2020 General Presidential Election Thread

[Flystripper]

Or maybe just acknowledging that the virus was real and not going to miraculously disappear or be cured by main lining ultraviolet bleach.

I am a complete Trump hater and his administration's COVID response has been atrocious, contributing to the loss of life as well as the prolonged main street economic hardships, but I will also acknowledge that it is not as simplistic as the narrative suggests.

There are so many reasons to vote against Trump. These two issues are just added to a long list of reasons.

[Katy Lied]

I think the belief is that if the shutdown was dramatic and complete early on, we would be on the other side of this and unemployment would be improving. I don't know how true that is, but I think that is the simplistic opinion.

Just look at Hawaii. They are on the most isolated rock on the planet. They had the power to effect a complete shutdown, and they did. But now they are going into crisis. All they did was flatten the curve (which is exactly what they were supposed to do). But in flattening and slowing the curve, they were lulled into not gearing up testing, not inventorying and assessing ventilators, and various supposed paliative drugs, so they squandered their political capital just as surely as Utah did. This is where states could help each other-- teach states where the epidemic has not yet started what happened to your state, and how you solved it. This approach was flattened by Trump's insistence that this was a state problem, and state governors were on their own. Trump turned this into a zero sum game between 50 states, rather than collaboratively learning and helping fellow states. In game theory parlance, this is a public good. No governor can separate his own citizens from venturing into hot spots, nor can he prevent others coming from virus ridden states from entering. Only Hawaii could do that. And their draconian rules made no sense. Walk across the sand to dive into the water, and you're ok. Stop on your way to put down your towel and gear, or pick up a piece of trash, and get arrested. Lifting weights at the gym: ok. Lifting weights at a park: get arrested. Pickup basketball indoors: ok. Pickup basketball at an outdoor court: get arrested. One lady was walking her dog and stopped at the COVID warning sign at the park to understand what can be done and cannot be done: arrested to stopping in the park. Flying in from another island or the mainland? 2 weeks quarantine, unless you're a student. Then wheee! away you go mask-free onto campus.

[Commando]

I think the belief is that if the shutdown was dramatic and complete early on, we would be on the other side of this and unemployment would be improving. I don't know how true that is, but I think that is the simplistic opinion.

Look at other countries' serious responses compared to our lukewarm patchwork bullshit non-response and see how we compare. 8 hard weeks would have been a much easier bounce-back than 6 months of whatever the fuck we've been trying to do.

[Uncle Ted]

The GOP should be incredibly ashamed they have given any legitimacy to Qanon. That's some Idiocracy shit right there.



They truly are and have been. The hrrr drrr Russia crowd just spits out Barr's letter about no conspiracy. Mueller didn't find enough evidence of a criminal conspiracy for charges, it's not that he found zero. He was also Stonewalled by Trump's people some of whom dodged subpoenas and somehow never ended up testifying. Mueller's ability to investigate was severely limited. It was not like previous folks before him like Ken Starr. We've never learned about what a counter-intelligence investigation into Trump uncovered.
The Trump-Russia connections have always been there, and increasingly there are now Russia-GOP connections.

Good job, Frank, of staying focused...

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[Jeff Lebowski]

Good job, Frank, of staying focused...

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Lol. I never get tired of that meme.

[Uncle Ted]

Vernon Jones ain't black... https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/25/opini...nes/index.html

[Uncle Ted]

WTF? Joe is after your nest eggs!

Joe Biden Promises To End Traditional 401(k)-Style Retirement Savings Tax Benefits. What’s That Mean?
[...]
So what did that proposal suggest? It included a variety of options, including

• Reducing total available pre-tax savings (employer and employee) from (at the time) $51,000 to only the lesser of $20,000 or 20% of pay;
• Expanding the currently relatively-small “Saver’s Credit” (equal to 50% of the first $2,000 in retirement savings, only for relatively lower earners, up to $$19,500 for singles, $39,000 for couples; and phasing out quickly, to 20%, 10%, and ultimately nothing for singles with $32,500/couples with $65,000 in income) to stay at 50% for higher earners and phase out in a much more gradual manner instead; or
• Wholly removing any tax benefit for retirement savings and provide a credit of 25% instead (often this proposal includes a limit to the credit; this particular proposal doesn’t specify such; also, note that this was prior to the 2017 tax law which dropped tax rates).

[...]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ebauer/.../#ece8a864eb08

Moli, please use your super accountant skills and explain what this means.

[Commando]

You still think Russia is a thing? LOL

Is this your entire position, or just a quip? That U.S. intelligence that verified Russian interference on Trump's behalf is made up?

[Goatnapper'96]

I am a complete Trump hater and his administration's COVID response has been atrocious, contributing to the loss of life as well as the prolonged main street economic hardships, but I will also acknowledge that it is not as simplistic as the narrative suggests.

