POTUS/General Election Thread 2020 + Aftermath

**ReluctantSamurai** · 07-19-2020, 03:59

I don't pay much attention to polls, just a big distraction, IMHO. What bodes dire for Fearless Leader is that since 1900, only one president has ever won a second term when a recession started in the last term of presidency...William McKinley in 1900.

https://www.newsweek.com/heres-all-p...ssions-1493467

Since then, the four presidents who ran for a second term during such an economic downturn—William Taft in 1912, Herber Hoover in 1932, Jimmy Carter in 1980 and George H.W. Bush in 1992—were unsuccessful.

Old article, but the warning is the same...nothing sways voters like a recession.

Similar article in Bloomberg:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...year-recession

The sudden turnaround in the labor market raised the possibility that the economy could grow fast enough between now and November for Trump to defy the historical record and win another term.

I don't know which Kool-Aid Bloomberg was drinking to make that statement, as it took at least four years to climb out of the last recession in 2008, and the economic situation in the US is tied to the pandemic like flies on on dung heap. And it isn't getting better anytime soon.

**Montmorency** · 07-19-2020, 04:17

Originally Posted by ReluctantSamurai

I don't pay much attention to polls, just a big distraction, IMHO. What bodes dire for Fearless Leader is that since 1900, only one president has ever won a second term when a recession started in the last term of presidency...William McKinley in 1900.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/17/polit...ump/index.html

The official portraits of former Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were removed from the Grand Foyer of the White House within the last week, aides told CNN, and replaced by those of two Republican presidents who served more than a century ago.

White House tradition calls for portraits of the most recent American presidents to be given the most prominent placement, in the entrance of the executive mansion, visible to guests during official events.
That was the case through at least July 8, when President Donald Trump welcomed Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. The two stood in the Cross Hall of the White House and made remarks, with the portraits of Clinton and Bush essentially looking on as they had been throughout Trump's first term. But in the days after after that, the Clinton and Bush portraits were moved into the Old Family Dining Room, a small, rarely used room that is not seen by most visitors. That places the paintings well outside of Trump's vantage point in the White House. In their previous location, the pictures would have been seen daily as Trump descends the staircase from his third floor private residence or when he hosts events on the state floor of the White House. Now, they hang in a space used mainly for storing unused tablecloths and furniture. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The portrait of former President Barack Obama is not expected to be unveiled for a formal ceremony during Trump's first term, a sign of the bitter relationship between the 44th and 45th presidents. Trump has accused Obama of unsubstantiated and unspecified crimes, and has questioned whether Obama was born in the US for years.

The Bush portrait has been replaced by that of William McKinley, the nation's 25th president, who was assassinated in 1901, and the Clinton portrait has been replaced by one of Theodore Roosevelt, who succeeded McKinley, three people who have seen the portraits this week tell CNN. Trump has shown more of an affinity for those predecessors than his more recent ones.