2020 General Presidential Election Thread

[Non Sequitur]

Never let a heavily followed Twitter account go to waste!

The veil is much thinner than I imagined.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I guess a senator that votes 90+% with the president's agenda doesn't strike me as particularly anti-Trump. Maybe you disagree somehow- I don't care.

Good call. Only by switching party affiliations and voting against Republican issues can we know that Mitt is genuinely anti-trump. Until then he should be despised by both republicans and democrats.

I saw a trump video clip the other day where trump said that hitler was a horrible person. I guess I need to become a hitler fan now to maintain my bonafides.

[myboynoah]

He's doing it.

Trump says Postal Service needs money for mail-in voting, but he’ll keep blocking funding

President Trump says the U.S. Postal Service is incapable of facilitating mail-in voting because it cannot access the emergency funding he is blocking, and made clear that requests for additional aid were nonstarters in coronavirus relief negotiations.

Trump, who has been railing against mail-in balloting for months, said the cash-strapped agency’s enlarged role in the November election would perpetuate “one of the greatest frauds in history.” Speaking Wednesday at his daily pandemic news briefing, Trump said he would not approve $25 billion in emergency funding for the Postal Service, or $3.5 billion in supplemental funding for election resources, citing prohibitively high costs.

“They don’t have the money to do the universal mail-in voting. So therefore, they can’t do it, I guess,” Trump said. “Are they going to do it even if they don’t have the money?”

[frank ryan]

This postal service stuff is scary. Trump/GOP sabotaging the system to interfere with the vote is something Putin or Maduro would do. People should be a lot more alarmed.

[Eddie]

He's doing it.

Trump says Postal Service needs money for mail-in voting, but he’ll keep blocking funding

Someone needs to ask Trump when he decided that absentee voters shouldn't have their votes count.

Moron still doesn't see that absentee and mail in is essentially the same thing.

[Moliere]

I find it odd that given our level of technology these days that mail-in voting is still a thing. I can do pretty much everything online. I recently moved my entire retirement account from one bank to another and did it all online without showing ID to anybody or physically signing anything. I've setup bank accounts for my kids and none of them have ever been inside a bank branch. I cast my proxy votes for investments I own. why can't we get an even more advanced method of voting by doing it online? Seems like it would be at least as secure as mail-in voting.

And how come the USPS can deliever 20 pieces of junk mail to my mailbox (and everyone else on my street) every week with no issue but they are going to struggle to handle delivering one ballot over the course of several weeks. The whole thing sounds odd and it seems like the left is using this as a way to get more funding for the USPS, which funding likely isn't necessary to handle mail-in voting.

[UVACoug]

I find it odd that given our level of technology these days that mail-in voting is still a thing. I can do pretty much everything online. I recently moved my entire retirement account from one bank to another and did it all online without showing ID to anybody or physically signing anything. I've setup bank accounts for my kids and none of them have ever been inside a bank branch. I cast my proxy votes for investments I own. why can't we get an even more advanced method of voting by doing it online? Seems like it would be at least as secure as mail-in voting.

And how come the USPS can deliever 20 pieces of junk mail to my mailbox (and everyone else on my street) every week with no issue but they are going to struggle to handle delivering one ballot over the course of several weeks. The whole thing sounds odd and it seems like the left is using this as a way to get more funding for the USPS, which funding likely isn't necessary to handle mail-in voting.

Junk mail, of course, is paid for by private advertising dollars. But I agree that the numbers don't make any sense. Why would it cost $3.5 Billion to facilitate mail-in voting? That's almost $23 per registered voter in the United States. And what does the $25 Billion in emergency funding have to do with everything? Is the USPS really on the verge of shutting down within 90 days if it doesn't get that money? I doubt it ... if so, there'd be a lot more attention to that crisis.

I'm concerned about Trump's rhetoric regarding mail-in voting, but a lot of this sounds like fear mongering more than anything. Are states not paying their own postage costs for mailing out ballots?

[beefytee]

I find it odd that given our level of technology these days that mail-in voting is still a thing. I can do pretty much everything online. I recently moved my entire retirement account from one bank to another and did it all online without showing ID to anybody or physically signing anything. I've setup bank accounts for my kids and none of them have ever been inside a bank branch. I cast my proxy votes for investments I own. why can't we get an even more advanced method of voting by doing it online? Seems like it would be at least as secure as mail-in voting.

