…remember when the weekends used to be fun?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/07/19/coronavirus-us-failure/
…I mean the regular kind of fun…the kind where you hit the ground running on a monday morning because you feel so much better for the days that preceeded it
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/we-re-fighting-our-own-state-southern-mayors-push-back-n1234280
https://nyti.ms/clearly-the-virus-isn-t-the-only-problem-video
…maybe it’s just me…but this morning that feels like it was a long time ago…not that that necessarily bestows any particular virtue…yadda yadda, learn yadda yadda, history yadda yadda doomed yadda yadda, repeat
…sure that may not be until next month but I read it over the weekend & couldn’t remember if it had already surfaced in a DOT so if the cap fits & all that sort of thing
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/black-residents-oppose-trump-s-visit-jacksonville-anniversary-ax-handle-saturday
…& in this case the MAGA hat most definitely fits…I don’t buy any argument that the orange sack of polysaturated fat is too ignorant & too entirely self-absorbed to have any understanding of the dog whistle potential of that piece of scheduling
…or at least I don’t see it as having enough substance to outweigh the fact that the cavalcade of misbegotten misanthropy that suckles the superannuated infant through its solipsistic senescence manifestly has among its number those who not only do but pride themselves on the fact
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/roger-stone-calls-black-radio-host-racial-slur-air-n1234303
…because those are the sorts of people it takes to decide to fudge the numbers on a fucking pandemic to inflate their chances of staying out of the fucking jail they know their asses ought to be rotting in
https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2020/07/18/white-house-testing-budget-cdc-coronavirus
…of course, that last lot of relief came through more substantial in some instances than others & it’s sort of interesting to see how that broke down
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ppp-loan-map-2020-n1233849
…& even then it doesn’t necessarily come off all that well by comparison
…but for all that Joe seems to be doing a reasonable impression of the rope-a-dope manouvre
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/07/19/president-is-very-proud-he-can-count-backward
…those poll numbers don’t look as firm as one might like
…sure there’s a lot of favorable-sounding numbers thrown around but if you shave it down to the demographics that handed the electoral college over last time & the states on which the whole thing turned it doesn’t sound sure enough to feel certain…& then there’s the other kind of certainty
Today, 75 percent of adults and 86 percent of registered voters say they are certain to vote in November, the latter figure higher among registered voters than at this point in any of the past three elections. The percentage of adults who back the president and say they are certain to vote stands at 81 percent, similar to the 78 percent noted in May.
Among adults supporting Biden, 77 percent say they are certain to vote, up from 67 percent in May. There has been a bigger jump — from 51 percent to 75 percent — of Biden supporters under age 40 who say they are certain to vote.
Biden’s advantage in the head-to-head matchup against Trump shrinks when only those who say they are certain to vote are analyzed and also when only those who say they voted in 2016 are considered. Among 2016 voters who say they are certain to turn out this year, Biden’s lead shrinks to seven points (53 percent to 46 percent).
…how in the fuck is anyone not certain they’re gonna fucking vote in this thing?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/19/x-things-that-could-swing-2020-race-trumps-favor/
…I know I already went on about this…but I’m not sure anyone should be shutting up about it, to be honest
…& it always seems to come back to numbers, somehow
https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/police-target-black-men-more-taller-they-are-doesn-t-protect
…oh, yeah…& there’s always this to really make you want to irish up that coffee
[Meg here – It was requested that I “un-doom-monger” the post a bit, so here’s a puppy!!]
Speaking of Irishing up your coffee, yesterday, because of the heat wave, I just made strawberries in yogurt for breakfast. We had a little brandy hanging around so I added that. Yummy. Dessert for breakfast. Two important notes;
1. There is a dessert called Strawberries Romanoff which is like this but you use whipped cream and add sugar. Sometimes also add sour cream to make it even richer.
2. We had this huge tub of Chobani yogurt. I know a lot of people think it’s garbage yogurt. However, I always think of Gawker’s Hamilton Nolan, who was dependable to write screeds against Chobani yogurt. He was with Gawker/Splinter for years. I looked him up. He’s now a labor reporter for something called In These Times, which I had never heard of.
