin.

    These seem to be cases where the parent is under detention, and appealing for asylum and DHS makes them an offer of agreeing to be deported (and excluded for 10 years from the United States) together with their children. There are no takers. Anyone who wanted to take advantage of that offer already has.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  87. But, even then, they were reluctant to offend Trump’s supporters, planning on picking them up after he was eliminated.

    You’re right.

    What I think hope will make this rodeo different is that in 2016 there were maybe five people who did not actively dislike Hillary — DCSCA and four others. This time around it’s the other way around. There are maybe five people who actively dislike Biden — DCSCA, Trump, and three others.

    nk (1d9030)

  88. No matter where one stands on immigration, this is just cruel and heartbreaking:

    Maybe so, but then some people are for cruelty and heartlessness, if that’s what it takes to enforce the law. But even they do not want to enforce the law in all cases.

    The question is not where someone stands on immigration, but where someone stands on enforcement, since the law is not likely to be made humane or satisfactory.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  89. Seems a fella who tells the world he wants to end/transition away from/phase out Big Oil “by 2025” no less, just may not have a good chance of winning Texas.

    Or Pennsylvania.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  90. @79.Tell me which candidate for President from 1945 to 2020 has won the office after telling the world he wants to phase out “Big Oil.”

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  91. #94. I am not aware of one. Can you find me a President in that period who botched a pandemic?

    Appalled (1a17de)

  92. @95.Well, Reagan wasn’t particularly on the ball w/AIDS. But campaigning against a virus is like running against thunderstorms and arguing over who was better at distributing umbrellas. Doom, doom, doom isn’t a winning strategy. Nor is vowing to phase out ‘Big Oil.’

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  93. So the fellas on the National Security Law Podcast made a good point: Texas accepts no late ballots and allows counting to start the day before the election.

    If they go for Biden — which is a real possibility — we might know that on Election Night. And that would probably make any path for Trump unattainable.

    Beto O’Rourke, of all people, made the same observation a couple weeks ago.

    Biden’s unfortunate choice of words on phasing out fossil fuels seems may hurt him in Texas, though.

    Dave (1bb933)

  94. A Very Strange Society

    My husband worked with several people who were Africans, by birth and citizenship. They often expressed confusion about what is happening here in the US. Those that had gained US citizenship were strong Trump supporters because they didn’t want this nation to turn into what they had left.

    While traveling this past week I passed several signs along the TX roadways stating “Moved here from a blue state? Come November remember why you left that state to move here” and one big billboard saying “Don’t California Texas”.

    Marci (405d43)

  95. If this is right … wow.

    Early voting in battleground states
    Ages 18-29

    Florida 2016: 44,107
    Florida 2020: 257,720

    North Carolina 2016: 25,150
    North Carolina 2020: 204,986

    Michigan 2016: 7,572
    Michigan 2020: 145,201

    Dave (1bb933)

  96. My husband worked with several people who were Africans, by birth and citizenship. They often expressed confusion about what is happening here in the US. Those that had gained US citizenship were strong Trump supporters because they didn’t want this nation to turn into what they had left.

    From what you describe, saying they are confused about what is happening here in the US seems like a vast understatement.

    Donald Trump is American equivalent of Idi Amin.

    Dave (1bb933)

  97. @91. Oh, nk; Joe Biden is the Ed Rooney to America’s Ferris Bueller.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  98. Biden’s unfortunate choice of words

    Aka a gaffe?????

    And what do they call it when a Swamp Creature makes one?

    The truth.

    He has lost Texas and Pennsylvania; certainly any votes not already banked by mail.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  99. @100. Perhaps I should have stated the link I provided explained exactly what they have stated.

    Idi Amin? Get a grip on reality.

    Marci (405d43)


  100. Nate Silver
    @NateSilver538

    Mail is the only way to vote in Colorado and every registered voter gets a ballot, so it’s not like these Republicans are sitting around waiting to vote in person. They’re just waiting longer to send in their ballots.
    _ _

    Matt Whitlock
    @mattdizwhitlock
    ·
    Nate you can vote in person in CO, you might consider deleting this.
    __ _

    furious_¡orale_despacito!_a
    @furious_a
    ·
    One can vote in person in Colorado.

    Reported for election disinformation.
    __ _

    Steve Staeger
    @SteveStaeger
    ·
    Since this is incorrect information about an election, I’ve reported it to Twitter. Hate doing this, but you’re getting ratioed with responses telling you how wrong this is and have yet to correct. The governor even tweeted at you.
    __ _

    Stephen L. Miller
    @redsteeze
    ·
    Nate Silver dropped a false bomb on twitter 7 hours ago and then just checked out.
    @NateSilver538

    __ _

    Big tech plays no favorites.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  101. Dave, those early voting tallies may not mean what you think they do. Motor voter was supposed to ease voting for “difficult-to-engage groups”, but it may of instead ushered in the Age of Newt in 1994.

    Marci may be pulling a trick in the vein of Theresa Heinz Kerry. The author of the article she linked to may be a white Afrikaaner as opposed to a black African, which admittedly would have more of a wow factor to those eager to show the inclusiveness of the Trump appeal.

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  102. “Don’t California Texas”

    “Don’t Uganda California” would’ve been wasted on Dave.

    beer ‘n pretzels (ae4602)

  103. “Donald Trump is American equivalent of Idi Amin.”
    __

    Never ignore them when they show you how they really think.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  104. Early voting in battleground states

    There is only early voting most places. There are counties in California where you have to drive 20 mile to cast an in-person vote. It is nearly impossible to get all those oldsters to man the polling places this year.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  105. Donald Trump is American equivalent of Idi Amin.

    So, how many people is Donald torturing in the WH basement?

    Donald Trump would be a new birth of freedom in most African countries.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  106. Never ignore them when they show you how they really think.

    You should do the same with a man who snuggles up to Vladimir Putin and breathlessly proclaims a love affair with Kim Jong Un.

    New Lincoln Project ad:

    Trump is English for Castro
    Versión en español

    Dave (1bb933)

  107. Donald Trump is American equivalent of Idi Amin.

    No, Ferris Bueller. You’re going very Ed Rooney, Dave.

    ‘Ohhhh yeah…’

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  108. Until this year, I have never voted absentee unless I was, well, absent. I am willing to bet that the polling place numbers will be WAY down. There will probably be more voters as you don’t even need a stamp, but the mean information-level of all voters will be down. Who will that help?

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  109. Trump is English for Castro

    They’ve lost the plot.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  110. So, how many people is Donald torturing in the WH basement?

    Do you doubt he would silence people critical of him if he had the ability?

    If so, on what do you base that charitable assumption?

    He has spoken glowingly of torture (not fake torture like waterboarding but real torture).

    He has expressed a desire to silence and incarcerate journalists and political opponents.

    Dave (1bb933)

  111. It is nearly impossible to get all those oldsters to man the polling places this year.

    Instead counties draft their employees to serve as poll workers.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  112. Trump is English for Berlusconi, perhaps. Maybe Yeltsin. BUt he doe3sn’t have people taken out and shot of dissing him. If he did no one would say that he was Castro or Idi Amin. At least not where they could be heard.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  113. Idi Amin? Get a grip on reality.

    Is it plausible Trump would eat human flesh? A flabby thigh, as Donald would tell you, is “not my type.” But a firm young breast? With two scoops of vanilla ice cream? You tell me.

    lurker (d8c5bc)

  114. It appears I have trouble typing and watching baseball.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  115. I have to say that that is one very stupid ad from the Lincoln Project, Mr. Dave. Castro is one of the great men of history, whereas Trump would have been one of the first to be put on a boat out of Muriel to wind up as a streetwalker in Joseph Wambaugh’s LA.

    nk (1d9030)

  116. Trump as the Fifth Avenue equivalent of Jefferey Dahmer would be giving him way too much credit. Jefferey Dahmer could operate a Skilsaw.

    nk (1d9030)

  117. Yeltsin?!

    Yeltsin was courageous and a man of principle. He resigned from the Politburo (first person ever to do so) because he wanted more rapid liberalization. He risked his life to give his country a chance at democracy and freedom when he stood on that tank in Moscow and faced down the communists. Of course, he was also flawed in any number of ways. But apart from being overweight, he bears no resemblance to Donald Trump.

    Dave (1bb933)

  118. Yeltsin was courageous and a man of principle.

    Liquid courage: a drunk.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  119. Rumor was, Russia was on its 3rd or 4th Yeltsin by the time he was finally eased out. Not unlike the Hillary 9/11/16 van switcheroo.

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  120. Another new Lincoln Project ad, targeting Republicans worried whether their party has a future

    And another one parallel to the ad about daughters a few days ago.

    Dave (1bb933)

  121. Rumor was, Russia was on its 3rd or 4th Yeltsin by the time he was finally eased out. Not unlike the Hillary 9/11/16 van switcheroo.

    Trump can’t even get the fake Melania to campaign with him…

    🙂

    Dave (1bb933)

  122. I have a feeling that it will be easier to compare future political leaders to Trump than comparing Trump to past political leaders.
    I can’t compare Trump to Castro because Castro was effective at his job, and ideological. Comparison fail.
    I can’t compare Trump to Mussolini because Mussolini was effective at his job.
    Maybe the best comparison is to Caligula: They both ruled for about four years, and this:

    There are few surviving sources about the reign of Caligula, though he is described as a noble and moderate emperor during the first six months of his rule. After this, the sources focus upon his cruelty, sadism, extravagance, and sexual perversion, presenting him as an insane tyrant. While the reliability of these sources is questionable, it is known that during his brief reign, Caligula worked to increase the unconstrained personal power of the emperor, as opposed to countervailing powers within the principate.

    It would’ve really worked if the pee episode was verified.

    Paul Montagu (e43b99)

  123. I speak fluent French, so allow me to offer some good news about the French people, if not their leadership. When the Charlie Hebdo massacre occurred, people all over the world were quick to adopt “Je suis Charlie” (I am Charlie) on social media. Well, after the murder of Samuel Paty, while we haven’t seen it here in the États-Unis, they’re all putting up “Je suis prof” (I am a teacher) signs. But they’re not only doing that. There have been massive pro-free speech demonstrations in several of the biggest cities in France. On C à vous, one of their leading morning shows (imagine if Today or GMA wasn’t candy-coated DNC propaganda), Richard Malka, the lawyer for Charlie Hebdo, got a solid 20 minutes to make the case for free speech just this past Wednesday.

    Here’s something else you don’t know. Malka is also the lawyer for a teen girl named Mila (last name withheld in the press), who went viral for denouncing Islam in a Facebook video back in January. “L’affaire Mila” resulted in over 30,000 online death threats and the kid being forced into homeschooling (which is viewed dimly over there). The gutless wonders of appeasement who pass for their leadership naturally hemmed and hawed about not insulting Islam. But “Je suis Mila” is a real phenomenon, too, and many of the people there who I’m proud to call friends protested that as well. That’s despite the fact they’d all vote Democrat over here.

    Eliot (a0ea2e)

  124. Bathos wears thin very fast. Ridicule is the more potent weapon.

    nk (1d9030)

  125. Here’s Who Biden Is Considering for Top Jobs in His Administration
    ……….
    Summarizing the list:

    State
    Susan Rice
    Tony Blinken
    Sen. Chris Coons
    Sen. Chris Murphy

    Treasury
    Lael Brainard
    Raphael Bostic

    Defense
    Michele Flournoy
    Sen. Tammy Duckworth
    Jeh Johnson
    Susan Rice

    Climate Advisor
    John Kerry
    Tom Steyer
    Gov. Jay Inslee

    Attorney General
    Sen. Doug Jones
    Sally Yates

    Chief of Staff
    Ron Klain
    Steve Ricchetti

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  126. Louis XVI as portrayed by Mel Brooks would be my choice, Paul.

    nk (1d9030)

  127. Trump is English for Castro

    Biden is French for toilet — w/a typo.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  128. The more I think about it, I see Trump never being prosecuted, or even investigated for his financial shenanigans. Neither federal nor NY. Might even be pardoned both places.

    Why? The Democrats do not want to remove the joy of Trump from Republican politics. Probably the only way that his fans could fall out with Trump would be for them to see that he WAS the swamp. Having a divided GOP unable to recover from this metastatic sleaze is something they want to enjoy for some time.

    Were Trump to win, I think the GOP would be over.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  129. Caligula did have bone spurs as a child, but nonetheless he marched along with his father Germanicus’s armies, with the help of a specially-made army boot, caliga, from which he derived his pet name from the soldiers, “Little Boot”.

    nk (1d9030)

  130. Maybe the best comparison is to Caligula

    Trump did not put his [homonym for] horse in the Senate.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  131. Louis XVI as portrayed by Mel Brooks would be my choice, Paul.

