POTUS/General Election Thread 2020 + Aftermath

[Hooahguy]

Interesting polling coming out of Michigan regarding demographic movement-

"There has been a major shift among voters over the age of 65 towards Joe Biden. Older voters now support Biden over Trump by a margin of 59.1%-29.2% -- a nearly 30-point lead for Joe Biden. Biden led senior voters by 7.5% in the Post-Convention survey. Senior voters have shifted by 22 points since early September."

Fascinating. Would not have thought the debate would impact that much. Also crucial since senior citizens are one of the more reliable voting groups.

On another topic, a friend of mine brought this up to me: what happens if Covid takes its toll on Trump and he dies right before the election, or otherwise incapacitated? And With less than a month to go, anything can happen. I guess Pence would take his spot but Im not sure how it would really impact the race. Would the trumpists be turned off because their leader is gone or would they be driven even more to "avenge" him? I could see some violence happening if he dies, as I've seen some trumpists say that they think the Dems purposely infected Trump with Covid.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Interesting polling coming out of Michigan regarding demographic movement-

"There has been a major shift among voters over the age of 65 towards Joe Biden. Older voters now support Biden over Trump by a margin of 59.1%-29.2% -- a nearly 30-point lead for Joe Biden. Biden led senior voters by 7.5% in the Post-Convention survey. Senior voters have shifted by 22 points since early September."

Fascinating. Would not have thought the debate would impact that much. Also crucial since senior citizens are one of the more reliable voting groups.

On another topic, a friend of mine brought this up to me: what happens if Covid takes its toll on Trump and he dies right before the election, or otherwise incapacitated? And With less than a month to go, anything can happen. I guess Pence would take his spot but Im not sure how it would really impact the race. Would the trumpists be turned off because their leader is gone or would they be driven even more to "avenge" him? I could see some violence happening if he dies, as I've seen some trumpists say that they think the Dems purposely infected Trump with Covid.

Right-wing terrorists groups would get violent. They just lost their figurehead. Turnout would collapse at the polls since Trump is the Republican party and there is no one who could fill in the enthusiasm gap.
It's not really a hot take to say that when the leader dies, voters get disillusioned.

[ReluctantSamurai]

All the above groups probably in the main don't have a fixed view on the whole mask / COVID thing. And so probably would have followed his lead.

And they've just been "told" that even if you have contracted COVID-19, and while still contagious, it's ok to “Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life.” Sez the man who's received world-class health care, while at the same time trying to repeal the health care for millions of Americans.

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...health-empathy

Even if we don’t believe in science, even if we don’t believe in the virus, even if don’t believe in the efficacy of wearing masks, we might, it seems to me, have adopted some version of Pascal’s famous wager. Though the existence of God cannot be definitively proven, posited the 17th-century philosopher, it would be wise to assume and behave as if God does exist: an attitude with no downside (except the fear of sin) and a host of likely benefits (heaven). Regardless of our stance on the course and prevention of the pandemic, why not take the gamble: wear a mask, keep our distance – and protect the lives of other people? But this response presupposes that we care about the lives of other people.

We’d like to believe that suffering instructs and ennobles; that our grief, fear and pain increases our sympathy for the grief, fear and pain of others. But again, Donald Trump seems to be ineducable, impervious to shame, guilt, or any sense of personal responsibility, unaffected by anything except vanity, selfishness and reckless self-regard. Certainly, the experience of having his blood oxygen level drop so low that supplemental oxygen was required must have been alarming, and yet the president continues to believe that bluster is the best medicine.

Unaffected by his illness, undaunted by his own experience, the president’s insistence on putting his own bombastic self-display above the welfare of others reached a new low on Sunday, when he decided to order up in his armor-plated, hermetically sealed SUV and be driven past his supporters outside the hospital, to “pay a little surprise to some of the great patriots we have out on the street”.

Does Trump care? Apparently not. Nothing – not illness, not danger, not the prospect of death – can diminish his posturing, his hubris, his sense of invincibility, his unconscionable lack of concern for others. Waving and smiling, somewhat wanly, at his fans, he cemented his position as – according to a recent study – the number one source of misinformation about the dangers of the virus. And that may be yet another way in which he and his supporters are super-spreaders, discrediting science, widely circulating the idea that we have absolutely no responsibility for the life and safety of our fellow humans and for the planet on which we live – an attitude that may prove to be even more dangerous, more catastrophic the deadliest plague.

Being that it's too early to say whether Trump lives or dies, it's also probably too early for the Dems to hammer all of this home, despite the fact that had roles been reversed with Biden, he'd have been chirping the whole time about how weak Biden was. If he lives, the Dems better be using a five pound ball peen hammer to illustrate this unconscionable behavior.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

270 to win is now shifted toward Biden. However, a number of the polls that include third party candidates are within the margin of error, including PA, which they list as leans Biden. Trafalgar group consistently shows the tightest numbers, though these numbers have slipped over the last week.