Just a little Gawker/Splinter class news notes.
Yesterday I looked over and Mr. McGee was polishing off what I thought was yogurt but turns out he was eating ricotta with a spoon.
This is only marginally relevant.
As a pandemic shut-in I have consumed way too much clickbait/sponsored stories. One I read recently (a slideshow, natch) was Jackie Kennedy’s favorite foods. Who knows how true any of this was. It was basically a compendium of 25 foods that a weight-conscious person, usually a woman, would have eaten in the early 60s.
One of the items on the list was fruit salad with cottage cheese. I haven’t had cottage cheese since I was very young and my mother had it around the house, but I remember liking it. I think I’m going to try that this week, if I can find any cottage cheese. I don’t think I’ll add liquor because I bet the cottage cheese would curdle.
Another semi-boozy no-bake dessert I sometimes make when it’s very hot and I’m channeling my best Sandra Lee is you buy those poundcake-like cups that people use(d) to make strawberry shortcake. Make vanilla pudding. When it’s cold add white rum and stir. Scoop into the cups, and garnish with any kind of cold fruit. If you use dark rum the pudding turns this unappealing color, which is too bad, because a dark rum, especially a spiced one, is actually better for this.
Dark rum, and a couple drops of food coloring, so that the color it purposefully different?😉
Ronas spiking all over Europe.. Belgium is still locked down…France ain’t looking so hot either
My daughter is sposed to be going to France in a couple weeks but I’m not so sure that’ll happen now….
Seems this thing ain’t going anywhere anytime soon
I’m definitely freaking out about the fact that I feel like I’m never gonna be let out of my country again.
im mostly just mourning my holiday plans….lol…
we are mostly allowed to travel about europe tho…tho…funilly enough..all the popular tourist destinations are now suddenly having spikes of rona cases…. strange that
i dont see myself traveling this year…
i hope me daughters trip doesnt get cancelled tho…shes really looking forward to her first holiday without us
how in the fuck is anyone not certain they’re gonna fucking vote in this thing?
I do not plan on voting, I can not vote for Biden. (Sorry for bold etc. not sure how that happened)
…honestly would like to know in what regard you can’t vote for Biden…but for the record that’s somewhat of a rhetorical embellishment on my part
…to me it seems like the very definition of a no-brainer to cast a vote that results in not-trump…I accept that doesn’t make it so, though
Because he doesn’t represent anything I can get behind, in fact, he represents the very opposite. Imperialism, supports shitty cops, history of systematic racism, etc. etc. etc. Trust me, I won’t vote for Trump either, I am non party affiliated, but I just can’t get behind someone who embodies so much that s wrong with the system. Biden is shit, it just so happens that he is running against someone that is all of the shit, but that doesn’t make it easier to cast a vote for shit, if ya dig. I would say, or type, that these two shits are a perfect example of how our system is broke and needs an upheaval.
And that’s how Trump wins.
Not necessarily. AWhit sounds like The Other Swing Voter. These are the people who either vote for Democrats or don’t vote at all as a result of a combination of their ambivalence toward the Democratic nominee AND the rampant voter suppression exercised by Republicans. So, if a particular voter’s feelings toward a candidate aren’t enough to overcome having to deal with the very real hurdles involved in actually having to cast a vote, then they simply do not vote. The take home message is two-fold: we have to address rampant voter suppression AND the DNC needs to keep their grimy paws off of the nominating process and let the actual voters decide who should be nominated. That’s not what’s happening–and the past two primary cycles prove that.
For my part, I’m not voting for Biden either, but that’s because I have the luxury of living in a state that even Clinton won by double digits four years ago, and Biden will win by the same margin. So, I will vote my conscience because I can. If I lived in a swing state, then sure I’d hold my nose, pull the lever for Biden and then go home and take a shower–but I don’t, so that means I do what I please and not worry about it.
There are no sure things this election. Treat every state as a statistical tie.
With all due respect, my state hasn’t voted for a Republican since 1984, and it’s share of the Dem vote hasn’t gone below 60% in 20 years. It’ll be fine.