    His Governor LePetomaine is even closer.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  132. Castro is one of the great men of history

    Like Donald Fyodorovna, Castro betrayed his countrymen to glorify and exalt himself. Castro was admittedly more resistant to the manipulation of his Russian masters.

    There are not many successful dictators as indolent or incompetent as Trump – that has been our salvation these four years, at least until the pandemic when it started killing people by the thousands.

    Dave (1bb933)

  133. That’s another comparison, nk: Little Sailor Suit and Little Boots.

    Paul Montagu (e43b99)

  134. cruelty, sadism, extravagance, and sexual perversion, presenting him as an insane tyrant

    Except for the lack of cruelty, sadism, sexual perversion or being a tyrant, yeah, pretty close.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  135. I never did get around to that Mel Brooks movie, nk, but sounds good. I suppose any incompetent-buffoonish-malevolent kind of leader would do.

    Paul Montagu (e43b99)

  136. Castro’s tragedy was that he thought he could build a workers’ paradise with a people without a work ethic. Nonetheless, without him Cuba would not even appear on a high school geography quiz, and he, himself, will be in the history books when Trump will not even be a footnote.

    nk (1d9030)

  137. I can’t compare Trump to Mussolini because Mussolini was effective at his job.

    I’m not sure it’s accurate to say Mussolini was effective at his job, even in the period 1922 – 1934. He made many bad decisions in that period, they just didn’t become evident until later.

    He wasted enormous resources pacifying and trying to settle the economically worthless colony of Libya (oil was not discovered there until much later, after the war).

    From 1934 onward, Mussolini was an unmitigated disaster.

    Dave (1bb933)

  138. Were Trump to win, I think the GOP would be over.

    No. Just 56 years of it.

    Glorious.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  139. Whoa, nk, aren’t you confusing that island with the one 2 to its east or the curved land mass to its west?

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  140. 138.Castro is one of the great men of history

    It’s incontrovertible.

    The first to conquer living space: the Castro Convertible.

    Ask Sammy.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  141. SNL; skits strained.

    But worth a watch to hear Adele vamp.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  142. There is no safe answer to your question, urbanleftbehind, so of the three groups I’ll limit my comment to the one less likely to be my neighbors.

    nk (1d9030)

  143. Why is comment 83 in moderation? It is linked to a legitimate news story?

    The word “shit” activates the filter.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  144. I thought the mid-June parade people and mid-September parade people were equal # nowadays in that part of the NW side. Definitely more mid-June parade people in years past (for you kids, I’m not referring to Juneteenth or Gay Pride).

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  145. Re: 147 – Aidy Bryant hardest hit; no more excuses with newly svelte Adele in the same rooms.

    urbanleftbehind (dc6b77)

  146. Rip Murdock (305171) — 10/24/2020 @ 10:30 am

    The question I have, Rip, is whether the Trump Tower lease with Bank of China was above market. Best as I can tell, they were paying $95 per square foot per year in 2012, which seems high, but I can’t judge. Amazon was paying around $45 per square foot for downtown Seattle space.

    Paul Montagu (e43b99)

  147. Nice choking oops I mean playing by the Dodgers tonight.

    qdpsteve (8d496a)

  148. Well, that was discouraging.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  149. A perfectly played, hard-fought game ends in two errors.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  150. There are not many successful dictators as indolent or incompetent as Trump

    I think he imagines being more like the dictators he praises, and he wants “his people” to sit up and listen when he speaks in the way they listen to Kim Jong Un (as he said). But he doesn’t have the discipline or the cunning to make it happen.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  151. In a system where ruthless men could rise, Trump would never have tried. He would be one of the Yes Men.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  152. In a system where ruthless men could rise, Trump would never have tried. He would be one of the Yes Men.

    That would depend on whether he was born on top of the pyramid, like the real Trump.

    Rocket Man didn’t have to try much (although Trump said he greatly admires him for becoming dictator at a relatively young age).

    Dave (1bb933)

  153. Except for the lack of cruelty, sadism, sexual perversion or being a tyrant, yeah, pretty close.
    Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/24/2020 @ 9:00 pm

    Donald Trump is the shamelessly cruelest person I’ve seen in public life.

    The sadism is evident in the pleasure he takes in his cruelty.

    Sexual perversion? Well he bragged about all the fun he had peeping on partially clad contestants in his Miss USA pageants. And five former Miss Teen USA contestants say he likewise peeped on the underage girls in that pageant. And he’s more than onece creepily sexualized his own daughter. I don’t know if any/all of those qualify as perversion, but it seems to me they’re close enough for government work.

    And no, he’s not a tyrant, but that’s not for want of trying.

    lurker (d8c5bc)

  154. And no, he’s not a tyrant

    He just plays one on teevee.

    Dave (1bb933)

  155. The Lincoln Project defenestrates Cory Gardner with a single word.

    Dave (1bb933)

  156. Biden will be competitive in Texas. It’s going to be a tight race.

    Democrats are concerned that his comments on phasing out or transitioning away from fossil fuels will cost him states where the oil and gas industries are particularly important economically, like Texas, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and a few others. The campaign itself quickly backtracked the comment hours after the debate, trying to clarify that what Biden meant to say was that he intends to phase out federal subsidies to oil and gas industries, and the ban on fracking would only apply to federally owned lands, but that’s a distinction without a difference.

    I think he was just pandering to the New Green Deal crowd. No Congress, not even with overwhelming Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, is going to take on the oil and gas industries. There’s too much money at stake, and the lobbyists for oil and gas have enormous influence, more than any other lobbyists in the country. The Democrats will fold before them quicker than the Republicans.

    Besides, this idea of transitioning to solar and wind power, clean energy, electric cars, blah blah blah, is a fantasy of the left. It’s just not going to happen.

    Look, down here in the Rio Grande Valley, Central Power and Light tried to go solar a few years ago. And there are large wind turbines near the coast. You know what happened? A power blackout that lasted for days across the entire grid in multiple cities and counties.

    In the Rio Grande Valley, are you kidding me? On an average day, it’s 95 degrees in the shade, and there is no shade. Practically every day is bright and sunny. If you can’t get solar power to work down here, you can’t make it work anywhere.

    The problem with solar and wind power plants, as opposed to oil, gas or coal power plants, is that they cannot generate or store sufficient energy to maintain a power grid. People DO NOT like living in the dark. A couple of days, a week or longer, you can’t cook, you can’t eat, you can’t even go to work because the stores, businesses and banks are as blacked out as your home. And electric cars, give me a break. You couldn’t charge them in a power outage.

    There is no substitute for oil and gas or coal powered plants. Sorry, but there is not. The energy grid may be supplemented by solar and wind plants, but never fully fueled by them. It’s simply not possible.

    By the way, I hate the term fossil fuels, because these fuels did not come from fossils. There weren’t enough fossils! It is extremely rare for any organism to become fossilized; that would require a unique set of circumstances. The reason why is because Nature is like a recycling factory.

    An animal dies. It happens in Nature, because all things live and die. But you know what you will hardly ever come across while hiking or exploring? A dead animal carcass. Scavengers set in, then insects, flies, beetles, ants, their larvae; there are even those that consume bone. In a matter of days or weeks, there’s nothing left to fossilize! The fossil record is historically incomplete, by like several million species.

    Besides, oil is an abiotic. Meaning that many single-celled organisms ingest and digest carbohydrates, then egest oil. So it is a renewable energy source. The same is true of natural gas and coal, except in the geological sense. Humans just found a way to exploit it as an energy source.

    Pollution is a problem of course, and that is the point I think Biden was trying to make, but he spoke ineffectually. The largest pollutant on the planet is plastics. Because plastic does not break down and reenter the environment; it remains trash forever.

    So these New Green Deal advocates should start looking less at oil and gas, and more at plastics.

    Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1)

  157. Whats it like being the cabin boy for the bill kristol cruise a thon, Dave?

    mg (8cbc69)

  158. That is a hilarious channeling of Trump, Gawain’s Ghost.

    nk (1d9030)

  159. the cruise was canceled due to covid mr mg

    thanks obama

    Dave (1bb933)

  160. I know people think Texas is turning blue because of the influx of blue state voters. Maybe that is true in Austin, but that has been happening in the rest of the State for years and we still vote for Republicans. In Texas, we care about character and morality and that will hurt Trump.

    DRJ (aede82)

  161. I know people think Texas is turning blue because of the influx of blue state voters. Maybe that is true in Austin, but that has been happening in the rest of the State for years and we still vote for Republicans. In Texas, we care about character and morality and that will hurt Trump.

    I’ve heard that before, most recently in the Cruz v Beto election.

    Hoi Polloi (92d467)

  162. 79.If I look at the campaign Biden is running in his commercials — really the only things that many people see — he’s running a centrist campaign and his only mandate is to govern from the center.

    Running spots saying ‘Big Oil’ “knew” and he’s gonna make them ‘pay’ isn’t centrist at all.

    Nor is a fella who ran interference for Delaware’s DuPont for decades crowing about ‘Big Oil’ being a polluter when DuPont has a history of being a leading polluter is just laughable.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  163. There is no substitute for oil and gas or coal powered plants.

    There is. It’s called nuclear power.

    Hoi Polloi (92d467)

  164. Democrats Hope 2020 Is the Year They Flip the Texas House

    BEDFORD, Texas — Deep in the suburbs northeast of Fort Worth, Democrats trying to win the Texas House for the first time in years have been getting help from a surprising source.

    Republicans.

    For 16 years, until he left office in 2013, Todd A. Smith was a Republican representing these suburbs in the Texas House of Representatives. His district covered a fast-growing hub of middle-class and affluent communities next door to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.

    When it came time to decide whom he would support for his old seat, Mr. Smith said he had no hesitation — he threw his endorsement to the Democrat in the race, Jeff Whitfield.

    “This is no longer my Republican Party,” Mr. Smith said last week while sitting outside his house, which has a “Republicans For Biden 2020” sign on the front lawn.

    “This is the Trump party,” he said. “If you give me a reasonable Republican and a crazy Democrat, then I will still vote for the Republican. But if you give me a lunatic Republican and a reasonable Democrat, then I’m going to vote for the Democrat, and that applies in the presidential race, and it applies in the Whitfield race.”

    Dave (1bb933)

  165. i don even no wy folx ‘d wanna go on won of them thair caruzes, mr. dave

    i heerd tel theis nuthin butta buntcha elits thet kin reed and rite

    sum ovum both

    nk (1d9030)

  166. In Texas, we care about character and morality and that will hurt Trump

    LOL But you ‘care’ about “Big Oil” more and that will hurt Biden.

    The name of that fella with “character and morality” was J.R. Ewing– and his ‘show’ that ran14 seasons was “Dallas”… not “Wilmington.”

    Or is it “Scranton” today. 😉

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  167. Texas. Red. Hmmmmm.

    Lloyd Bentsen Jr. was an American politician who was a four-term United States Senator (1971–1993) from Texas and the Democratic Party nominee for vice president in 1988 on the Michael Dukakis ticket. He also served as the 69th United States Secretary of the Treasury under President Bill Clinton. -source, wikipurple

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  168. DCSCA,

    Why is “LOL” a response to caring about character and morality?

    I bet your show Dallas has as much to do with Texas today as Lord of the Rings has to do with jewelers in New Zealand.

    No one I know remembers it. I’ve lived here all my life and it has never come up, even older folks I know do not remember it. Maybe in California it is useful to define Texas as a place where this JR guy is a relevant discussion of our values, but don’t they always get it wrong?

    Why did Clayton Williams lose? What did Ted Cruz beat Dewhurst? why did Cruz have a hard time being re-elected? I think there’s real skepticism of leaders that prove they can’t be trusted.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  169. 1993 was thirty years ago.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  170. The sad thing, Mr. Hoi Polloi, is that there are more people who will not recognize Gawain’s Ghost’s comment as satire than there are who do. Who don’t know that fossil fuel are long-dead animals and vegetation, or that all the plastics, and most synthetics including the clothes we wear, come from coal and petroleum. Petroleum didn’t just produce the gasoline for our car. It also produced the insulation for the wiring and most of the interior down to the shift knob and seat belts. Seriously, I knew a lady with a PhD in some “Communication” major who did not know any of these things.

    nk (1d9030)

  171. @174. Morality is a transient, Dustin. Ask the Pope.

    … and Galileo smiled.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  172. DRJ, is Texas one of the states in which out-of-state college students are considered residents for purposes of voting even though they are not residents for any other purpose (and especially tuition)?

    nk (1d9030)

  173. @175. So?

    Purple is purple.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  174. We’re reliving Deezy-eska’s childhood with him, whether we want to or not Dustin.

