Balcony scene in Three Stooges film 80 years ago this year: pic.twitter.com/mUTHVLuL7O
— Michael Beschloss (@BeschlossDC) October 5, 2020
These good boys are ready to build bark better. pic.twitter.com/OzaEkehJUR
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) October 5, 2020
Now that President Trump is busy tweeting campaign messages, I would ask him to do this: Listen to the scientists. Support masks. Support mask mandates nationwide.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) October 5, 2020
While we've all been focusing on the presidency, the Senate has moved out of toss-up range and Democrats are now nearly 2:1 favorites. A long way from a sure thing, but trending poorly for the GOP. https://t.co/eev4w6wba9
— Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) October 5, 2020
There has been way too much analysis the last four years about how all Trump’s lying creates an environment where no one has any faith in anything anymore, and way too little analysis of how all the lying has destroyed Trump’s ability to sell any message https://t.co/NhSWKCjCC1
— Isaac Chotiner (@IChotiner) October 5, 2020
MJS
I think now would be a good time for Joe to get back out on his bike (socially distanced, of course), and cut an ad contrasting that with Wheezy McCovidspreader gasping for breath on the balcony.
Immanentize
I love the Dogs for Biden ad. Trump could not ever pull off anything close to that in terms of ease and joy.
A Ghost to Most
Welcome to the most dangerous time in America since the (first) Civil War.
Baud
@Immanentize: Trump couldn’t find enough dogs that would agree to be in his ads.
Immanentize
@MJS: new Reality President challenge —
Once around the track on a bike.
The downward ramp race.
Two flights of stairs.
Lifting hands over head three times.
Etc.
Immanentize
@Baud: If Trump would agree to stand still like a fire plug, many dogs would come runnin’.
Karen S.
Open thread! My wife and I have been looking after my elderly parents (both are 92) for much of the year. They still live in my (2-story) childhood home. My mom had surgery in February to repair fractures in her tailbone and has also had a UTI. They both are hard of hearing and my dad’s short term memory is pretty much nil at this point. We had the living room converted into a bedroom for them downstairs last year, despite my dad’s reluctance, and I’m glad we did. That’s where they sleep now. A caregiver comes in a few times a week to help them out. I’m out there a few times a week and my wife comes with me at least once a week. If it weren’t for Covid, I’d be more inclined to try to persuade them to consider moving into a senior residential community. But the home they’ve lived in since 1966 is the best place for them right now, as stressful as it is to keep them comfortable there. I’m sad beyond measure to see their decline. The memories of when they were still vibrant and vigorous are ever present in that house.
And despite all that, helping my mom and dad out has been, in a weird way, a welcome distraction to the absurdist comedy-drama that has been life in the U.S., especially this year.
Quinerly
@Immanentize: and drinking a glass of water with one hand!
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
rikyrah
@Immanentize:
Morning Imma
How is Little Imma ?
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Immanentize
@A Ghost to Most:
FDR — “If I fail, I will not be the worst President, I will be the last.”
Seems like those times might have been sorta difficult too. Quit yer hyperbolic, symbolic pant crapping. You will be a happier human!
Ken
I’m still expecting one of the open thread titles today or tomorrow to be “Well That Was Fast”.
I turned on the TV and they aren’t playing solemn music yet. I’m wondering if they’ll try the “Weekend at Bernie’s” scenario.
rikyrah
Never forget
Pence oversaw a severe breakout of HIV in Indiana under his watch because he ignored the science.
He is the perfect VP for Dolt45 ?
Immanentize
@rikyrah: Little Imma is doing well. His classes are going really well, but his math class he says is difficult because it is long on boredom punctuated by moments of intense insights. He has joined the Rice Eclipse — their rocket club. College is cool.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Karen S.: That’s tough, Karen. And it’s made so much worse by the pandemic.
Karen S.
@rikyrah:
I haven’t forgotten. I remember being appalled and angry when I first read about Pence’s dereliction of duty there. That outbreak shouldn’t have happened, but Pence is who he is, no better than trump.
mrmoshpotato
@Immanentize: How about bald eagles?
Bald Eagles For Tearing Off Dump’s Face
I’d support it.
Immanentize
@Quinerly:
Clearly not a fair competition!
John S.
@Karen S.: I’m not there yet, but those days are coming for me soon. My father is in his late 80s, but has been living overseas for the past 20 years — so there’s not much I can do to help him. My mother is in her 70s, but she refuses to slow down and doesn’t have a penny to her name. Between my brother and I, it’s almost certain my wife and I will end up being her primary caregiver in the next 10 years. And then there’s my autistic teenage son, who at this point it’s hard to say whether or not he will be able to live on his own at some point in the future.
But I don’t look at at any of this with apprehension, because I know whatever the future holds I will find joy and satisfaction from it. The only thing that worries me is the prospect that Trump may win another 4 years.
rikyrah
@Karen S.:
I understand.??