The reason those private online systems work is because the businesses are willing to eat the fraud and "mistake" costs that are associated with more convenience for the customer/shareholders, not really an option for elections that take place.

Also having a paper trail is a huge preventer of fraud on a large scale. It is relatively easy to manipulate 1 and 0's that are exposed to the internet somehow. Much harder to add/remove/change a large number of paper ballots.

I really like the optical scanned votes (mail-in or otherwise). Straight forward, easy to understand and verify by hand, and counting is super quick and accurate.

[Uncle Ted]

This postal service stuff is scary. Trump/GOP sabotaging the system to interfere with the vote is something Putin or Maduro would do. People should be a lot more alarmed.

The USPS loses my sh*t all the time or delivers it to my neighbors. I get my neighbors important mail as well. Once I got their passports. Yes, the USPS is scary stuff and shouldn't be trusted with anything important.

[Eddie]

I'm still waiting on a new debit card the bank mailed out to me a while back. They called me to ask if I'd moved, because it was returned to them with "moved" written on the envelope in sharpie. They're going to drop it in a new envelope and try again.

The USPS does an OK job - but I can't help but believe it's an element of government that could do better with privatization. Even if the government still pays for most of it, but contracts out the work.

[Uncle Ted]

I find it odd that given our level of technology these days that mail-in voting is still a thing. I can do pretty much everything online. I recently moved my entire retirement account from one bank to another and did it all online without showing ID to anybody or physically signing anything. I've setup bank accounts for my kids and none of them have ever been inside a bank branch. I cast my proxy votes for investments I own. why can't we get an even more advanced method of voting by doing it online? Seems like it would be at least as secure as mail-in voting.

And how come the USPS can deliever 20 pieces of junk mail to my mailbox (and everyone else on my street) every week with no issue but they are going to struggle to handle delivering one ballot over the course of several weeks. The whole thing sounds odd and it seems like the left is using this as a way to get more funding for the USPS, which funding likely isn't necessary to handle mail-in voting.

Computer security experts constantly state that online voting can't be made secure and trusted. You would think that of all companies Apple could make something secure and "trusted". Well, it is a really hard problem. For example, they went to all this trouble to build, in hardware, a "secure enclave" that keeps all your important stuff, like passwords and credit card numbers, safe but then those Chinese f'kers hack it. Basturds.

[Commando]

Good call. Only by switching party affiliations and voting against Republican issues can we know that Mitt is genuinely anti-trump. Until then he should be despised by both republicans and democrats.

I saw a trump video clip the other day where trump said that hitler was a horrible person. I guess I need to become a hitler fan now to maintain my bonafides.

Derp.

[frank ryan]

The USPS loses my sh*t all the time or delivers it to my neighbors. I get my neighbors important mail as well. Once I got their passports. Yes, the USPS is scary stuff and shouldn't be trusted with anything important.

So you aren’t addressing the part about Trump sabotaging the system to game the election. Makes sense. You’re a 5th ave Trump voter, even if you pretend it’s for the lolz.

Also USPS is pretty great. Thanks for your anecdote.

[Uncle Ted]

I get a lot of mail and rarely lose anything. I buy coins, and the USPS has been stellar.

I even have Informed Delivery, which tells me what letters I should get. I get pictures of all my mail. I would say I don't get one letter a quarter or so but one of my neighbors letters instead. The only good thing about the USPS around here is that I live in an old part of town where we don't have mailboxes. They bring all our mail up to our door and stick it into a mail slot, which is nice.

[Jeff Lebowski]

I even have Informed Delivery, which tells me what letters I should get. I get pictures of all my mail. I would say I don't get one letter a quarter or so but one of my neighbors letters instead. The only good thing about the USPS around here is that I live in an old part of town where we don't have mailboxes. They bring all our mail up to our door and stick it into a mail slot, which is nice.

Me too. I love it.

One time I saw that I was getting a letter from an attorney, but it never showed up. Three weeks later our neighbor brought it over. They delivered it to the wrong house.