    Dave (1bb933)

  175. WaPo: Insisting that the Hunter Biden laptop is fake is a trap. So is insisting that it’s real

    The lesson of 2016 is to be even more careful with potential disinformation in 2020

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/
    __ _

    Thomas Rid
    @RidT

    JUST OUT: How should we deal with the Biden leaks?
    __ _

    Patti Myers
    @Hey_its_Patti

    The media went through Kavanaugh’s high school yearbooks but can’t be bothered with Hunter’s laptop.
    __ _

    Frankie 2 times
    @frankie2timzes
    ·
    Sure. If these stories impacted DJT negatively these stories would be tattooed on every “journalists” a** in 30 seconds as “We got him” headlines.
    __ _

    defunctus
    @defunctus
    ·
    Media did more research on the woman nodding behind Trump in the townhall.
    __ _

    Dave ATX
    @daveatx512
    ·
    The media also had NO problem posting smears against Trump with anonymous sources and NO supporting documents about his taxes, and the Atlantic had no problem publishing smears about Trump’s comments about vets, again, with anonymous sources and no supporting documentation.

    __ _

    There is no double standard.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  176. @174. No one I know remembers it.

    Broaden your circle. It’s not the show, Dustin; it’s the character of it.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  177. @180. LOL Making America Great. Again, Davey.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  178. Popes who are transitory. Ask any cemetery.

    nk (1d9030)

  179. its not safe to visit nursing homes these days mr eska

    Dave (1bb933)

  180. “This Trump guy’s like JR! I think I’ll vote for him because you know, that means Donald is basically a real Texan!”

    You could check every nursing home in America and you will not hear anything like that.

    Texans might vote against Biden, and his energy comments were dumb and bad politics. And I get tired of how often Biden claims Scranton (albeit that’s a swing state he is trying to get).

    But ancient traditions of those who came before, such as the soap opera Dallas, do not come to mind when I think about my state.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  181. Hoist with his own petard:

    Surging coronavirus endangers Trump plan to counter Biden edge with Election Day vote

    A surge in coronavirus cases in counties critical to President Donald Trump’s victory may disrupt his plans to drive up in-person voting on Nov. 3, potentially reducing Republican turnout in areas the president can least afford it.

    In Kenosha, a Wisconsin county that voted for Barack Obama in 2012 and Trump in 2016, the positivity rate for COVID-19 test results has reached 27%. In relatively populous Westmoreland County in Western Pennsylvania where Trump won by more than 50,000 votes four years ago, the positivity rate for coronavirus cases has nearly tripled in two weeks, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

    And Calhoun County, Michigan, which gave Trump a double-digit margin of victory in 2016 after narrowly voting for Obama in 2012, has recently seen the fastest spread of the virus of any county in the state’s lower peninsula.

    Epidemiologists and political experts alike believe numbers like these point to an increasingly dire Election Day picture, in which spiking cases and diminishing hospital capacity in counties where Trump must run up the score could scare voters away from the polls.

    Dave (1bb933)

  182. We’re reliving Deezy-eska’s childhood with him, whether we want to or not Dustin.

    Dave (1bb933) — 10/25/2020 @ 8:17 am

    I don’t even mind. It’s interesting and he goes back to NASA and Dallas and the Pentagon Papers. I’m sure to him this represents a decade or two where America did some interesting stuff.

    But are these lessons really showing anything that helps explain why someone would vote for Trump? I guess to the extent he’s anti-war (is he really though)?

    Dustin (4237e0)

  183. @186. Reaganoptics, Dustin: sooner or later it’ll sink in that in today’s era, Americans don’t want to be governed; they wish to be entertained.

    End ‘Big oil’ is a show stopper, no to mention a job and economy killer– and “No miracle is coming” is doom and gloom.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  184. his energy comments were dumb and bad politics.

    47 YEARS IN THE MAKING.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  185. To paraphrase Trump’s Chief of Staff: “We have completely failed.”
    Meadows might as well suggest that voters pick the other guy.

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  186. The second of the cocks crowing for the senior senator from South Carolina:

    The Senate is very tough. There are a couple senators I can’t really get involved in. I just can’t do it. You lose your soul if you do. I can’t help some of them. I don’t want to help some of them.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-senate-republicans-election/2020/10/24/f93f5ed0-15f4-11eb-ba42-ec6a580836ed_story.html

    urbanleftbehind (a908a6)

  187. A new Biden national unity ad aired during the World Series last night, this one narrated by Brad Pitt.

    Dave (1bb933)

  188. That’s Missouri’s podt-Gephardt secret sauce…send its potential sensible moderate Dems to Hollywood.

    urbanleftbehind (a908a6)

  189. Americans Should Brace for 100,000 New COVID Cases a Day, Experts Say
    “You should be prepared for how bad it’s going to get.”

    The words of Dr. William Haseltine, an internationally renowned infectious disease expert, summarized the resounding—and sobering—takeaway from several public health experts and epidemiologists who spoke to The Daily Beast on Saturday, hours after the U.S. smashed its previous record of new daily COVID-19 cases. The country hit 83,757 reported infections in one day on Friday, while hospitalizations skyrocketed across the nation by 40 percent.
    …….
    ……..”We’re looking at easily an excess of 100,000 infections a day and overwhelmed hospitals all over the country.”
    ………
    …….. While many states saw clusters originating in meatpacking plants, prisons, and retirement facilities earlier in the year, they’re now being traced more often back to private family gatherings, religious services, bars, athletic events, colleges, high schools, and more.
    ………
    Dr. Jennifer Horney, founding director and professor in the University of Delaware’s epidemiology program, noted that Haseltine’s prediction was consistent with the latest published results from the forecasting team at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington in Seattle. Its report on Friday in Nature estimated a cumulative total of 511,373 deaths across the United States by February 28, 2021.

    ……..[H]ospitalization and fatality rates are also increasing—robust indications of trends—and that positivity rates in several states are too high to be accurately reflecting a full picture of the number of infections.

    “Hospitalizations don’t yet reflect what happened this week,” Haseltine said.

    Even still, hospitals all over the country—from Amarillo, Texas to Salt Lake City, Utah, and Kansas City, Missouri and Milwaukee, Wisconsin—reported this week that they were overwhelmed and approaching capacity.
    ……..
    In June, Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the number of confirmed cases likely represented only 10 percent of true infections. That means on the days that the country saw 60,000 new cases, there were actually closer to 600,000. While Delaware’s Dr. Horney noted that such case representation has likely improved with access to testing, it hasn’t improved enough not to be reflecting a true rise in cases across the nation.
    ………
    The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation’s projection published on Friday in Nature also found “that achieving universal mask use—95 percent mask use in public—could be sufficient to ameliorate the worst effects of epidemic resurgences in many states” and that such compliance “could save an additional 129,574 lives” through the end of February 2021. Even 85 percent mask compliance, said the forecast, could save an additional 95,814 lives.
    ………
    Without a federal strategy, said infectious disease experts, pandemic-weary Americans have been left to make their own decisions in the public interest, to decipher mixed messages from departments and politicians, to understand that eating indoors at restaurants may be technically allowed, but not responsible. There will always be people who trust a corporation’s analysis that its product is safe—or who believe their individual liberty is more important than the public good.

    “We are always emotional and sometimes rational, it’s just human nature,” said Haseltine. “Belief trumps facts every time.”
    ………

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  190. That is a good ad. Just shmaltzy enough. And Mrs. Dr. Biden cuts a fine figure, too.

    nk (1d9030)

  191. Jobs will be created by hiring thousands of people in the abortion industry from aborting babies to harvesting the parts. Just like China.
    Harris/Biden/2020

    mg (8cbc69)

  192. “I don’t want to help some of them.”

    Party loyalty for me, but not for thee!

    Apparently President Trump is perfectly willing to see Democrats elected if their Republican opponents don’t measure up to his standards.

    I guess he and I agree after all.

    Dave (1bb933)

  193. Proposed: Good people will not have abortions except for the most compelling reasons, and it is better if bad people do not to propagate their kind.

    Debate?

    nk (1d9030)

  194. do not to propagate

    nk (1d9030)

  195. Three generations of Trumps present a compelling irrefutable argument for the second half of your proposition, Herr Doktor-Professor.

    Dave (1bb933)

  196. Seriously, I knew a lady with a PhD in some “Communication” major who did not know any of these things.

    Not long ago I heard a prominent person speak of how we should be moving toward a “carbon-free world.” (Count me out.)

    And how many times have you seen a product advertised as having “no chemicals”?

    Radegunda (20775b)

  197. Party loyalty for me, but not for thee!

    That’s been one of the defining themes of Trumpism. He basically ran against the Republican Party, which his fans sneeringly called the “GOPe,” and they said it needed to be blown up.
    They called every Trump-critical Republican a RINO — not a real Republican, or even a “real American.”
    Once Trump got the nomination, the Trumpists began demanding party unity, defined by unconditional loyalty to Trump. On Trumpy comment boards I’ve seen people saying that because Trump is “the head of the GOP” his word must be accepted and heeded above all others.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  198. Good point, Radegunda. Trump calling for party loyalty is a confession he thinks we’re suckers.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  199. Gawain’s Ghost (b25cd1) — 10/25/2020 @ 3:23 am

    I think he was just pandering to the New Green Deal crowd.

    Well, he;s trying to finesse this.

    His positon actually is pretty clear. Set a course that will (in theory at least) lead to the elimination of the use of coal, oil and natural gas by the year 2050.

    No Congress, not even with overwhelming Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, is going to take on the oil and gas industries.

    They’ll try to have it both ways. This is more serious than most people think.

    California is ow outlawing the sale of gasoline powered automobiles past the year 2035. (they;ll have to be imported from other states)

    https://www.gov.ca.gov/2020/09/23/governor-newsom-announces-california-will-phase-out-gasoline-powered-cars-drastically-reduce-demand-for-fossil-fuel-in-californias-fight-against-climate-change/

    Following the order, the California Air Resources Board will develop regulations to mandate that 100 percent of in-state sales of new passenger cars and trucks are zero-emission by 2035 – a target which would achieve more than a 35 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions and an 80 percent improvement in oxides of nitrogen emissions from cars statewide.

    They;ll just pretend that, pursuant to the Kantian Categorical Imperative everybody else is doing the same thing AND this is a first step, and more will follow as we gain support.

    They proclaim: “Climate emergency!” Of course that doesn’t make any of the proposed remedies any more effective than it otherwise would be. The world cut down on carbon emissions by about 15% in one year: 2020. The only thing that they are saying is that the climate is worse than ever this year.

    That’s maybe actually because it is counterproductive – less soot from less coal. Also, I think, more dihydrogen monoxide is released into the atmosphere every year, and it’s the dihydrogen monoxide that is changing the weather. It makes it more variable.

    Combined with a very slight heating effect, which is the accumulated result of everything that’s happened in the past 150 years or so, especially the last 50, this results in more record highs.

    More important we have records both ways in precipitation.

    None of the remedies by the greens work, even according to their own projections.

    That doesn’t stop them. “All life on earth will be in danger in 12 , 11 ten years!” And they’ll get 67 scientists to sin on to that.

    There’s too much money at stake, and the lobbyists for oil and gas have enormous influence, more than any other lobbyists in the country. The Democrats will fold before them quicker than the Republicans.

    Perhaps some Democrats will break ranks (while still going enough in that direction, like enacting a giant program to retrofit buildings to make them more airtight so that various forms of indoor air pollution, radon and viruses can linger, for the Republicans to win back control of the House of Representatives in 2022.)

    Besides, this idea of transitioning to solar

    Wait, they haven;t yet discovered that solar power contributes to global warming

    and wind power, clean energy, electric cars, blah blah blah, is a fantasy of the left. It’s just not going to happen.

    Well, actually, I’m not worried much about this. If on;y this was the only thing to worry about in the event of massive a blue wave.

    it’s 95 degrees in the shade, and there is no shade. Practically every day is bright and sunny. If you can’t get solar power to work down here, you can’t make it work anywhere.

    Solar power is still not consistent. It needs to go with batteries (that don;t explode) or storing power in some other way, like pumping water to higher levels.

    There is no substitute for oil and gas or coal powered plants. Sorry, but there is not.

    They talk about carbon neutral fuels, like wood and jojoba. Of course there are catches to that, too.

    By the way, I hate the term fossil fuels, because these fuels did not come from fossils. There weren’t enough fossils! It is extremely rare for any organism to become fossilized; that would require a unique set of circumstances. The reason why is because Nature is like a recycling factory.

    There;s probably whole lot more carbon buried in the earth than anyone thinks.

    Besides, oil is an abiotic. Meaning that many single-celled organisms ingest and digest carbohydrates, then egest oil. So it is a renewable energy source.

    They want a shorter timeframe.

    Pollution is a problem of course, and that is the point I think Biden was trying to make,

    No, Biden got confused. back when he got started in politics, that was what was supposed to be wrong with oil.

    Someone could have asked him a question: “Do you consider carbon dioxide” to be a pollutant?”