I feel like assuming a state was “safe” was exactly how Hillary lost places like Michigan and Pennsylvania. I’m with blue collar; the only way to really ensure Trump is out of office is to vote early and to vote in numbers too large for them to manipulate. Trump doesn’t need to merely be beaten; he needs to be eviscerated. It needs to be so clear that he lost that any attempt for him to say the election was rigged look exactly as foolish as they sound. That means electoral college and popular vote.
But the only side of this coin is…I mean, the people did decide the nominee. By large numbers, the people selected Joe Biden. Does that mean the DNC didn’t want Joe Biden to win? Of course not. But in 2008, Hillary was the DNC’s chosen candidate and she still got handedly beaten by Barack Obama. Up until the South Carolina primary, Bernie was considered the frontrunner. Joe Biden straight up won, fair and square.
Now we can talk all we want about how Joe got favorable coverage and how the establishment seemed desperate for Joe to get back in the game, but the bottom line is, when all the smoke settled and the votes were tallied, Joe won, by a significant margin, and there’s little doubt that’s what the people wanted.
Except Michigan and Pennsylvania weren’t safe–the problem was that Clinton and her people were so arrogant that they refused to believe the former Sanders people when they were ringing the alarm bells–plus the fact that she barely set foot in those states and instead decided that trying to flip TX and AZ was a solid strategy. Plus, as I’ve said before, my state isn’t a swing state–it’s not even close. Clinton took it by 27 point margin. That’s as clear as can be.
Let’s please not pretend that the DNC clearing the field in 2016 to the point that Sanders was literally the only viable option to Clinton–or the fact that Pete and Amy dropping out literally two days before Super Tuesday didn’t have a significant impact on what took place on ST itself. A forced choice isn’t really much of a choice at all.
There was not “a” problem that led to Trump’s razor thin margin in multiple states that then led to him caging kids and sending unidentifiable paramilitaries to attack peaceful protestors.
It was not an “a” issue any more than you can point to “a” single reason a team lost a 5-4 game. It is sadly, tragically true that Clinton screwed up in the midwest and for that matter had unforced errors at multiple stages.
But she also suffered from the infamous “voting is for squares” attitude in that infamous Deadspin writers survey in November 2016 (Magary excepted). Lots of voters in the Midwest absorbed the nihilistic attitude of safe blue state posters online. They figured since Michigan always went for Obama, it was going for Clinton, and stayed home.
This attitude spreads like a virus. Chomsky is well aware that his vote won’t make or break Trump in Massachusetts where he lives. But he also knows what he says can influence a vote here and there in Austin and Santa Fe and Madison, and trying to slice and dice it in terms of the Electoral College is pointless. Fight the virus. Wear a mask even when you are sure you don’t have COVID.
I realize Deadsplinter has a limited reach. But every vote matters.
And let’s be honest. When John Lewis was standing on Pettus Bridge looking at the swirling water dozens of feet below, and when he saw the helmets and clubs and tear gas canisters about to be deployed, he also knew that winning the right to vote, if it somehow happened, was only going to mean the right to vote for whatever awful candidate was nominated in Alabama. At that moment, he didn’t start telling everyone on the bridge about the challenges of the electoral college system and the nuances of voting. There was a much bigger principle at stake.
We can’t go back in time to 1965 and stand with John Lewis. Because of his passing on Friday night, we can’t literally stand with him ever again.
But between now and November we can still stand with John Lewis.
Christ, I remember reading that on Splinter and Deadspin and just about losing my fucking mind.
Deadspin was so good that it occasionally made me forget that it was almost entirely staffed by straight white men and women who’s view of “what it means to be a liberal” so often clashed with my own. About the only decent thing Herb Spanfeller has done with the bloated corpse of Deadspin is hire more people of color to write for it.
I’m…not even following the reference to John Lewis here. Yes, the protest was in service of the Voting Rights Act, but the fact is that the VRA was essentially stripped bare by SCOTUS so now the pressing issues are fixing that AND fielding candidates who people are willing to plow through the suppression bullshit to actually go vote for them so they can fix the VRA. It’s not even my argument (although I subscribe to it). It’s Ibram X. Kendi’s. If you haven’t read the article I strongly suggest doing so before replying again.
