2020 US Election (Part Two)

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Votes cast are minds that cannot change, so early votes represent Biden at his strongest.
Isn't that true for Trump as well? Or are you saying that Trump voters are less sure they actually can stomach voting for him, and are waiting until the last minute so that they can change their mind?
The trade war, pretty sure, is permanent even if parts of it change around.
I don't know... I think a Biden administration tamps that down, and maybe even rejoins the TPP.
 
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I often caution people against assuming Puerto Rico would be a dependable Democratic power center if it became a state. Many Latinx people in the US have conservative views and would likely support the GOP if only they would stop actively trying to put their children in cages and demonizing them 24/7.
That doesn't matter. Puerto Ricans are Americans and deserve to be able to vote. How that plays strategically from a partisan perspective is a secondary concern that should have no impact whatsoever on their rights as Americans. I maintain that racism is a large factor in why Congress has felt so comfortable holding the people of PR and DC's rights hostage over partisan concerns for so long.
I think it's definitely possible for Biden to win all of those states. People see that Trump won in 2016 as evidence that all the polls were garbage when in reality they were the most accurate we've had. They were off in a few states because pollsters discounted the growing voting differences between college and non-college whites and further discounted the turnout of the latter. But overall, the polls were actually great and I have confidence the models have been improved this year which means that I think Biden is actually going to pick some of these long-shot states where he's polling even or ahead.
538 is currently placing Ohio in Biden's column (its listed as a tie). I've noticed that they always assign outright ties to one candidate or the other. I think it might be based on second or third decimal places that aren't shown in the graph.
What is an amuse bouche? This sounds great though.
Its a fancy French term for a free appetizer/hors d'oeuvre that you just get without ordering it from the menu.

It's intended to show off the restaurant's or chef's style.

That was 2018. The suppression was so bad then that it seems to have created a significant rebound where liberal-leaning voters finally realized how bad they were being suppressed and they've all gone out and registered and voted early. Some of the longest early-voting lines this year have been in Georgia and they've been full of black people specifically.
The longest line I ever waited in to vote was when I lived in Southwest Atlanta. It was hours and hours and hours. When I lived in Philadelphia, it was bad too... hours to vote, but nowhere near as bad as Atlanta. I live in mostly-white, affluent suburban neighborhood now though... so voting takes only a few minutes. It takes longer to drive to the poling place, which is incidentally, less than 1 mile away, than it does to walk in and vote... It actually takes about as long to walk to and from my car to the building, a distance of maybe 50 yards, than it does for me to check in, vote and leave. Voting in America... perfectly illustrated.
 
That doesn't matter. Puerto Ricans are Americans and deserve to be able to vote. How that plays strategically from a partisan perspective is a secondary concern that should have no impact whatsoever on their rights as Americans. I maintain that racism is a large factor in why Congress has felt so comfortable holding the people of PR and DC's rights hostage over partisan concerns for so long.

Amen.

Voting in America... perfectly illustrated.

Rates still held last we checked though. At least against those tiny counties. I'm guessing the rich burbs, generally, are what humps everything off.
 
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By every reasonable metric, we have good reason to believe that he sexually assaulted Natasha Stoynoff while his wife was pregnant.

After she was assaulted, she immediately requested advice from her mentors and she immediately quit her assignment that put her in proximity to Trump.

Pretty garbage move by Trump if true, I’m not so sure there’s much to separate it from what you describe in the last paragraph. The important point though is its wrong, just like Joe and Jill Biden cheating on the side before getting married and Hunter Biden having sex with his dead brother’ wife. I doubt it affects any of their abilities to be president. Like I opened with, I’m not sure Trump is “worse” than Joe Biden and his family.
 
I don't know... I think a Biden administration tamps that down, and maybe even rejoins the TPP.