    Because that’s the basis for all of this.

    While burning carbon based fuels does raise the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere locally by about 50 ppm, that;s never seriously been considered a pollutant.

    Instead, they are talking about no longer making a practically infinitesimal contribution to polluting the entire world!

    I think they should concentrate on getting the entire word to observe human rights first.

    but he spoke ineffectually. The largest pollutant on the planet is plastics. Because plastic does not break down and reenter the environment; it remains trash forever.

    It;s not getting into the oceans from the United States! But this is again more of the Kantian categorical imperative.

    So these New Green Deal advocates should start looking less at oil and gas, and more at plastics.

    No, they should stop!

    We need plastic bags!

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  200. What do you call it when a person is the head of the organization but at the same time above the organization and not subject to its will?

    nk (1d9030)

  201. We need plastic bags!

    We need nylon stockings!

    Crude oil is the basis of all the synthetic fibers and thousands of other things too.

    nk (1d9030)

  202. Aspirin is made from the “industrial waste” coal tar! For crying out loud!

    nk (1d9030)

  203. BTW, nylon was invented by DuPont, the chemical company that *somebody* mentioned earlier.

    nk (1d9030)

  204. Donald Trump is the shamelessly cruelest person I’ve seen in public life.

    You confuse a lack of manners and general boorishness with cruelty and sadism and in doing so lessen the meaning of those latter two words. Whether he wants to be a tyrant does not mean he IS a tyrant. Lots of people want to be a tyrant, including most of the 535 people on the Hill. Our system makes that quite difficult because most of the people who wrote the Constitution new the dangers people like themselves could pose.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  205. *knew

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  206. That would depend on whether he was born on top of the pyramid, like the real Trump.

    Like most bullies, Trump is a coward. He’d be one of the beta-bullies to a real alpha-bully like Putin, Xi or the late and unlamented Huey Long. Those people don’t need wealth to get on top.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  207. 128. Paul Montagu (e43b99) — 10/24/2020 @ 8:40 pm

    I have a feeling that it will be easier to compare future political leaders to Trump than comparing Trump to past political leaders.

    I think Mitch McConnell compared him, and treats him like, Ross Perot.

    Which is unfair to Ross Perot.

    I can;t find the quote I am looking for. I found this:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/09/us/politics/trump-republicans-third-parties.html

    “The truth is that he is a political independent, and he obviously won the nomination and the presidency by disrupting a lot of norms that Republicans had assumed about their own party and their own voters,” said Ben Domenech, publisher of The Federalist, a conservative website….As for Republicans, Mr. Domenech said they should not think of Mr. Trump as their party leader. “They need to approach him the way they would have approached a Ross Perot presidency,” he said. “They’re dealing with a guy who technically has an R next to his name, but only technically. We have to convince him that our way is better, not just assume he’ll think so.”

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  208. Biden will be competitive in Texas. It’s going to be a tight race.

    According to REal Clear Politics’ poll aggregator, Biden has 232 electoral votes at more than +6%. He needs 38 more from the battleground states (-5.9 to + 5.9) to win. Texas has 38 electoral votes. For Trump to win he has to somehow get all but 37 of the 181 in-play EVs.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  209. 207. Founder and/or controlling stockholder.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  210. Look what I found:

    From the year 1999:

    https://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/ross-perot-cold-opening/n11240

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  211. I know people think Texas is turning blue because of the influx of blue state voters. Maybe that is true in Austin, but that has been happening in the rest of the State for years and we still vote for Republicans. In Texas, we care about character and morality and that will hurt Trump.

    Even though some people getting out of CA are just as liberal as what they left, many leave because they cannot stand it any more, not just because they want to realize their equity. Those people are probably MORE likely to vote GOP than many of their old-time neighbors, because the horror is fresh.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  212. Glenn Greenwald
    @ggreenwald

    One of the clearest and most important sentences you’ll read, showing how US media really works, from WashPost op-ed by
    @RidT
    :
    “We must treat the Hunter Biden leaks as if they were a foreign intelligence operation — even if they probably aren’t.”

    __ _

    This is where we are.
    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  213. @210. “BTW…”

    Du Pont is the single largest corporate polluter in the United States. In 1989, the latest year for which data are available from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Du Pont and its subsidiaries reported discharging more than 348 million pounds of pollutants to land, air and water. – source, multinationmonitor.org

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  214. @192. LOL Personal attacks simply reveal you mean you have no argument, Davey.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  215. @194. As Brad Pitt goes so goes the nation, eh Davey?

    Jolie good show, wot?!

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  216. Biden has no public events schedule for today.

    … and Putin smiled.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  217. nk @200-

    I’ll bite. Overturning Roe v. Wade should not return the abortion issue to the states. If abortion is a moral evil, it’s just as evil for states to allow it as the federal government. Doctors who perform abortions should be prosecuted as well as the women who seek abortions.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  218. Personal attacks simply reveal you mean you have no argument

    LOL.

    What does copy-pasting some fatuous banality and convincing yourself it’s even more clever and profound than the last thousand times you posted the same thing verbatim reveal about you, Deezy-eska?

    Dave (1bb933)

  219. @186. Reaganoptics, Dustin: sooner or later it’ll sink in that in today’s era, Americans don’t want to be governed; they wish to be entertained.

    In a couple of weeks it’ll sink in that Americans have grown tired of what you find so entertaining.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  220. … and Putin smiled.

    I don’t think he’ll be smiling on November 4.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  221. @225. Poor Davey.

    President Trump has the energy to do 3 to 4 event rallies a day.

    Biden has no events scheduled; but does plan a closing pitch next week at Warm Springs, GA., where Franklin D. Roosevelt frigging DIED.

    Doom, doom, doom!!!

    ‘No miracle is coming.’ – Joe Biden

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  222. Rip Murdock (305171) — 10/25/2020 @ 11:54 am

    . Overturning Roe v. Wade should not return the abortion issue to the states. If abortion is a moral evil, it’s just as evil for states to allow it as the federal government. Doctors who perform abortions should be prosecuted as well as the women who seek abortions.

    Outkawing abortion is what the West German Suoreme Court did in the 1970s.

    https://www.nytimes.com/1975/02/26/archives/top-german-court-rejects-abortion-bonns-1974-law-allowing.html

    ONN, Feb. 25—The West German Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, in a highly controversial decision, today struck down as unconstitutional a law allowing abortions on request during the first three months of pregnancy.

    The court’s 6 to 2 decision said the measure legalizing abortions, which was approved by the West German Parliament last June but never became effective, violated the Constitution’s guarantee of the right to life for everyone.

    The court, whose authority is similar to that of the United States Supreme Court, did however rule that abortions could be performed in the first three months of pregnancy in cases of rape, of danger to the mother’s health, when there was a prospect that the child might be born deformed and when the birth could cause “grave hardship.”

    The court president, Ernst Benda, read the decision at the tense, heavily guarded Karlsruhe court building as about 1,000 pro‐abortion demonstrators staged a protest march in the city center.

    And what the top court in Poland just did:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/22/world/europe/poland-tribunal-abortions.html

    Poland Court Ruling Effectively Bans Legal Abortions

    The decision, which cannot be appealed, halts pregnancy terminations for fetal abnormalities, virtually the only type currently performed in the country.

    ….

    Oct. 22, 2020

    A constitutional tribunal in Poland ruled on Thursday that abortions for fetal abnormalities violate the country’s Constitution, effectively imposing a near-total ban in a nation that already had some of the strictest abortion laws in Europe. …

    ….In the ruling, the tribunal’s president, Julia Przylebska, said that allowing abortions in cases of fetal abnormality legalized “eugenic practices with regard to an unborn child, thus denying it the respect and protection of human dignity.”

    Because the Polish Constitution guarantees a right to life, she added, terminating a pregnancy based on the health of the fetus amounted to “a directly forbidden form of discrimination.”
    Before the decision, which cannot be appealed, Poland permitted terminations only for fetal abnormalities, a threat to a woman’s health or in the case of incest or rape.

    But in practice, the overwhelming majority of legal abortions — 1,074 of 1,100 performed last year — resulted from fetal abnormalities.

    bortion rights advocates say those numbers reflect the restrictions already in effect, which make it all but impossible for Polish women to obtain a legal abortion, prompting them to seek illegal abortions or go abroad.

    “In practice it takes weeks, sometimes months,” to obtain a legal abortion, said Karolina Wieckiewicz, a lawyer and activist with the group Abortion Without Borders. “Some people decide to risk the battle in Poland; others look for alternatives.”

    But in the United States, a court is unlikely to declare abortion impermissible.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  223. President Trump has the energy to do 3 to 4 event rallies a day.

    Rallies are the essence of the job, in his mind.

    He doesn’t go to COVID task-force meetings anymore. He is disinclined to study anything, and unable to absorb much information anyway.
    He spends large chunks of time watching FOX to see what they say about him, and rage-tweeting about anyone who doesn’t flatter him.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  224. @226. Then you have nothing to worry about. OTOH, 63 million Americans voted for Trump; they haven’t just disappeared. It isn’t just ‘me’– neither of us like that aspect of this era. It took several decades to cultivate and won’t end over night. But everybody likes a good show. Reagan gave one; Trump is just better at it. Biden, not so much. Doom and gloom isn’t a winning strategy; nor is vowing end ‘Big Oil.’

    @227. He’s been smiling for a dozen years, winning pots w/ pair of deuces. Most recently in Helsinki… and Crimea. 😉

    Either way, for my POV, it’s a win/win. Prediction stands: Trump squeaks out a win w/3% or so; or it’s a President Harris in 24 months. Biden turns 78 years old in 26 days.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  225. ‘No miracle is coming.’ – Joe Biden

    Mattel’s famous “Chatty Cathy” talking doll (1965) could say *eleven* different phases when you pulled her string.

    If we all pitch in, maybe we could get Deezy-eska an upgrade?

    Dave (1bb933)

  226. If I can’t comment on Patterico’s latest over there, I’ll do it here. Mr. Goen put forth two tests as to whether the candidate is a Christ follower…

    The first test is a question: who do you say Jesus Christ is? But the second test is an observation: does this person show a self-sacrificing love for others (1 John 4:7-8)? John says that if you don’t have love, you don’t have God because God is love.

    Trump does not pass the first test. He said he’s a “non-denominational Christian”, but he has never said or written who Christ is, that Christ is his Personal Lord and Savior. There’s no need for the second test. Trump is a poser when it comes to our Christian faith.
    By way of Mr. French, John Piper also has a good piece on the subject.

    Actually, this is a long-overdue article attempting to explain why I remain baffled that so many Christians consider the sins of unrepentant sexual immorality (porneia), unrepentant boastfulness (alazoneia), unrepentant vulgarity (aischrologia), unrepentant factiousness (dichostasiai), and the like, to be only toxic for our nation, while policies that endorse baby-killing, sex-switching, freedom-limiting, and socialistic overreach are viewed as deadly.

    The reason I put those Greek words in parentheses is to give a graphic reminder that these are sins mentioned in the New Testament. To be more specific, they are sins that destroy people. They are not just deadly. They are deadly forever. They lead to eternal destruction (2 Thessalonians 1:9).

    They destroy persons (Acts 12:20–23). And through persons, they destroy nations (Jeremiah 48:29–31, 42).

    And French finishes with this…

    Trump cannot end abortion. Even if SCOTUS overturns Roe, it will not overturn abortion. That will require a culture that emphasizes love, selfless sacrifice, and mutual support. If a “pro-life” president uses his immense power to flaunt “boastfulness, vulgarity, immorality, and factiousness” even as he purports to modestly change policy, he is ultimately destructive to the culture Christians seek to create.

    Piper puts it more bluntly: “It is naive to think that a man can be effectively pro-life and manifest consistently the character traits that lead to death—temporal and eternal.”

    Paul Montagu (77c694)

  227. @232. Only if she also says,

    “‘C’mon, man!”
    “Here’s the deal!”
    “Malarkey!”

    And, of course, “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black!”

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  228. @230. So? Reagan was known to nod off.

    And ate jelly beans.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  229. 66. Patterico:

    Biden leads Trump in Texas by one point in the latest poll.

    For the last 3 Saturdays, the ANew York Times has [rinted polling avea=rages for certain key states; what the results would be in the polls were as wrong now as they were in 2016, and what they would be if they were as wrong as they were in 2012.

    Texas is +2 Trump and would be +4 if they were as wrong as they were in 2016.

    Ohio is also plus Trump.

    The rest go to Biden.

    If they were as wrong as they were in 2016, Trump would carry North Carolina, and Wisconsin by 1% and and Florida by an extremely small margin, and Biden would carry Michigan, and carry Pennsylvania by an extremely small margin. He is also slated to win Arizona.