…I think we can all agree that there’s a lot in need of fixing
…& certainly I take the point that there’s several kinds of swing vote in the mix…I just can’t help feeling like this thing is not like the others & might turn out to be for more of the marbles than we can afford to lose so I’m loathe to leave a box unchecked that could make the trump outcome less-probable?
Both Pete and Amy were basically mathematically eliminated at that point.
Like…again, I’m not going to pretend that it wasn’t a calculated move on the DNC’s part. But, people who were voting for Amy or Buttigieg could have easily lined up behind Warren, or behind Bernie, who everyone thought was the first choice anyway.
Regardless of the timing, it’s like…there’s two outcomes, right? Either Amy and Pete stay in the race long past the point they’re viable candidates in an effort to split the centrist votes, or the leave in an effort to solidify the centrist vote.
Let’s not forget that “you should drop out so the old white guy can win” was also something that was lobbed at Elizabeth Warren by progressives in regards to Bernie. But when Elizabeth Warren dropped out, those votes went to…Joe Biden.
I’d argue the same thing happened when Harris and Booker and the lot dropped out as well. There was more movement in Joe Biden’s direction than in Bernie’s, and it wasn’t because they were forced to pick Joe. It was because, for a variety of complicated reasons, they chose to pick Joe.
So…it’s easy to point to the DNC as this monolithic boogieman that’s fucking shit up for everybody and “forcing” people to vote for the candidates they want, but the reality is, it seems like they didn’t really have to do much more than “offer Joe Biden as a candidate” to get people to vote for Joe Biden.
And again, the reasons people are voting for Joe are varied and complicated, and he for damn sure wasn’t my first choice during the primaries. But the primaries are (basically) over. Joe won. Last time the DNC was criticized for basically fielding no viable candidates in an effort to steer people to Hillary. This time the DNC is being criticized for steering people to vote for Joe in spite of fielding a huge, diverse field of candidates.
Maybe people are just going to vote for who they vote for and all the backroom shenanigans and dealings to get so-and-so elected amount to jack and/or shit in the face of an electorate that isn’t privy to those convos and that is just gonna do what it thinks is best regardless.
After all, the RNC wanted no fucking part of Trump, and all he did was keep being louder and more racist and sexist than everyone else until the field was decimated.
Americans are weird, man, and I think people like us who are politically “in the know” put too much stock in shit that regular people don’t give a shit about. My wife didn’t know that Trump sold steaks in Sharper Image until like a month ago when I told her, which shocked me until I remembered that the internet and political Twitter aren’t the same as real life.
Yet, witness the fact that literally everybody expected Joe to win SC, so why did Pete and Amy decide 1-2 days before Super Tuesday to drop out? Nothing had changed in the electoral landscape. They could have easily dropped out before SC or after Super Tuesday. SC had nothing to do with that calculus, and ain’t no way Pete and Amy made this decision on their own without input/pressure from the DNC. Plus, I wouldn’t for a minute expect Pete/Amy voters to vote for either Warren or Sanders. They are much more likely to vote for Biden…which is the whole point. By timing the dropouts the way they did, it ensured that Biden’s vote would consolidate, rather than continuing to split the centrist vote. Warren got super screwed by that, and by the treatment she received generally. Sanders likewise got the shaft–just not as badly as Warren.
Most voters are low-info voters. This means that they tend to vote for people they’ve heard of and people who they hear the most about. Joe Biden fits that bill just as easily as Hillary Clinton did. Again, we can try and kid ourselves that most voters are somehow making thoroughly informed decisions based on an open and honest system…but that’s simply not what’s happening here. So, the solution to the problem of Joe’s poor early performance was to remove the vote splitting that was taking place, and the most effective way to do that was to take out Pete who had showed early promise and Amy who had a shot at winning a number of delegates in her home state. As someone who used to be deeply involved in state-level electoral politics, these conversations happen all the damned time.