Maybe, but those will exist to counterbalance the rising and increasingly aggressive PRC. It's not small anymore, and frankly, it's at least cusping on being able to take us straight up short of the "let's kill errrrybody!" game. The EU and NATO might be annoyed at the US telling them to man up on defense, but we actually need them to. Money spent does not equal effectiveness. Pretending that trade isn't a weapon that both the US and the PRC are happy to use on each other is shot as a concept.
 
The longest line I ever waited in to vote was when I lived in Southwest Atlanta. It was hours and hours and hours. When I lived in Philadelphia, it was bad too... hours to vote, but nowhere near as bad as Atlanta. I live in mostly-white, affluent suburban neighborhood now though... so voting takes only a few minutes. It takes longer to drive to the poling place, which is incidentally, less than 1 mile away, than it does to walk in and vote... It actually takes about as long to walk to and from my car to the building, a distance of maybe 50 yards, than it does for me to check in, vote and leave. Voting in America... perfectly illustrated.
When you were in that long line in Atlanta, was that for early voting or election day voting?
 

There’s probably some truth to this, I’m no economic expert, but Trump taking office resulted in some historic booms to the economy (both in total counting numbers and in percentages). Check out my link below to The Hill,

Errrr...Have you forgotten Clinton balanced the budget and the income of the middle class actually increased for the first time since 73?
Obama added more jobs in his last three years than Trump did before he crashed the market.
Clinton added $1,396 in billions to the debt. That was a 32% increase to the total.
https://www.thebalance.com/us-debt-by-president-by-dollar-and-percent-3306296
Under Trump, employment was at record lows and wages saw a 3-5% increase. Median household income rose by $5,000, and faster than they did under Obama. There’s actually a lot of great stuff in here about it: https://www.google.com/amp/s/thehil...eports-middle-class-americans-are-surging?amp
 
His ‘oh but percentage-wise’ should already have clued you two in to the fact that he's simply trying to spin it somehow because telling it straight up just makes him look like an idiot.
Percentage wise is just to even out differences over time from inflation. Obama and Bush are worse offenders in terms of total $ as well if it makes you feel better. Straight up enough for you?
 
Pretty garbage move by Trump if true, I’m not so sure there’s much to separate it from what you describe in the last paragraph. The important point though is its wrong, just like Joe and Jill Biden cheating on the side before getting married and Hunter Biden having sex with his dead brother’ wife. I doubt it affects any of their abilities to be president. Like I opened with, I’m not sure Trump is “worse” than Joe Biden and his family.

Did you just compare cheating to sexually assaulting someone and forcing her to risk her career.

Dude, Trump assaulted Stoynoff.

It doesn't affect his ability to be President, insofar as enough Americans want a lying sociopath in office. But don't equate cheating with sexual assault.

And that's the solid one. One sexual assault makes every additional accusation more likely.

Edit: notice that you didn't know about Stoynoff, due to your news sources
 
When you were in that long line in Atlanta, was that for early voting or election day voting?
Election day. I didn't even consider early voting back then so I don't know if it was even a thing in those days. I don't remember seeing any signs or advertising about it.
 
Election day. I didn't even consider early voting back then so I don't know if it was even a thing in those days. I don't remember seeing any signs or advertising about it.
That's why I'm really hopeful about this year's results. Democrats always lose when turnout is low but this year people are showing up weeks ahead of time, in the middle of a pandemic to vote. This shows all the signs of a massive blowout for the Democrats but we're all so scarred by 2016 that we discount the consistent good news for Biden the way people discounted the consistent bad news for Clinton.
 
Have any states allowed (pre election day) counting of mailed-in votes?
I think Florida is starting their counting early. They are actually planning on being done in time to make a call on election night. Texas as well. 538 has published a graph of what states we can expect to be done or nearly done with their counting on election night.
That's why I'm really hopeful about this year's results. Democrats always lose when turnout is low but this year people are showing up weeks ahead of time, in the middle of a pandemic to vote. This shows all the signs of a massive blowout for the Democrats but we're all so scarred by 2016 that we discount the consistent good news for Biden the way people discounted the consistent bad news for Clinton.
I heard on the news this morning that Texas has already gotten more early vote in than the total vote in 2016:eek: That's just mind-blowing. It is really shaping up to be a record-turnout election, which is historically, good news for Democrats.