    But really, Trump is campaigning like he will lose Pennsylvania, and Biden is worried

    Trump is almost like Andrew Stein running for mayor in the 1993 election – he’s making rookie mistakes. Everything has gone into the hands of campaign consultants. He’s making mistakes like a losing campaign does – spending so much money on unnecessary ads, expecting money to come in. And he’s not replenishing money with his own.

    If Trump loses Michigan and Pennsylvania, he cannot lose any more states; if he loses Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona, but carries Pennsylvania and everything else remains the same as it was in 2016, (i.e. he carries North Carolina, Florida, Iowa and Maine and doesn’t carry Minnesota) it’s a 269-259 tie, not factoring in faithless electors, one of whom might give us a third choice.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)


  230. Fix the Court
    @FixTheCourt
    ·
    30 Constitutional Law Scholars Endorse Proposal to End Life Tenure at #SCOTUS in Favor of 18-Year Term

    https://fixthecourt.com/2020/10/thirty-legal-scholars-endorse-house-dems-scotus-term-limits-bill/… Police cars revolving light
    __ _

    Alex Thompson
    @AlxThomp

    Ted Kaufman signed this. Biden’s longtime chief of staff who is leading the transition team.
    __ _

    Stephen L. Miller
    @redsteeze
    ·
    If only there were a way to know where the candidate himself stood.
    __ _

    on zoom or just happy to see me?
    @thethirtysixco
    ·
    The candidate himself stands carefully guarded in a dark basement, w no access to a video feed or phone, apparently.

    __

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  231. CNN
    @CNN

    A right-wing offensive is underway to discredit social media companies just days before the election.
    __ _

    Logan Hall
    @loganclarkhall

    the new york post still can’t access their twitter account.
    _ _

    John.D.Stone
    @John_D_Stone
    ·
    No worries – they will regain access Nov 4
    _ _

    Andrew Kerr
    @AndrewKerrNC
    ·
    There you go discrediting twitter again
    _ _

    mountain energy
    @mountainenergy1
    ·
    It’s a message to other newspapers
    __ _

    Saff
    @Saff92225295
    ·
    Accuse your enemies that of which you are guilty yourself. Where did we see this being used before.

    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  232. If/when Trump is re-elected, conservative ideologues can expect The Donald to try to fill at least one or two more seats w/righty picks giving ’em a SCOTUS for the next 40 years. Losing the Senate may make that harder, but he’ll pick from that published of his.

    That’s a helluva consolation prize.

    Certainly beats Biden court-packin’.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  233. ^published list

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  234. Totals per the New York Times:

    If each candidate carries states (or districts) where he is leading in the polls by 3 points or more:

    Biden: 326 Electoral votes, Trump 125 Electoral votes (with 87 remaining)

    If the results are exactly what the polls show:

    Biden: 357 Electoral votes, Trump 181 Electoral votes

    If the polls are as wrong in each state as they were in 2016:

    Biden: 280 Electoral votes, Trump 258 Electoral votes.

    That is an average of all polls within 3 weeks of election day.

    But the polls may not be as wrong as they were in 2016. Wisconsin, I think, wasn’t really polled in the end, and pollsters have corrected their models – perhaps overcorrected them.

    Things are affected by the percentage of mail in votes; how difficult it is to get a mail in vote accepted; how much banking of votes there has been (that was a big factor in Nevada in 2016);whether after mailing a vote a person can cancel or override it, and the date
    s early voting starts.

    Here’s the New York Times page on polls (updated regularly)

    https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/presidential-polls-trump-biden

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  235. None of the Above doesn’t mean anything.

    What might do something is lie on the ballot asking for how long the term of te person elected should be.

    Difficult to do for president.

    But something like:

    1 year,

    2 years

    4 years

    o pass only 38% of the vote is needed (with 1 year being included in 2) and the excess of the votes cast for the office over the combined 1 year and 2 year totsls, being considered as 4 years.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  236. There are longer lines in some places for early voting than anyone is likely to encounter on Election Day.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  237. Donald Trump:

    The Cases are up because TESTING is way up, by far the most, and best, in the world. Mortality rate is DOWN 85% plus!

    The two statistics go together.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  238. @ So? Reagan was known to nod off.
    And ate jelly beans.

    You made a point about energy, I countered with a point about priorities, and about mental capacity.
    Trump’s priority is soaking up adulation. Doing anything for anyone else is much lower on his scale of importance. He can’t or won’t pay attention to briefing material unless it has pictures and/or conspicuous references to himself.

    Reagan had been writing and speaking about his political philosophy for many decades and had been a governor before becoming president.
    Trump had been intent on getting applause as a wealthy big shot. (“All my life I’ve been greedy. I grab and grab and grab,” he said to a rally, in the tone of boasting.) Running for president was only his latest gambit for elevating his status. He didn’t expect to be president; he just wanted to cash in on the publicity.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  239. SF @229-
    But in the United States, a court is unlikely to declare abortion impermissible.
    With a federal court system of their dreams, a lot of Trump supporters then will be disappointed.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  240. Donald Trump:

    The Cases are up because TESTING is way up, by far the most, and best, in the world.

    Sorry, Donald, the cases would exist even without testing. Seeing no evil doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  241. New Hampshire newspaper backs Biden, first Democrat for president in 100 years
    ………
    The New Hampshire Union Leader, which is based in Manchester, first deviated from its near-century streak of endorsing only Republican presidential candidates in 2016 when it chose to endorse Libertarian Gary Johnson over now President Trump, according to Axios. The paper endorsed Biden on Sunday just hours before Trump visited the Granite State for a rally.

    In its editorial, the Union Leader declared, “President Trump is not always 100 percent wrong, but he is 100 percent wrong for America.”
    ……..
    ……….While recognizing the pandemic is not Trump’s fault, the paper railed against the president for failing to own the situation as infection and death rates soared, and instead feigning ignorance to avoid uncomfortable topics.

    Describing the president as a “consummate linguistic takedown artist,” the paper said Trump also weaponized the “social-media-driven political landscape we now live in” and lacks the skillset for a second term. Biden, on the other hand, is a “caring, compassionate and professional public servant,” according to the editorial.
    …….
    “Joe Biden may not be the president we want, but in 2020 he is the president we desperately need. He will be a president to bring people together and right the ship of state,” it said. “Sadly, President Trump has proven himself to be the antithesis of thoughtful and pragmatic; he has failed to earn a second term.”
    …….
    While the UL isn’t the same as it was in ‘80s, that’s gotta hurt when Trump is having a COVID-19 superspreader event (I mean rally). 😏

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  242. President Trump has the energy to do 3 to 4 event rallies a day.

    While this demonstrates a high level of energy by the 74-year old, one has to ask then, why is he so motivated to do 3 or 4 rally events a day and not attend meetings or spend time reading and learning about the vital interests of Americans? Why doesn’t he attend his own Covid task force meetings anymore? Why doesn’t he prioritize them given we are still in the middle of the pandemic and 220,000 Americans have died? Shouldn’t that be at the top of his list?

    He prioritizes the rallies, not because the election is in 10 days, but because that is what feeds his insatiable ego and need for adulation and worship. It is the only environment in which he commands the room with no objections or protests, and he is guaranteed to be revered by nearly everyone present. Informational meetings, briefings, studying, and learning about issues does not and cannot provide that, and that is his greatest need. I’m betting heavily that these rallies don’t bring in new voters to his camp, but instead provide entertainment for the attendees, and to filling for the performer.

    Dana (6995e0)

  243. Following Paul Montagu’s lead at 233,Piper is good:

    In fact, I think it is a drastic mistake to think that the deadly influences of a leader come only through his policies and not also through his person.

    This is true not only because flagrant boastfulness, vulgarity, immorality, and factiousness are self-incriminating, but also because they are nation-corrupting. They move out from centers of influence to infect whole cultures. The last five years bear vivid witness to this infection at almost every level of society.

    This truth is not uniquely Christian: “A little leaven leavens the whole lump” (1 Corinthians 5:6). “Bad company ruins good morals” (1 Corinthians 15:33). Whether you embrace that company in your house or on social media, it corrupts. There are sins that “lead people into more and more ungodliness” as “their talk [spreads] like gangrene” (2 Timothy 2:16–17).

    There is a character connection between rulers and subjects. When the Bible describes a king by saying, “He sinned and made Israel to sin” (1 Kings 14:16), it does not mean he twisted their arm. It means his influence shaped the people. That’s the calling of a leader. Take the lead in giving shape to the character of your people. So it happens. For good or for ill.

    Dana (6995e0)

  244. President Trump has the energy to do 3 to 4 event rallies a day.

    Meth will do that.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  245. Health Agency Scraps Ad Campaign That Promised Santa Claus Performers Early COVID-19 Vaccine
    ……..
    According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump administration official Michael Caputo wanted performers who portray Santa Claus, Mrs. Claus and elves to lend their talents to a coronavirus-related ad campaign meant to promote the benefits of the eventual vaccine. In return, the official offered them early access to the vaccine, ahead of the general public. The campaign was funded by $250 million in taxpayer money.
    ………
    Chairman of the Fraternal Order of Real Bearded Santas, Ric Erwin, told the Wall Street Journal that the news was “extremely disappointing” to Santa performers. “This was our greatest hope for Christmas 2020, and now it looks like it won’t happen,” Erwin added.
    ………
    The goal of the Santa-led ad campaign was to “defeat despair, inspire hope and achieve national recovery,” as reported by the Wall Street Journal. The campaign had plans for ads to run on television, radio, online and on podcasts. The Santas were also said to appear at vaccine rollout events across 35 cities.
    …….
    Ho Ho Ho! 🎅 Link to WSJ article with recordings.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  246. Funniest part is where Caputo tells Erwin, “If you and your colleagues are not essential workers, I don’t know what is.”

    Radegunda (20775b)

  247. Meth will do that.

    You will also lose significant weight, not to mention teeth. But I guess that was just snark. More likely steroids.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  248. President Trump has the energy to do 3 to 4 event rallies a day.

    Pep rallies are one thing. I could go have my ass kissed 3 to 4 times a day too. No problem.

    45 seconds of ‘hey why did you screw up?’ and Trump is crying for his mommy.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  249. the indelicacies of Donald Trump, which he freely admits are indelicacies and generally only uses as a part of a joke,

    Where does he admit any such thing, freely or otherwise? He never admits any wrongdoing — though he freely accuses others of sins and crimes. And when he says “I was being sarcastic,” it’s because the ridicule has become so intense.

    The idea that Trump’s only fault is “indelicate” jokes is farcical. He has been accused of sexual assault or other misconduct by dozens of women. He lies prodigiously. He is devoid of empathy. He has a history of cheating contractors in business, and pushing the costs of his failures onto others in bankruptcy. He is steering government business to his own properties in a blatantly corrupt way. He openly frames questions of right and wrong in terms of whether it benefits himself, because he recognizes no other measure.

    People who have worked closely with him are attesting to his selfishness, dishonesty, callousness, and lunatic ideas. Gem. Mattis resigned when Trump asked him to do something “criminally stupid.” John Kelly called him the most flawed person he has ever met.

    Trump showed no sign of objecting to the “horror-enabling acts of the Democratic establishment” until he decided he could elevate his status by running for president, and doing so in the GOP looked easiest.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  250. Sammy Finkelman (a69e24) — 10/25/2020 @ 1:07 pm

    Well, the NYT isn’t using thew same polls or aggregator as RCP. Using the same 3% rule as the NYT, Real Clear has Biden just over the threshold at 279 – 163 with 96 toss-up votes (AZ, GA, FL, NC, IA, OH & ME2).

    If you change the threshold to 5% only WI drops out of Biden’s total dropping him to 269, allowing him to lose if Trump runs the table. Drop it to 6%, assuming truly terrible polling, and Trump has a shot at PA, MN and NE2, giving him multiple paths, but generally including PA.

    Trump leads by 4 in TX, a state he cannot win without.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  251. @256-
    Of course it’s snark. I could have easily said crack, more likely pills from Dr. Feelgood.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  252. indelicacies. :). heh. I disagree with Piper’s theology but I have to admire his consistency. And he knows his Bible very well.

    JRH (52aed3)

  253. After the ‘no Big Oil’ and the fracking flip-flopping, Trump will win PA and TX, Sammy. The oil patch dummies who already banked votes for Biden are likely kicking themselves.

    This mail-in voting thing varying state-by-state is crap. The window across the land should be post-marked ten days out or less from election day. No accepting before the ten day window or after ED.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  254. The rude anonymous Pokemon can take his recurring troll act elsewhere.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  255. @257. Pep rallies are one thing.