Trump, at some level in that addled brain of his, knew that acting like a total piece of shit was a feature, not a bug, in the Republican Party. The RNC simply liked to pretend that they had the knuckle-draggers under control. That’s really the difference, because the DNC is much better at keeping the rabble from getting too much control (which, not for nothing, is probably why they lose elections so often).
I don’t think Sanders could have won in either primary year (assuming 2016 wasn’t a straight up railroad job to clear the field for Clinton. If the DNC hadn’t done that, I seriously doubt anybody would be talking about Bernie Sanders today.), but Warren had a solid shot as the person who isn’t as scary as Sanders but also isn’t as corporate as Biden. Plus, neither Warren nor Sanders are particularly viable four years from now simply due to their age (please don’t remind me that Biden will be 82, because he’s the nominee whether we like it or not). So now the problem is who is going to take up the fight against the corporate wing of the party after this election? Warren and Sanders will still have plenty to do in the Senate. We’ve got a growing list of people in the House. But who has a realistic shot at being a viable candidate for the nomination in 4 years (assuming Joe doesn’t run again)? Whoever that person is will basically need to start making their case right after this election so they will have enough momentum to have a real shot.
The one thing I’m EXTREMELY concerned about, that I don’t (yet!) See either of y’all mentioning, is the TrumpCo Goon-Squad factor…
BBTM, you mention being in a safely Blue state… is it Blue enough statewide (I’m guessing, yes?), that if the Goon Squads are deployed into your major metro areas in the coming weeks, and remanding anyone TrumpCo sees as “protesters” (aka BIPOC, and their white allies–and/or basically ANYONE *not* wearing Trump 2020 gear),
That your state will *still* be dependably Blue?
Because for me, here in MN, if the Goon Squads *are* deployed to MSP & Duluth,like I worry they will be, our state could potentially go Red for the first time in *my* entire lifetime (we haven’t gone Red in a Presidential election since Nixon in ’72–four years before I was born!)…
Folks aren’t talking about it much yet–mostly just the true political junkies on places like Twitter… but if TrumpCo adds the Goon Squads to D-leaning cities/population hubs in states where the outlying population votes red, and then intimidates voters, or simply starts hauling awayfoljs headed to the polls, for holding/”questioning” until after the polls close… we could easily see “dependable” blue states flip/stay Red…
States like MN, IA, WI, MI, etc wouldn’t need a big push–just the commandeering of a large arena or two to hold folks, and then strategically-placed groups of “police” with busses & Van’s to haul folks there “to be questioned”
Between the folks who don’t make it to the polls, and the folks who’d stay home, out of fear,entire states could be won.
I KNOW it makes me sound like a crazy conspiracy theorist!😉
But, honestly, with EVERYTHING this administration has done, that EVERYONE thought they wouldn’t, can we really put something like this past them–that folks like Miller, Gorka (who’s now back *in*), and the rest of them AREN’T planning something like it?🤨🤔
…I want to say it couldn’t happen…but if you’d asked me 10 days ago I’d have said that after the teargass-your-way-to-the-church-door fiasco they’d given up on the dubiously unidentifiable “federal officers” with no badge numbers, name tags, precinct markers or ANYTHING AT ALL BEYOND A “POLICE” PATCH I COULD FUCKING BUY (& slap on the velcro sectoion of my cammo outfit) hopping out of unmarked vans to pull people off the street was the stuff of banana republics & secret-police-having states that hollywood clearly taught me were the bad guys…well, that shit couldn’t happen in a modern american metropolis…because even now that kind of thing couldn’t actually stand up…much less be considered a net positive move?
Exactly.
As always, the Malignant Narcissist is unraveling; https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-couch/201608/why-its-so-hard-end-relationship-narcissist…
I know I’ve shared it a bajillion times already.
But it’s what IS happening, and what’s GONNA keep on happening.