[Montmorency]

Inside Trumpworld, the shock of Trump’s hospitalization is giving way to despair about his prospects in the upcoming election. “They all know it’s over,” a Republican close to the campaign said. “This is spiraling out of control,” a former West Wing official said. Some Trump allies are entertaining conspiracy theories that the White House outbreak was caused by someone with political motives. “It’s weird that all these Republicans are getting it,” a prominent Republican told me. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on. But one thing I’ve learned is: when something major happens thirty days before an election, it usually has to do with the election.” (There is no evidence for this wild claim).

Meanwhile, America’s closest allies are entertaining wild scenarios as well. An outside White House adviser told me that a high-level government official from a G-7 country asked him if Trump would try to appoint Ivanka president instead of Mike Pence. “He’s broken every norm so far, so they think anything is possible,” the source said.

There's a reason Republican partisans and electeds in particular reject the science of epidemiology to the degree that they behave like it's what they believe, even when it puts themselves at risk and Trump isn't even looking: they believe it.

Orwellian doublethink is almost a definitional product and feature of conservative evangelical faith, but it's not strictly associated with the "[religious] faith" element of it. See:

Federalist: How Strong Women Like Amy Coney Barrett Submit To Their Husbands With Joy (the mind boggles at the allusions)
Trump campaign: Trump campaign attacks Joe Biden for not having COVID-19 ("He has experience now fighting the coronavirus as an individual. Those firsthand experiences — Joe Biden, he doesn't have those.")
Fox: Fox host: Trump “took the risk, he got the virus," because “he was doing it for us” (Greg Gutfeld: “He was going to walk out there on that battlefield with you, and not sit somewhere in a basement”)

Republican voters continue to believe that Republican politicians intend to create/protect health insurance protections for people with pre-existing conditions (as Obamacare did), despite it being a formal and explicit and frequently-attempted policy plank of the Republican Party since 2010 - now Trump admin - to eliminate these protections.


@ samurai: I take your point that on an issue without pre-existing political salience, such as public health protocols, Trump's signalling could set the tone for tens of millions one way or another. However, don't forget the fifth column that is conservative media here. We know Fox and the like experimented with a variety of coverage styles in March, including advocacy for masks and shutdowns, but in the end what we have are lethal propaganda mills that refine and amplify the President's emotional message far better than he could ever articulate.


I guess I'll tune in to tomorrow's debate, just because it is arguably worthwhile to watch our very plausible 2024 candidate perform. I hope she plays a similar role to Biden in 2012 vs. Paul Ryan.

GET HIS ASS HARRIS. If the country can take a woman Veep/President (OK, fine, debatable), then it can take a woman GETTING HIS ASS.*

*Re: Observations that a woman in Biden's position would have received disapprobation for telling Trump to "shut up" (Biden received a notable, in some polls outstanding, boost in the polls for his debate showing). If the observation is true, it's outrageous BS that sets my teeth on edge. Now we have an excellent opportunity to test the case, and hopefully far beyond.

(To be completely sober-minded about it, the Biden campaign will probably have decided from the past experience that sheepish restraint serves their brand better than loosing the attack dog would. So I don't honestly think my preferences will be met in the VP debate, possibly for good reason, but on some level it's a darn shame.)

270 to win is now shifted toward Biden. However, a number of the polls that include third party candidates are within the margin of error, including PA, which they list as leans Biden. Trafalgar group consistently shows the tightest numbers, though these numbers have slipped over the last week.

More reliable polls have shown results like Biden +14 nationally, +8-11 among likely voters in Pennsylvania, and at a supermajority among the +65 demographic. Much of this movement has been since September, or even since the debate.

It really does feel like we're going to get that landslide most of us have been anticipating since at least the beginning of 2020. Even with all the opposition's active measures, a 54-44 blowout looks quite plausible (and there's no turning those numbers around in the EC).

I can't stress this enough: Trump is almost as bad at politics as he is at business.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Republican voters continue to believe that Republican politicians intend to create/protect health insurance protections for people with pre-existing conditions (as Obamacare did), despite it being a formal and explicit and frequently-attempted policy plank of the Republican Party since 2010 - now Trump admin - to eliminate these protections.

What many GOP supporters, outside of the ultra-conservative evangelicals, don't realize is that their own party could care less about them. You have this abject moron stating that "[...] ill or medically infirm senators [will be] wheeled in to cast critical votes on the Senate floor." [referring to the confirmation vote for Amy Coney Barrett]

https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/to.../05/id/990458/

Combine that with Fearless Leader just cancelling COVID stimulus talks until after the election, and voila, the Republicans just flipped the bird to a large proportion of their constituency. He just gave the Dems a great big target to use.

https://www.theguardian.com/business...mulus-election

Are you kidding me?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I would not be surprised at a 55 to 42 vote in the popular vote.

The issue is that cadre of 6-7 swing states. Most/all of them show Biden with a lead of 3-7% but the margins of error vary and one or two feature a number of undecideds.

To be fair, 2016 featured far more undecideds at this juncture, Trump had no record to hang around his neck, and nobody hates Biden as they do H. Clinton.

I am hopeful -- but guarded.


Sadly, I do NOT see the GOP losing 40 house seats, 10 senate seats, and an extra third of the governerships. Which I would LIKE to see so that the GOP is forced to reboot.