    Pep rallies are everything; certainly metric of levels of enthusiasm. Trump rallies are fun. Even my young niece, went to one out of curiosity, said it was a blast. Biden’s are anemic; border line pathetic.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  256. Trump has violated every Commandment except the Fifth: Honor thy father and thy mother. He is a servant of the Beast, a false prophet and hypocrite, a wolf in sheep’s clothing in religious matters, and a jackass in a lion’s skin in secular matters.

    nk (1d9030)

  257. @264. He is a servant of the Beast, a false prophet and hypocrite, a wolf in sheep’s clothing in religious matters, and a jackass in a lion’s skin in secular matters.

    He’s Presbyterian.

    Which beats being an Irish-Catholic by 550 million miles:

    ‘First you get do on your knees; fiddle with your rosaries…’ 😉

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3f72CTDe4-0

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  258. Pep rallies are everything…….

    Size isn’t though, otherwise Bernie would have been the Democratic nominee in 2016 and 2020.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  259. He’s Presbyterian.

    Bifocals can cure that.

    nk (1d9030)

  260. New wave of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations strain health systems
    ……..
    In Texas, authorities are scrambling to shore up resources in El Paso, where covid-19 hospitalizations have nearly quadrupled to almost 800 in less than three weeks. In Utah, the state hospital association warned that if current trends hold, it will soon have to ask the governor to invoke “crisis standards of care” — a triage system that, for example, favors younger patients.
    ……..
    This past week brought the highest number of coronavirus cases since the pandemic started. Dozens of states have seen a seven-day average of more than 100 new cases per 100,000 people, with more than 700 per 100,000 in North Dakota — population-wise, the equivalent of Florida reporting more than 20,000 cases during the same time period.
    ……..
    Utah is “marching toward” what it considers to be full capacity for hospitals, or 85 percent of beds occupied, Dougherty said. Any more than that, he said, risks having beds free but insufficient staff to man them. Some facilities have already reported bed usage higher than the 85 percent benchmark.
    ……..
    Total infections in El Paso County have rocketed from fewer than 25,000 at the beginning of the month to nearly 40,000 this weekend, according to Washington Post tracking. New deaths have yet to surpass a peak in August, but fatalities lag behind spikes in cases and hospitalizations.

    Gov. Greg Abbott (R) on Sunday announced plans for a new medical facility at El Paso Convention and Performing Arts Center, which will start at 50 beds but can expand to 100 if necessary. “Auxiliary medical units” will boost hospitals’ capacity, the governor’s office said. In a Sunday call, Abbott also asked the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services if a Department of Defense medical center in El Paso could help ease the pressure.
    ………
    We’re rounding the turn. We’re rounding the corner. It’s going away.” Trump needs to realize the light at wend of tunnel is an oncoming train.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  261. @266. In a way, he is; Biden’s candidacy was dead; he was finishing poorly in the primaries; it was Clyburn who decided to save his butt and not Bernie’s. But Sanders’ agenda has shaped Biden’s trajectory– and you’ll see a woman president before a Jewish male/female one.

    @267. LOLOLOLOL Reading glasses will do.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  262. White House signals defeat in pandemic as coronavirus outbreak roils Pence’s office
    ………
    The outbreak around Pence, who chairs the White House’s coronavirus task force, undermines the argument Trump has been making to voters that the country is “rounding the turn,” as the president put it at a rally Sunday in New Hampshire.
    ……….
    “We’re not going to control the pandemic,” Meadows said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We are going to control the fact that we get vaccines, therapeutics and other mitigations.”
    ………..
    Cases this fall have been rising rapidly in a number of Republican-leaning states and counties, according a recent analysis of health data by Harvard University scientists.

    Campaigning over the weekend, Trump tried to present an alternate reality. At a rally Sunday in Londonderry, N.H., Trump said the pandemic would soon end thanks to a potential vaccine, which he said was “going to be delivered fast.”
    “That will quickly end the pandemic — it’s ending anyway,” Trump said. “We’re rounding the turn, but the vaccine will get it down fast, because we want normal life to resume. Normal life. We just want normal, normal life.”
    ……..
    In Arkansas, where the coronavirus infection rate and hospitalizations are on the rise, Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) said Trump’s message about the country rounding the turn conflicts with the reality on the ground in Arkansas, which he described as “very concerning.”
    ………
    Hutchinson also took issue with Trump’s reluctance to wear a mask or strongly endorse that others do so, despite saying he is okay with mask usage.
    “It may mkes it confusing,” he told anchor Margaret Brennan. “I mean, he’s made it very clear that wearing a mask is important. I saw him wear a mask going into the polls yesterday, but obviously with the rallies, there is confusing messages there.”
    ……….
    Meadows has confirmed that “No miracle is coming. “

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  263. @268. “Doom! Doom! Doom!” Biden/Harris 2020 😉

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  264. In Texas, you can vote by email, but only if you are an astronaut in space. Spacists!

    nk (1d9030)

  265. @271-
    Better than big 1980s rose colored glasses.

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  266. Kevin M @258.

    Well, the NYT isn’t using thew same polls or aggregator as RCP. Using the same 3% rule as the NYT, Real Clear has Biden just over the threshold at 279 – 163 with 96 toss-up votes (AZ, GA, FL, NC, IA, OH & ME2).

    The katest New York Times has it 297-125 Electoral votes in favor of Biden counting only states where a candidate leads by 3 or more, instead of 326.

    The difference of 29 evidently comes from Florida (29 Electoral votes) polls tightening up slightly.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  267. In DCSCA world, #272’s a good segue to…

    urbanleftbehind (a908a6)

  268. Conversely, an interesting development…the foreign policy equivalent of the 5o de Mayo taco salad?

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/putin-rejects-donald-trumps-criticism-180709486.html

    urbanleftbehind (a908a6)

  269. Pep rallies are everything;

    If you think the main responsibility of the president is to entertain a subset of the population with bad taste and a juvenile sense of humor, and a bizarre need to revere a sociopath.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  270. Rip Murdock (305171) — 10/25/2020 @ 4:55 pm

    “No miracle is coming. “

    The “miracle” is already here. It cured Trump. Trump, at the time promised to make it available to everybody, but he chickened out. He doesn’t want to really disrupt the process of medical approval.

    Possibly the companies (Regeneron and Eli Lilly, lobbied him not to do it because they are afraid of the F.D.A.

    Don’t discount the effect of Democratic Party pressure not to announce any cur or vaccine before Election Day.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/09/health/trump-regeneron-antibodies.html

    When President Trump promoted an experimental drug as a “cure” for Covid-19 in a video on Wednesday, it might have seemed that he was at it again: touting a questionable fix for a deadly pandemic, not unlike his earlier enthusiasm for the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine or even, at one point, disinfectant.

    But the treatment that Mr. Trump extolled, which was administered last week after doctors diagnosed Covid-19, is not a fringe product. It’s a promising drug in the final stages of testing developed by a respected biotech company, Regeneron. Infectious disease experts have been closely following the treatment, as well as a similar product from Eli Lilly, in the hopes that the therapies could be a real advance in the fight against Covid-19.

    Pharmaceutical companies often pay handsomely for celebrity endorsements, but this patient testimonial was like no other. It came from a polarizing president who, just weeks away from an election, and having found himself and his White House at the center of an outbreak, is eager to show that his administration is doing something about a pandemic that has killed more than 212,000 Americans.

    Although he couldn’t possibly have known whether Regeneron’s treatment had helped him…

    Really?? He’s 74. What were the doctors telling him about his condition? His wife Melania, 23 years younger than he was, and female, who didn’t take the antibodies, stayed moderately sick for quite some time

    — or even if he was out of the woods yet

    It’s almost two weeks later. Now was he or was he not out of the woods? The doctors were being a bit cautious, at the time.

    — Mr. Trump sang its praises in the video, calling it “unbelievable” and suggesting it was only moments away from being authorized for widespread use.

    Trump didn;t follow through, because he lacks political courage.

    Regeneron, which filed an application with regulators within hours of the president’s video, must now shepherd its antibody treatment through a politically fraught approval process, where the president’s over-the-top endorsement has likely raised the profile of its product, but could also sow suspicion about whether it works.

    I wonder what slowed them down.

    “I don’t see how it is going to end up being good for a pharma company,” said Ronny Gal, a pharmaceutical analyst for the Wall Street firm Bernstein. “Once you become a political opinion, that’s not great.”

    Already, Regeneron is fielding messy questions about how its treatment was tested using cells originally derived from an aborted fetus — a line of research that Mr. Trump has opposed — and the president’s relationship with Regeneron’s chief executive.

    Mr. Trump has further complicated the potential rollout of these treatments by pledging — first on Wednesday and again in another video Thursday — that the drugs would be free of charge and would soon be available in hundreds of thousands of doses.

    But Regeneron said it would only initially have enough doses for 50,000 patients, with the plan to have enough for about 300,000 people by the end of the year. Regeneron has received more than $500 million in federal funding to develop and manufacture the treatment, and through that deal, the company has said it will make the products available at no cost to Americans.

    So that’s how it would be free. Not sure how much the company would like that, though. (making more than 300,000 doses available free)

    In addition, much smaller doses can be used as a prophylactic – the equivalent of an immediately effective, although temporary, vaccine.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  271. If we had the dame process of approval 100 years ago as we have now, insulin would not have been used for diabetics for another 15-30 years after it was discovered, and water would not be chlorinated.

    Most people prbably think things still work the way they before 1948 or 1962.

    Dr. Mark Mulligan, director of the N.Y.U. Langone Vaccine Center, who is involved in studies of both Regeneron’s and Eli Lilly’s antibody products, said the president’s claim that he was cured seemed premature — though not impossible.

    Premature? Nonsense!

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  272. 272. I think you mean by email.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  273. The “miracle” is already here. It cured Trump

    Or so he and his obsequious doctors say. And given he was treated with a number of different therapies, there is no way to say if and what “cured” him. And how soon will this “miracle” be available to all Americans? Certainly not before the election, and I doubt before summer. And it won’t be free, your friends ax dollars will pay for it (but isn’t that socialized medicine?)

    Rip Murdock (305171)

  274. @277. a subset of the population with bad taste and a juvenile sense of humor

    Reaganaurics/Reaganoptics: And whooooo was it who’d constantly quip to deflect with, “Well… I knew George Washington [Thomas Jefferson, Abe Lincoln, Ben Franklin, etc., etc.,]

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  275. 275. Will the orange albatross clog McSally’s jets like he did two years ago, I wonder? Because she should win, otherwise. Astronaut or not, Kelly is a lightweight.

    nk (1d9030)

  276. More likely steroids.

    Hmm! A doctor I know suggested that Trump’s Covid could have been real because his manic behavior at and after Walter Reed did indicate high doses of steroids. But now that you mentioned it, that could have come from his regular anabolics too. Cumulative effect or an extra high dose or two.

    nk (1d9030)

  277. @250. While this demonstrates a high level of energy by the 74-year old, one has to ask then, why is he so motivated to do 3 or 4 rally events a day and not attend meetings or spend time reading and learning about the vital interests of Americans?

    Well, it is election season so rallies are to be expected–especially by a challenger– which we’re not seeing frm the Bien camp in ay regularity, even w/Covid restrictions. Jut 6 months of bunker talk. But as one-termer President Carter discovered, a ‘hunker down at your desk’, “Rose Garden strategy” doesn’t work too well if you want to win.

    Put you politics aside and just examine Biden’s activities as a person.

    He’s not doing any public events ten days out, has only been seen for brief periods– one or two hours at most– for debates between long ‘down time’ periods. He’s had at least two brain surgeries that we know of; and a history of stuttering aside, slurs his words during debates enough to be noticeable [meds perhaps?]; repeats time-worn, long out-of-date phrases; makes odd references to things like ‘record players’, long dead colleagues and such. Makes up– or mixes up– old stories; appeals to unions in speeches, attacks big oil… [great rhetoric for 1974]…. you can go on.

    So we have the Joe Biden of 2020, a man applying to start the most difficult job in the world [aside from motherhood] on January 20, 2021… who will turn 78 years old in just 26 days.

    You wouldn’t hire him to drive your kids school bus; nor want him to pilot the 767 you’re in; nor let him perform brain surgery on you… but it’s okay for him to be the most powerful man on Earth?

    Nope.

    He’s too old for the gig.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  278. @283. Aside from being an accomplished space shuttle astronaut, Mark Kelly is a naval aviator.

    McSally is just a mere air force pilot.

    “They call them aviators in the Navy. They say they’re better than pilots.” – ‘The Right Stuff,’ 1983

    [And if you think that’s just ‘malarkey’ – or I’m kidding- at a meet and greet years ago I made the error or calling the now late Wally Schirra a ‘pilot’ in conversation to his face and he instantly corrected me w/t term, ‘aviator.’]

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  279. SF: The “miracle” is already here. It cured Trump

    Rip Murdock (305171) — 10/25/2020 @ 5:32 pm

    Or so he and his obsequious doctors say.