There are *multiple* factors involved–simple narcissistic ego being the first one, but then deterioration (honestly, probably a frontal-lobe issue/dementia/the first-degree relation with Alzheimers/etc.) being added in there; plus the fact that he can’t get his ego stroked by rallies; PLUS the fact that the News keeps focusing on The ‘Rona, rather than letting it slide away (because we know the Narcissist doesn’t CARE about the deaths); PLUS-PLUS the Mazars ruling and the fact that if he doesn’tget re-elected he WILL get sued; PLUS-PLUS-PLUS, the fact that–due to Mazars–the SDNY will gain access to those tax returns, proving once & for all of ETERNITY that Trumpty-dumpty is mortgaged up to & including his hair plugs to the Oligarchy (and probably the Saudis & some Chinese oligarchs, too, by now!), and was never as rich as he claimed–now with the threat of RICO, FinCen, and other assorted financial/insurance/tax fraud charges coming up the pike….
Yes.
I firmly believe we will see him attempt to keep control by hook, crook, goon squad, and whatever else sorts of declarations of “Martial Law!!!” He can try.🙃
Motherfucker is a trapped, rabid, rat, on a burning ship at sea…. and he’s gonna try to save himself at ALL costs, no matter who (literally!) dies to make that possible.😕
Truly, yes, my state is so blue that Trump would have to disappear at least 30% of the Democratic voters in my state for it to be in play. It is neither worth the effort, nor the electoral votes. Midwestern states are a much better target for them.
With all due respect…this is an exceptionally white viewpoint to have.
Like, the country is on fire, my dude, and what you’re saying is that you’d rather not even attempt to put the fire out with a cheap hose because it’d be just as bad as throwing more gasoline on it.
Biden is a better choice than Trump if for no other reason than Biden won’t stand by a let hundreds of thousands of people die for no reason. Trump represents an actual, literal existential crisis for millions of Americans. I understand how you feel in regards to Biden, because I’m not exactly thrilled he’s the nominee. But if the choice is between, at the bare minimum, a guy who will at the very least take action to prevent countless deaths, and a guy who if re-elected would rather millions of people die than acknowledge anything approximating reality, then you pick the guy who’s gonna prevent people dying.
Biden ain’t perfect, but don’t let perfect be the enemy of good, or even the enemy of mediocre. The difference between Biden and Trump is that Biden at least seems kinda-sorta-almost willing to change his positions (see: his climate policy, which is entirely influenced by Bernie and Progressives, him switching from “I won’t defund the police” to “we have to re-direct police funding”), where as Trump will quite literally die before he changes his mind about anything, and he’ll drag all the rest of us with him.
Exceptionally white, and just adding incredibly ableist, too.
There are hundreds of thousands, probably millions of people whose lives will be increasingly & incredibly at risk, if God-forbid, Trump were to gain a second term–many also BIPOC people.
…obviously I can only really speak for myself…but like I said above I don’t really feel like the polling (which was so off-track last time) gives biden a secure victory in terms that would leave me comfortable not voting (essentially with no input into the decision based on my feelings for or against biden as a candidate) since to my mind that’s one less vote that trump has to surpass
…to me it works like this…& I get that there are arguments galore why it shouldn’t but in this particular instance I’d argue that they don’t rise to the level of outweighing the simplified version…it’s basically pascal’s wager except instead of an afterlife we get life after trump
…a vote for trump is (to me) an unconscionable act but it results in biden needing two votes to beat
…likewise a vote for biden results in trump needing two votes to cancel it out & get ahead
…not voting for trump or biden may not award either of them the extra boost (whatever that might be worth) but it lowers the bar by which they derive advantage over their opponent
…however much you might dislike biden…or feel that his place on the ticket bespeaks significant problems with the party he represents…I personally would need to be living in a district so firmly blue that no power on earth could avert that outcome before I’d consider not casting my vote to provide that tiny increment in terms of how steep a climb trump needs to emerge victorious
…if for no other reason than the knowledge that if I hadn’t & by some act of outright malfeasance or other they concoct a count that gives him another term I would find my choice more than difficult to come to terms with
…if I could have caused the (D) candidate to be someone else I’d have been glad of a better option but I can’t get past the floor of that being the only vote that meaningfully guards against a repeat performance from the clown car posse?
…but if you absolutely can’t bring yourself to (& I don’t want to beg but in most circumstances I feel like I probably would) then would you at least be willing to vote (D) downticket in order to try & restore the other branches of government to a broadly functional state rather than sticking with the avowedly dysfunctional that currently holds sway?