Based on that 538 graph I've linked above, and 270towin's polling map. Its looking like it might be close on election night, with both candidates in about the 150 to 200 EC count range, based purely on the states that have all or nearly all their votes counted.

However, given that the majority of the states that are likely to be only partially into counting are such reliably blue states... CA, CT, NY, WA... the networks will probably feel comfortable calling those states for Biden with very little of the vote actually reported. So @Gori the Grey may actually be right that we do end up getting a call election night. As an aside, 538 has dropped Trump's chances of victory to 10%.
 
Is this story correct ?
The risk that the SC decides after the election whether the postal votes for Pennsylvania received after Nov 3 would be valid or not ?

In any case, Pennsylvania seems to be at the crossroads of a battle for the election results. The Republicans unsuccessfully filed a case with the Supreme Court to invalidate the receipt of postal votes after Nov. 3, something the Electoral Commission has allowed. Immediately after Amy Coney Barrett was named the new Chief Justice, Trump's party tried a second time. The court did not accept the case this time. Coney Barrett did not agree, because she had not yet been able to delve into the matter.

So far so good
but

Validity
But the Pennsylvania verdict had a tail end. The Supreme Court said that it would consider the validity of late votes after the elections. This could even mean that the rules of the game change afterwards. The notes will now be sorted into two stacks, one before and one after November 3. The same thing happens in Winsconsin. Those second piles may turn out to be a rock on which America's popular will breaks down. Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are decisive swing states and a lawsuit in which thousands of votes are subsequently declared invalid is conceivable.
 
One of a dozen editorials in the NYT today about what we have lost because of Trump.

The Friendships Trump Pulled Apart
  • Oct. 30, 2020, 5:00 a.m. ET
NYT said:
Many of my oldest friends are voting for President Trump on Tuesday.

They’re supporting Trump despite the arguments my pundit colleagues and I have been making — or perhaps because of them. My pro-Trump friends and readers complain that the mainstream media are biased against Trump, and thus they tune us out for being unfair and piling on. “The picture painted by the media is a caricature of the person,” said my high school buddy Dave Richardson, who voted for Trump warily in 2016 but is supporting him enthusiastically this time.

The conundrum for those of us trying to change minds is that the more urgently we shout, the less we’re heard. “We’re not stupid, gullible sheep,” one reader, Frank J., complained. “Be fair and balanced in your reporting and it would have more power.”

My childhood friend Mary Mayor likewise supported Trump and is turned off by coverage that she regards as hostile. “I’ve never known a president who has gone through so much scrutiny, overlooking all the positives he has done,” she told me. I understand why people like Mary voted for Trump. The loss of well-paying jobs devastated places like my hometown, Yamhill, Ore. Mary spent seven years homeless, lost four relatives to suicide, and herself once put a gun to her own head, before she pulled herself together with the help of a local church. Trump talked about bringing jobs back and helping ordinary workers — so she voted for the first time in her life, for Trump.

“We hoped Trump would help boost the economy and jobs,” my old friend Jani Sitton said, explaining her vote for Trump in 2016.

The challenge for opponents of Trump like myself is that our denunciations of the president sometimes backfire and help him, just as polls suggest that impeachment increased support for him (Gallup shows him with his highest presidential approval numbers after being impeached). As Jani said: “The condescension from very loud and aggressive Trump critics has contributed big time toward conservatives feeling sympathy for him.”

So in my last column before Election Day, let me explain as respectfully as I can why I’m so worked up about this election. It’s partly because I believe that Trump is a charlatan who preys on my friends who trust him. Trump’s own sister has said he is a liar with “no principles,” and his former chief of staff Gen. John Kelly reportedly referred to him as “the most flawed person” he has known.