There are so many reasons to vote against Trump. These two issues are just added to a long list of reasons.

Trump's inability to communicate and his tendency to make shit up/lie as a shortcoming was highlighted during the Covid response. However, I think anyone who believes there would be any substantive difference with anyone else as President is stoned on tribalism. I think the various entities dealing with Covid, both public and private, would have done exactly the same things and that is far more how this is dealt than the bloviating ramblings of Donald Trump.

But if you already hated Donald Trump certainly there was nothing but reinforcement as he talked his talk while the rest of the world scrambled to figure this thing out. A President's job is to keep the nation focused during a crisis and Trump clearly is unfit to do that and would be unfit to do it under any circumstances, but I think our people don't want to be unified so nobody could do what the people don't want.

I think Trump is more our future than we are willing to recognize.

[wapiti]

Is this your entire position, or just a quip? That U.S. intelligence that verified Russian interference on Trump's behalf is made up?

It's old news, dramatically overstated by those with TDS, and mostly understated by MAGA supporters. It's over and time to move on.

[Commando]

Trump's inability to communicate and his tendency to make shit up/lie as a shortcoming was highlighted during the Covid response. However, I think anyone who believes there would be any substantive difference with anyone else as President is stoned on tribalism. I think the various entities dealing with Covid, both public and private, would have done exactly the same things and that is far more how this is dealt than the bloviating ramblings of Donald Trump.

But if you already hated Donald Trump certainly there was nothing but reinforcement as he talked his talk while the rest of the world scrambled to figure this thing out. A President's job is to keep the nation focused during a crisis and Trump clearly is unfit to do that and would be unfit to do it under any circumstances, but I think our people don't want to be unified so nobody could do what the people don't want.

I think Trump is more our future than we are willing to recognize.

Wrong. This administration was scrambling to put a national response in place and was on track to do so by early April, despite the late start. Trump squashed it b/c he was seeing that covid was hitting mainly Democratic population centers and decided to go ahead and let the Democratic governors and mayors take the blame and that it would be politically dumb to help them. You think any other president in our history would have kicked the ball to the individual states and silenced/contradicted the national experts and downplayed the virus like this, never wearing a mask? That's pretty cynical.

[Commando]

It's old news, dramatically overstated by those with TDS, and mostly understated by MAGA supporters. It's over and time to move on.

Agreed, except that they are doing it again with renewed vigor, right? Is this just a non-starter for people who want Trump to win anyway? I think this severely colors our relationship with Russia, or OUGHT to. Why does Trump act like he's best butt buddies with Putin? I'm baffled by this. Would it be so bad for our president to stick up for America? He'll stick a finger in Canada's eye- no problem- but he won't even look at Putin sideways. What is going on there?

[wapiti]

Agreed, except that they are doing it again with renewed vigor, right? Is this just a non-starter for people who want Trump to win anyway?

I was unaware that they are doing it again. Its not surprising that Russia is meddling, but I would be surprised if it were coordinated with the Trump campaign in any way. Regardless, I don't think Russian meddling is very effective. That's the reason its a non-starter with most people.

[Flystripper]

Trump's inability to communicate and his tendency to make shit up/lie as a shortcoming was highlighted during the Covid response. However, I think anyone who believes there would be any substantive difference with anyone else as President is stoned on tribalism. I think the various entities dealing with Covid, both public and private, would have done exactly the same things and that is far more how this is dealt than the bloviating ramblings of Donald Trump.

But if you already hated Donald Trump certainly there was nothing but reinforcement as he talked his talk while the rest of the world scrambled to figure this thing out. A President's job is to keep the nation focused during a crisis and Trump clearly is unfit to do that and would be unfit to do it under any circumstances, but I think our people don't want to be unified so nobody could do what the people don't want.

I think Trump is more our future than we are willing to recognize.

I am not a tribal democrat at all . I have voted republican for most of my life. What is said and done by the POTUS matters. 50% of this country didn't take COVID seriously at all and much of that you can lay at the feet of Trump. We don't know what a somber aggressive federal response would have accomplished in the US because we didn't get that response. We do know what happened when we didn't get that though.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Trump's inability to communicate and his tendency to make shit up/lie as a shortcoming was highlighted during the Covid response. However, I think anyone who believes there would be any substantive difference with anyone else as President is stoned on tribalism. I think the various entities dealing with Covid, both public and private, would have done exactly the same things and that is far more how this is dealt than the bloviating ramblings of Donald Trump.

But if you already hated Donald Trump certainly there was nothing but reinforcement as he talked his talk while the rest of the world scrambled to figure this thing out. A President's job is to keep the nation focused during a crisis and Trump clearly is unfit to do that and would be unfit to do it under any circumstances, but I think our people don't want to be unified so nobody could do what the people don't want.

I think Trump is more our future than we are willing to recognize.

I disagree with just about all of this.