    No, his doctors do;t say that. They are more cauious, at least in public.

    And given he was treated with a number of different therapies, there is no way to say if and what “cured” him.

    Thatt is absolutely not the cae. We know what different drugs do.

    If he wanted to just claim something acceptd and available did it, he’d say remdisivir. But he doesn’t, or didn’;t October 9.

    https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2020/10/09/mega-maga-the-largest-radio-rally-in-history

    ….They talk about the vaccines. And the vaccines are very important, Rush. But this is more important because we can go in the hospitals and clean out the hospitals literally with people that… The vaccines are very important. It’s a different stage.

    RUSH: Well, yeah, this is the antibodies that you speak of.

    THE PRESIDENT: This is the antibody. This is the antibody, and Regeneron. It’s the most unbelievable thing I’ve ever seen. And I had a meeting with doctors today. You know, it’s always… The good thing about when our president, 11 doctors show up, and they’re all the head of Johns Hopkins and this and that. They’re great people. But Walter Reed is an incredible place. These 11 guys came in today.

    They showed me stats. It’s amazing. I don’t know I would have… I don’t know that… You know, I was not in the greatest of shape. A day later I was fine, maybe [NOT] perfect, but I was fine. But a couple of days later… Now I’m free. I’m… You know, I feel perfect. I have no… I’m not taking anything. You know, I’m off any regimen that they gave me, but it was primarily this one drug.

    And we’re sending that and the Eli Lilly version of it, which is very similar. We’re sending that to all of our hospitals. We’re gonna get people better. We gotta get it there fast. That’s why I’m doing an emergency use authorization. I gotta get ’em to approve it really fast.

    Broken promise.

    I gave them my numbers to put in with the other numbers that they already have, which are very good, excellent, and it’s… You know, it’s the most amazing thing — and it’s not Remdesivir. Maybe that helps a little bit. But Remdesivir is not the same thing. This is stuff that is so good. It just wiped out the virus. It wiped it out —

    Donald Trump said the obvious. He is the boy who said the emperor has no clothes.

    The reason his doctors, and others, don;t want to say that is that it was a cure is that then they would bee saying our system of drug regulation is keeping lifesaving treatment away from people. People don;t want to face up to that. So they pretend we don’t know enough to say. Total nonsense.

    They’re just justifying the status quo.

    And how soon will this “miracle” be available to all Americans? Certainly not before the election, and I doubt before summer.

    It’ll be in a race with the vaccine, but it will win it.

    Somebody stopped Donald Trump from pushing this further.

    And it won’t be free, your friends tax dollars will pay for it (but isn’t that socialized medicine?)

    No, socialized medicine is doing this for everything. The vaccine also is going to be free, I think.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  280. @275. You do know ‘pilot’ Buzz backs Trump, right?

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  281. Then maybe the Aldrin endorsement is nothing more than the political equivalent of Joe Namath getting fresh with a sideline reporter.

    urbanleftbehind (832ed1)

  282. You do know ‘pilot’ Buzz backs Trump, right?

    I didn’t, but I know McSally sides him. That’s why I called him her albatross.

    nk (1d9030)

  283. 211.

    You confuse a lack of manners and general boorishness with cruelty and sadism and in doing so lessen the meaning of those latter two words.

    OK, let’s see.

    cruel
    adjective, cru·el·er, cru·el·est.
    1. willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others.

    I’m not the one who’s confused, Kevin. And you shouldn’t be either. If somebody did this to your wife I think you’d recognize the cruelty. How about if some guy said “Look at that face, would anyone vote for that?” about your daughter? If the reporter whose disability he mocked was someone you cared about?

    How about if your cheating dad shamelessly talked about his affair in the tabloids, bragged about how much better the sex was than with your mom, and went out of his way to mention how grossed out he was by the feel of Mom’s breast implants? Do you think you’d see the cruelty then? I mean really, what kind of person does that?

    Needless to say, there’s more like that than there’s time or space to mention. And none of it is bad manners, Kevin. It’s Donald Trump willfully causing pain. And anyone who’s seen it, which I assume includes you, knows he does it with pleasure.

    lurker (d8c5bc)

  284. Ronald Reagan didn;t have to make these jokes. He could have made accurate observations.

    Ronald reagan was older than most countries.

    He remembered a time, not just before there was television, but before there was radio

    And when babe Ruth was a pitcher.

    And Eisenhower was thought to be a Democrat (turned down an offer to try for the Democratic nominaton

    Eisenhower? He remembered a time (even if he was too young to follow politics) when Herbert Hoover was thought to be a Democrat (He declared himself a Republican and tried to get the Republican nomination in 1920.)

    https://hoover.blogs.archives.gov/2020/04/08/hoover-and-20th-century-presidents-franklin-roosevelt

    ….Early in Hoover’s career, Franklin Roosevelt wrote to Hugh Gibson in January 1920: ‘I have had some nice talks with Herbert Hoover before he went west for Christmas. He is certainly a wonder and I wish we could make him President of the United States. There could not be a better one.’ ….

    …Through Gibson, Hoover let Roosevelt know that he was a Republican. Later in 1920, after FDR’s nomination as vice president on the Democratic ticket, Hoover wrote: ‘My dear Roosevelt: The fact that I do not belong to your political tribe does not deter me from offering my personal congratulations to an old friend. I am glad to see you in the game in such a prominent place…. If you are elected you will do the job properly.’ …

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  285. @289. Buzz quit drinking decades ago.

    _____

    FWIW, 60 Minutes viewers: Lesley Stahl will be 79 years old in December.

    Her do:

    [ ] dyed
    [ ] a wig
    [ ] a piece

    Choose.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  286. McSally is in a tough spot. She can’t win without Trumps’s supporters but she can lose with them, and as an appointee she needs to dance with the one who brung her.

    Oh, well, I cried because I did not have a Senate seat and then I saw somebody who did not have ketchup for his steak.

    nk (1d9030)

  287. @290. Buzz is AF; he ran the AF test pilot school up at Edwards for a time; he’s a Thunderbirds over Blue Angels guy; it’s an ‘aviator’ vs., ‘pilot’ thing.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  288. The New York Times
    @nytimes

    Breitbart News, The Gateway Pundit, The Washington Examiner and other right-leaning sites regularly amplify false claims by President Trump and his allies about voter fraud. It is an example of what a new Harvard study calls a “propaganda feedback loop.”
    __ _

    Michael Brendan Dougherty
    @michaelbd
    ·
    What’s it called when its the Russian bounties story?

    _

    harkin (7fb4c9)

  289. @294. Kelly’s got it made. But I’m biased; got a friend who knows and is close w/him.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  290. How to say this is a cure while ;ambastng Donald Trump:

    https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/16/politics/trump-regeneron-antibody-treatments/index.html

    Trump’s pursuit of coronavirus vaccine comes at the expense of therapies he now claims as a ‘cure’

    (CNN)When President Donald Trump huddled with vaccine makers last spring, the CEO of Regeneron — who landed an audience with the President after a private call to a well-placed White House adviser — made the most of the chance to plug his company’s coronavirus treatment.

    During that face-to-face meeting at the White House in March, Trump appeared taken with Dr. Len Schleifer’s promise of a treatment that could speed up the recovery for sick coronavirus patients and prevent others from becoming infected.

    At least one top government scientist was also convinced. Dr. Rick Bright, former head of biomedical research at the Department of Health and Human Services, had witnessed Schleifer’s phone pitch for the right to make his case to Trump directly. He, too, believed that monoclonal antibodies held huge potential for combating the pandemic.

    But in the months that followed, Trump’s focus drifted toward other unproven treatments such as hydroxychloroquine and the bigger prize of developing a vaccine. Scientists inside and outside the government tried to prod the administration to aggressively invest in antibody treatments such as Regeneron’s, but the Trump team waited months to ink a deal to invest in their manufacturing….

    ….It was very disappointing that the administration was only focusing on leaning forward on vaccines and not really choosing to do the same for antibodies,” said Bright, who has since left the administration. “There should have been no hesitation on leaning forward to address the supply chain and the volumes that we knew that we would need.”

    Ironically, the antibody cocktail Schleifer pitched in March is now Trump’s miracle “cure” of choice. After taking a large dose of Regeneron’s dual-antibody cocktail during his recent hospitalization for coronavirus, Trump has touted the treatment and pledged to expedite its approval….

    ….Experts say that’s probably not going to happen. Even if Regeneron’s treatment or another antibody cocktail is authorized by the Food and Drug Administration, there certainly won’t be enough to treat anyone who falls ill with coronavirus. Concerns are already arising about how that limited supply will be distributed. Some worry that after the government’s initial distribution, the treatment could wind up with such a high price tag that is serves only the most privileged patients.

    “Since the very start of the pandemic, scientists have predicted monoclonal antibodies would be a very effective treatment as well as preventative measure against Covid-19 and yet the Trump administration seems to have focused its Operation Warp Speed almost entirely on vaccines,” said Rep. Bill Foster, an Illinois Democrat and member of the House coronavirus subcommittee. “How do they intend to allocate this life-saving treatment? Will it be dispensed on the basis to save the most human lives or will they…allow a market-based allocation where those were able to afford it would get treatments unavailable to ordinary Americans?” …

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  291. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/20/health/covid-antibody-regeneron.html

    Nearly two weeks ago, President Trump told Americans that they would soon be getting an antibody treatment that he had promoted, without evidence, as a “cure” for the coronavirus. This weekend, as the country braced for another major wave of coronavirus infections, Mr. Trump’s health secretary promised such therapies were just around the corner.

    But these statements are misleading, at best. Even if the drugs are proven to work — still a big if — there’s little chance that they will soon be widely available. A smooth distribution of the antibody treatments will be dependent on the very same factors that have so far bedeviled the country’s response to Covid-19: fast and plentiful testing, coordination between state and federal officials, and equitable access to health care.

    Supply will be extremely limited at first, even though the pool of patients who might benefit is vast, raising messy questions about who should be first in line for treatment. The drugs are believed to work best in people who have recently been infected and are not yet very sick….

    https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/10/21/926376342/how-will-the-limited-supply-of-antibody-drugs-for-covid-19-be-allocated

    They could stretch it out by giving lesser amounts of it to asymptomatic people, or people exposed to people who might get it.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  292. More from the NYT:

    Early data about the therapies have shown that they help clear the virus in people who have recently been infected, and that they may help prevent hospitalizations. In another positive sign, the F.D.A. recently approved an Ebola treatment made by Regeneron that uses the same technology.

    Eli Lilly and Regeneron have said the antibodies might be used both as a treatment for those who are sick and to prevent infection in people who have been exposed. The treatments could serve as a bridge to a vaccine, protecting high-risk groups like nursing home residents and the workers who care for them.

    Still, it’s unclear when the F.D.A. will give a green light to emergency authorization…

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  293. https://patterico.com/2020/10/25/a-conservative-evangelical-explains-why-he-rejects-trump/

    To keep the actual thread free of controversy, and since it is locked, I will ask my simple question on the open thread.

    What does Bob think about Biden’s Christian chops?

    BuDuh (e1ce7a)

  294. On another topic:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/24/business/economy/trump-economy-manufacturing.html

    ….In the end, it may turn out that the president’s most significant impact on economic policy is not one that he intended: overturning the conventional wisdom about the impact of government deficits.

    By simultaneously pursuing steep tax cuts for businesses and wealthy individuals, raising military spending and ruling out Medicare and Social Security reductions, Mr. Trump presided over unprecedented trillion-dollar deficits. Emergency pandemic relief added to the bill. Such sums were supposed to cause interest rates and inflation to spike and crowd out private investment. They didn’t.

    “Trump has done a lot to legitimize deficit spending,” Mr. Furman said….

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  295. Trump has done a lot to legitimize deficit spending,” Mr. Furman said….

    Might wanna check w/Cheney on that, who famously said, ‘Reagan proved deficits don’t matter.’

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  296. Trump has done a lot to legitimize deficit spending,” Mr. Furman said….

    DCSCA: Might wanna check w/Cheney on that, who famously said, ‘Reagan proved deficits don’t matter.’

    Yes, I remembered that. But Furman still has a point, because after Reagan’s presidency, they were still criticizing deficits somewhat. Ross Perot and Bill Clinton did.

    And the current deficits are bigger.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  297. Amazing Kamala thinks women need to know they can succeed because of her in 2020.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  298. https://www.wsj.com/articles/government-payment-rules-are-the-culprit-on-infusion-11603656478

    Regarding Drs. Scott Gottlieb and Mark McClellan’s “Where Do I Go to Get My Covid Antibody Cocktail?”(op-ed, Oct. 19): They are right regarding the need for the government to prime the pump to stimulate the development of private infusion clinics for Covid patients. However, they overstate the associated problems.