So if I’m passionate, it’s because I feel he has exploited my friends and then betrayed them with his policies. How can a president be called “pro-life” when he has presided over the deaths of more than 225,000 Americans from Covid-19 and still doesn’t have a strategy to fight it? Trump is also working to take away health insurance from my friends: Already, the number of Americans with health insurance has dropped by 5.2 million since Trump took office, and he is trying to completely overturn the Affordable Care Act right after the election.

I’m a great believer in community, in the idea that what makes countries strong is “social capital” — the web of relationships, beliefs, trust, decency and identity that make a society work. Trump has taken this social fabric and acted as the Great Unraveler. He replaces accepted facts with lies, baseless accusations, support for QAnon and even a conspiracy theory that President Barack Obama had SEAL Team 6 killed instead of Osama bin Laden. In both supporters and opponents, Trump nurtures hate. He is what Proverbs 6:19 calls “a person who stirs up conflict in the community.”

Trump has been a corrosive acid on America’s social capital. He has cost us trust. He has dissolved our connectivity. I understand now why kindergarten teachers sometimes want to remove a loudmouth bully who disrupts the class and leaves it dysfunctional. That is what Trump has done to our democracy. For much of my career, I’ve written about national security, from Afghanistan to North Korea, China to Iran. But great nations more often rot from within than suffer defeat from outside, and Trump is exacerbating longstanding divisions and weaknesses in this country.

So to those who think I suffer from “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” let me explain — with respect, but also urgency — that my intensity arises because I see Trump as not just a phony but also a threat. He has left the United States a more turbulent and divided nation, one close to war with itself. Today the greatest threat I perceive to America’s national security isn’t from Qaeda terrorists, Russian cyberattacks or Chinese missiles. As I see it, it’s from Trump’s re-election.

This is when conversations with friends become awkward. I may think that Trump bamboozled my pals, and they may think I’m manipulated by leftist propaganda, but we all have agency — and we each think the other is using that agency to endanger a country we all love. I doubt I’ll change many minds. But the only thing I can do is reach out in a good-faith effort to undecided voters.

Sometimes it works. Jani, a committed Christian, has worried about Democrats and abortion. But this time she will vote for Biden because she’s appalled at Trump’s policies toward migrants, Black Lives Matter and health care, and because “God cares about oppression, justice, the voiceless.”

As Jani goes, so, I hope, will the nation.
 
I think that it should be kept as simple as possible, which is why I personally have no issue with not allowing votes which arrived after Nov3. THAT SAID:
I am sure some in the US would love to artificially make sure some votes arrive late, so maybe a better idea is to allow votes by sending time (within reason; you can't expect the letter to arrive if you sent it one minute before Nov4).
 
I think that it should be kept as simple as possible, which is why I personally have no issue with not allowing votes which arrived after Nov3. THAT SAID:
I am sure some in the US would love to artificially make sure some votes arrive late, so maybe a better idea is to allow votes by sending time (within reason; you can't expect the letter to arrive if you sent it one minute before Nov4).
Much of the problem is that Trump's man at the head of the Postal system has been working to slow down the mail so votes arrive late.
 
Much of the problem is that Trump's man at the head of the Postal system has been working to slow down the mail so votes arrive late.

I also fear there will be various issues with people claiming letters weren't prepared according to the rules. I am not sure if the US is actually ready for this election - recall the farce at Iowa.
 
I think that it should be kept as simple as possible, which is why I personally have no issue with not allowing votes which arrived after Nov3. THAT SAID:
I am sure some in the US would love to artificially make sure some votes arrive late, so maybe a better idea is to allow votes by sending time (within reason; you can't expect the letter to arrive if you sent it one minute before Nov4).

Can't use arrival time, cuz of unexpected local delays. Most will declare a due-by postmark date.
 
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