I get the sentiment, Biden was not in my top 5 but with the country on fire, we all need to do our part to remove the Orange Menace & flip the Senate. Biden has already moved way left of where Obama was & will fill most positions with competent people, remember competent advisors? I hope you rethink your position & work to change from within instead of literally standing by & watching people die as we turn into a 3rd world country.
At this point, even if you don’t want to vote for Joe, you should at least vote for down ballot measures and initiatives. Hold your nose and vote for Biden, sure, but then vote for your Representatives, your Senators, and likely a bunch of state and local officials as well, because fuck me, do we really need to state flipping some of these state legislatures around.
When we talking about “voting”, so often we only talk about who the President is going to be, which is part of why the GOP has managed to get such a stranglehood on state legislatures despite (in many, many case) representing far fewer people in those states.
Local and state elections matter maybe even more that national elections do. So please, if you’re thinking about not voting because Joe Biden sucks, try and vote for candidates down ballot that you don’t think suck, and just check the box next to Biden so you don’t have to hear your liberal friends bitching about you choosing not to vote.
Ruth Bader Ginsberg has cancer. Again. She is 87 years old. Who would you prefer to nominate her replacement, Trump or Biden?
Noam Chomsky and Bernie Sanders are voting for Biden without hesitation. Sanders calls Biden’s platform the most progressive since FDR.
John Lewis backed Biden wholeheartedly. But what did he know? Did John Lewis do anything for progress in this country?
But yeah, Biden’s the same as Trump.
Back in 2015 or 2016, I was speaking with this younger Republican about votes and polls.
(Remember when talking was an option? If I see this fool now, I might not control myself.)
Anywho: dude starts bringing up this “study” that I’m now 43.75% was just a meme. Supposedly this group of surveyors scanned their respondents’ social media for pro-Trump content, then contacted them to do a regular poll like just repeating Gallup’s questions. Supposedly whenever Trump was being extra embarrassing these pro-Trump folks would just lie and say they like Biden.
That means we’re probably both being flooded with disinformation, and white people will keep on white people-ing.
I think this truly was a problem with 2016 polling. Not enough people were honest about not intending to vote for Clinton lest they look like misogynists or conspiracy-believing dupes, and too many people were dishonest about admitting they were going to vote for Trump because…reasons.
2016 Polling turned out to be accurate. Clinton’s margin in the national polls was within the margin of error. One problem is that polling in some battlefield states wasn’t conducted close enough to the election and didn’t pick up the small swing Trump got to put him over the top in the Electoral College.
I think the bigger question this year is that it’s going to be awfully hard to measure the willingness of people to vote in the face of all of the obstacles that are being thrown up, and that includes both sides. The GOP is discouraging their voters from vote by mail, and the GOP traditionally has a lot of voters who need to cast absentee ballots. Do those voters show up at all for the GOP? And then, of course, there are all of the roadblocks and tire fires the GOP will be throwing up all over — who has the guts to go through them? We’ll see.
With all due respect, Noam Chomsky lives in a state that hasn’t voted Republucan since 1984 and its share of the Dem vote hasn’t gone below 60% in 20 years.
Here is what he had to say:
“We’re now dealing with a gang of psychopathic maniacs. It’s off the spectrum of traditional parliamentary politics, something new.”
Compared to the Trump White House, Chomsky said a Biden administration will be “susceptible to pressure” from organisers, especially that a large part of the voting base of the Democratic Party is open to the idea of holding Israel accountable for its human rights abuses.
Chomsky went on to make an unambiguous case for voting for Biden in November.
“What does it mean to say you can’t vote for the lesser of two evils, that means: I’m going to vote for the greater of two evils,” Chomsky said.
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/noam-chomskys-advice-palestine-advocates-vote-biden-keep-pressure
Heck, I don’t agree with Biden or Chomsky on a bunch of things. But there is no way that there is any reason to dilute even one vote against a “gang of psychopathic maniacs.” We cannot risk another Florida and Bush v. Gore, even if the odds are 1000 to 1.