    Infusion clinics are quite simple, requiring only a room, one registered nurse, four patients and IV poles. Infusion pumps are generally not necessary. The big issue is the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ payment scheme for professional services, which is in the range of $60-$70 per infusion, regardless of how long it takes (many exceed four hours for allergy and neurology services). Hence, the profit in such centers hinges on the split between the cost of the drug and the amount a payor gets reimbursed for it. In such circumstances, volume is the key to financial stability.

    If CMS will change its reimbursement methodology to reimburse professional services by the hour infused, and reimburse for drugs with modest profit for the provider, there will be no shortage of clinics.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/where-do-i-go-to-get-my-covid-antibody-cocktail-11603052662

    … It might be possible to treat some Covid patients at home, staffed by medical professionals trained to handle the small risk of allergic reactions. The FDA would need to authorize the drugs for delivery in home settings. The risk of managing reactions to the drug must be weighed against the risks that patients will avoid the hospital and forgo the therapy altogether.

    A related issue is payment. Even if the antibody drug is free for patients, providers need reimbursement for the substantial costs of administering the drug, especially if the goal is flexibility of location. The usual methods won’t work.

    In Medicare, for example, the administration fee is typically a percentage of the drug price, which can run into the hundreds or thousands of dollars, with proportionally big copayments for patients. There have been efforts to change this approach. The Trump administration and others have proposed that Medicare move toward a flat fee per dose or encourage specialized centers to compete on the cost and quality of providing complex medications. There is likely strong bipartisan legislative support for fixing this problem for Covid. But such a solution seems unlikely to come together quickly.

    Our politicians are oblivious to any of this.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  299. 305. That’s the sort of thing all feminists say: Women need role models.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  300. #285

    Biden is too old for the job. He wasn’t inspiring when he was younger. Even when he was channeling Niel Kinnock.

    His opponent is Donald Trump. An awful human being who wants his country to be as awful and callous as he is.

    Think I’ll go with Biden.

    Appalled (91242f)

  301. Candidates can be fooled all the time by the enthusiasm of their crowds. They need to count.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  302. Appalled (91242f) — 10/25/2020 @ 8:07 pm

    Donald Trump. An awful human being who wants his country to be as awful and callous as he is.

    This is actually true, although it’s because he thinks callousness and selfishness (or perceived self interest) is what motivates voters. Promoting what he believes, just because he believes it, would be a form of altruism.

    Against that, he, or his appointees, are right on most other issues.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  303. Some of Trump’s businesses, like casinos, were callous in their very nature.

    And sometimes callousness in public policy carries no benefit for anybody, but the very fact of its callousness can give people the idea that it has some benefit, because if not, people will reason, then, why?

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  304. An awful human being who wants his country to be as awful and callous as he is.

    Yeah. The capitalist. You tell’em.

    Think I’ll go with Biden.

    Yeah. The socialist. You tell’em.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  305. it’s because he thinks callousness and selfishness (or perceived self interest) is what motivates voters

    He thinks voters are motivated by callous selfishness because he views the world though the lens of his own callous selfishnes.

    Likewise, he accused doctors of padding the numbers of COVID deaths because (he claims) they get more money that way. Which is not true. But Trump accuses them of what he would do himself if he could. (“All my life I’ve been greedy. I grab and grab and grab.”)

    Radegunda (20775b)

  306. Cholo Riot very late October Surprise still in play. Dodgers 1 win away.

    urbanleftbehind (832ed1)

  307. I had a lengthy conversation today with a Chinese-American in the Bay Area. She immigrated to the U.S. thirty years ago.

    She voted for Trump. She mentioned a few reasons.

    First, she hates socialism.

    Second, she thinks children are a reflection of the parents, and considers Trump’s children to more respectable than Hunter Biden.

    Third, she hates the CCP, and believes Trump is tougher on China than Biden would be.

    Fourth, she hates racial preferences. Her son got a perfect 1600 SAT score, and was a starter on his high school basketball team, and yet wasn’t accepted by UCLA. His black friend, who was second-string on the same basketball team, scored 1100 on his SAT test, and WAS admitted to UCLA (and he wasn’t recruited by UCLA’s basketball team, either).

    She said she knows many Chinese people who support Trump because they are turned off by BLM, Antifa, and racial preferences. I don’t blame them.

    norcal (a5428a)

  308. Impressive how many commenters here have cast the beam out of thine own eye.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  309. @315: Every immigrant demographic who has experienced communism firsthand skews heavily toward Trump. Those that experience communism/socialism only as a romantic concept in their heads skews towards Biden.

    beer ‘n pretzels (042d67)

  310. If interest rates were to go up, we’d be in very deep doo-doo quickly.

    Dave (1bb933)

  311. Mandarins were the ruling class in China.

    nk (1d9030)

  312. Equating European welfare state “socialism” with communism is typical Trumpian fantasy.

    While I think our system is better, I’ve lived in France and it’s not *quite* Cuba, Venezuela, North Korea or mainland China.

    We have many of the same elements of “socialism” here, and have for all our lives, and the difference is only one of degree.

    Dave (1bb933)

  313. she thinks children are a reflection of the parents, and considers Trump’s children to more respectable than Hunter Biden

    What about Beau Biden? Doesn’t he count?

    If the measure is Hunter Biden vs. the (overrrated) Trump kids, that means they can’t really say that Trump himself is more respectable. There’s not been another president, at least in my lifetime who was held in such low regard by so many people who have worked closely with him.

    Trump has described his fathering style as providing the money and letting the mother do the hands-on part. And considering that he has twice dumped the mother of his children for another woman, it’s unlikely that he was a very strong influence on their development — except to the extent that they reflect his narcissism. Also, a former mistress of Don Jr. has rather negative things to say about the Trump kids, including Barron.

    Radegunda (20775b)

  314. I didn’t, but I know McSally sides him. That’s why I called him her albatross.

    McSally, like most GOP senators, has to toe a fine line. In 2018 she had beat Trump’s darling in the primary and his lickspittles sat on their hands and let the Democrat win. So, this time she tried to make nice and the kneejerk #NeverTrumps are now giving her grief.

    Meanwhile popcorn sales are up among Democrats.

    Why the F can’t people just vote on the damn candidates on their own merits, instead of their Trump-affinity? If the erstwhile GOP voters insist on having two separate parties, they ought to be honest enough to split.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  315. I am unconvinced that Trump ever was more than a Democrat invention. If I ignore judges (not all of whom have been winners anyway), all I see is Trump at the center of destruction within the GOP. He is a living, breathing wedge issue. Whatever the opposite of “triangulation” is, it’s Trump.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  316. Biden is too old for the job. He wasn’t inspiring when he was younger. Even when he was channeling Niel Kinnock.

    His opponent is Donald Trump. An awful human being who wants his country to be as awful and callous as he is.

    Think I’ll go with Biden.

    In the end, I voted for the Libertarian. I fear that if I had voted for Biden, it would be viewed as a vote for Biden.

    Kevin M (ab1c11)

  317. Why the F can’t people just vote on the damn candidates on their own merits, instead of their Trump-affinity? If the erstwhile GOP voters insist on having two separate parties, they ought to be honest enough to split.

    America or Trump.

    Binary choice.

    Anyone who supported Trump in 2016 showed abysmal judgment, but it was theoretically possible to hope that he would not vindicate all the worst predictions. I will stipulate that while it should have been obvious to anyone that Trump was unfit in every way, it was difficult to conceive – in the absence of any historical precedent – just how terrible he would be.

    Today, nobody has to guess or extrapolate what kind of president Trump would be. We know. Supporting him at this point makes you either malign toward America or certifiably insane.

    Dave (1bb933)

  318. 316. Garry Kasparov doesn’t.

    DRJ (aede82)

  319. anyone who doesn’t vote for
    trump is a babyklilling communist who loves to see people suffer.

    mg (8cbc69)

  320. she thinks children are a reflection of the parents, and considers Trump’s children to more respectable than Hunter Biden

    That’s very Chinese culture. Korean and Japanese too. Not to mention Stalinist and Maoist. If a person committed an offense against the emperor or the party, the whole family would be purged. Extirpated. Erased. Extinguished. Backwards, forwards, and sideways.

    Don’t be fooled, comrades. I also know a lot of people from sh!tholes who made their way to America. They bring their childhood-ingrained attitudes that made their birthplaces sh!tholes in the first place with them. The xenophobia, the insularity, the racism, the superstitions, the submissiveness to the boot on their face.

    nk (1d9030)

  321. 308. 310. 313. Radegunda (20775b) — 10/25/2020 @ 8:32 pm

    Likewise, he accused doctors of padding the numbers of COVID deaths because (he claims) they get more money that way. Which is not true. But Trump accuses them of what he would do himself if he could.

    Not necessarily.

    There’s the factor of the chances of getting caught at it, and suffering some bad consequences, or retaliation.

    It’s also not true that someone who accuses someone else of doing unfair or worse things would necessarily do so himself, so you cant draw any conclusions directly from that fact alone. But it may mesh with the picture.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  322. 322. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 10/25/2020 @ 11:04 pm

    I am unconvinced that Trump ever was more than a Democrat invention.

    Yes, maybe, but he was supposed to lose to Hillary Clinton!

    Just like Barack Obama.

    That’s two strike for political mastermind Bill Clinton.

    His getting Orval Faubus – that Orval Faubus of 1957 Little Rock fame – to run against him in the Democratic primary for Governor in 1984 was more successful.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  323. 315. norcal (a5428a) — 10/25/2020 @ 9:15 pm

    She said she knows many Chinese people who support Trump because they are turned off by BLM, Antifa, and racial preferences. I don’t blame them.

    Trump wold get even more if he wasn’t against family reunification (chain migration) bu there are two factors that might reduce the effect.

    1) The Democrats arn;t talking much about it.

    2) Trump is moving to admit a few more people from Hong Kong (as refugees) to the United States. Of course, it’s at odds with his general policy.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/24/world/asia/hong-kong-asylum-seekers.html

    The United States is directly challenging Beijing over its crackdown on Hong Kong. The Trump administration moved to list refugees from the city as a priority for the first time — even as it reduced the total number of refugees the United States will take in annually.

    https://www.humanrightsfirst.org/press-release/us-executive-order-unlikely-help-hong-kong-refugees

    While the president last night called on U.S. agencies to reallocate refugee resettlement slots to residents of Hong Kong in his executive order on Hong Kong normalization, due to his own administration’s policies, the U.S. refugee resettlement program has been decimated and any protestors from Hong Kong who seek asylum in the United States could find themselves thrown in immigration detention by U.S. immigration authorities and denied asylum.

    I don’t think they’re getting thrown into detention, but the only Hong Kong people here are those who got here on other visas.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)

  324. Why the F can’t people just vote on the damn candidates on their own merits, instead of their Trump-affinity?

    Because the election is about whether a nation of laws is an illusion, thanks to the severe misconduct of Trump. This election is about Trump.

    They can push your polls and stories and facebook memes but at the end of the day, Trump crossed some lines. Some people were OK with that because white pride or hatred or some twisted unrecognizable loyalty to a twisted and unrecognizable party. Those people hate themselves and are projecting what they are onto the rest of the country, fixated on the goofball fringe left that hasn’t changed all that much in 20 years. they aren’t relevant to the real question. Biden is barely relevant, an analysis of “is he so horrible he eclipses the urgent issue of the election? No, obviously he doesn’t.”

    Dustin (4237e0)

  325. DCSCA, Biden’s not a socialist any more than Trump and Romney are for supporting universal healthcare in some form at some point.

    Everyone’s a socialist and everyone’s a libertarian on some issue. I want socialized police and fire services, and libertarian views on my religion and how I raise my children.

    Dustin (4237e0)

  326. 320. Radegunda (20775b) — 10/25/2020 @ 10:52 pm

    What about Beau Biden? Doesn’t he count?

    Nobody is saying very much about him, so that that voter may be barely aware he existed.

    Not Biden because then he has to discuss his older son’s political career, and reiterate he never discussed any matter his son was dealing with as Attorney General of Delaware, and he’d have to explain what Beau did to take care of the problem that was Hunter. You know they pulled strings to get him into he military.

    And the Republicans and the Trump friendly press never mention him except in passing, like the fact that the Mac that was left in the computer repair store had a sticker on it from the foundation that was established in Beau’s name.

    This sounds like there could be an overlooked accusation that could have made against Hunter. The sticker probably means that it belonged to the foundation, but the fact so much from Hunter was on it could mean he misappropriated the laptop. Although he could have come into possession of it legitimately – it could have been set aside for recycling for instance, and then retrieved by Hunter, or it could have been given to him for foundation use, except he didn’t use it for that purpose very much, if at all.

    Maybe too many other people use computers for other than intended purposes for Bannon or whoever to dream up this accusation. Like many people treat pencils.

    Sammy Finkelman (a69e24)


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