Immanentize
@mrmoshpotato: We don’t need to be so mean…. Staying on the post topic, how about just petting a dog. Or walking a dog around the block?
NotMax
File under: Silly Marketing Ploys
Care for some whipped cream on your breast?
Immanentize
@Karen S.: I am sorry about the difficulty of your situation. And having your parents in their home this year is a very good thing. My Mom is in a transitional facility in the apartment/independent living section. She has been locked down since March. They get to take a walk around the parking lot a few times a week. Meals brought to their room.
She will be turning 90 on Sunday. I am negotiating with the ‘Warden’ for a half hour visit. It sucks.
MattF
NYT (Science section) has interesting graphs on course of COVID infection and immune response.
mrmoshpotato
@Immanentize: Then I’ll leave out the volcanoes.
Flock (?) of bald eagles sending Dump running for the hills in terror?
the pollyanna from hell
When the red, red robin comes bob, bob bobbin ‘ along, along
Karen S.
@John S.: There are moments when the sadness overtakes me and I can’t help but cry, but I also know the days I spend with them are precious. I’m getting into watching TV with my mom. We watch the food channels, the History Channel and the Discovery Channel. Her arthritis prevents her from cooking and baking anymore, but she enjoys watching others prepare food. There’s also a show about moonshiners in Appalachia she finds entertaining, probably because she grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia, so it’s familiar to her. Even though my dad has to have the volume turned way up, I watch sports with him. I cannot watch TV news with him, though. He loves it, but I find most TV journalism appalling nowadays.
I guess what I’m getting at it is that I still have fun with them, despite everything.
Hoodie
@Karen S.: We’re going through the end-of-life stage with my wife’s parents now. FIL has end stage renal disease and MIL is early Alzheimers. Tough but funny at some times. We realized how much MIL had slipped when she became convinced that FIL is having an ongoing affair with his secretary from his tour in Viet Nam some 60 years ago. Now it’s up to affairs with 3 different women from Viet Nam, who apparently are emailing him daily. Have no idea if this has any basis in reality, e.g., maybe he did have affair back in the 60s (wouldn’t put it past him). FIL is not well, but still has his wits about him, I’m sure he wishes he was having 3 simultaneous affairs.
Karen S.
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Yep. I can’t help but think that if we had a better national response to the pandemic, we might be further along in getting back to “normal.” But we have a monster for a president and many other monsters aiding and abetting him, so here we are.
Immanentize
@mrmoshpotato: volcanoes? Eagles? Have you been watching Lord of the Rings again?
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax: Last Week Tonight loves pumpkin spice.
Jeffro
Catherine Rampell has a tweet up mocking a White House staffer who’s complaining that trumpov & Co’s negligence resulted in so many Republicans being exposed to the virus by quoting the staffer and then tweeting (and I quote!): “From a member of the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party”.
SO
If you’re up and reading Balloon Juice already, Ms. Rampell, welcome! ;)
Four weeks to go, peeps. Let’s fight hard and really run up the score!!!
sherparick
Rick Wilson wants Biden-Harris to restart their negative ads
https://twitter.com/TheRickWilson
I have a different take. I follow the classic old Irish-American political axiom that when your enemy is busy destroying him or herself, you just step back and don’t interfere.
I also think the positive ads (especially the dogs), cause an almost giddy feeling of relief when you look at the horror of the Republican Party and Trump, the gang of nihilists who couldn’t shoot straight.
Baud
@Jeffro: It’d be cool if she read BJ, but we didn’t come up with that term.
catclub
In my neighborhood there are many golf carts, so when those folks take the dog around the block it is often in the cart. This is called ‘riding the dog’.
I only feel a little dirt typing it.
Immanentize
@catclub: That gave me a sad.
Amir Khalid
@sherparick:
I thought the negative ads against Trump and the Republicans were what Wilson and his Lincoln Project cohort volunteered to do.
Kay
It enrages me. Eugene Scalia was at those SCOTUS parties they threw. He’s the Secretary of Labor. He regulates workplaces. He does a terrible job as it turns out, but that is his official job. He can’t even protect the workers who are serving him in the White House.
They’re like some kind of royal court. It’s appalling behavior.
NotMax
Had a (rare) craving for something sweet so opened up a bag of a good brand of dark chocolate drops I had grabbed from the Halloween candy aisles during last month’s shopping trip.
Same product the company puts out the rest of the year except with seasonal motifs on the bag. No change in product look or shape or taste. Only other concession to the holiday shows somebody has a sense of humor.
Unwrapped the individual piece and by chance happened to notice teeny printing on the inside of the wrapper, to wit: “This isn’t a foil. It’s a costume.”
@Hoodie
Yup. When I’m at Mom’s, for me the volume set at 17 or 18 on her TVs is more than enough. She has them set at 45.
MattF
@sherparick: I’m in the ‘Biden camp appears to be good at this politics thing and doesn’t need my advice.’ On the specific question, polls show that the driving force in this election is anti-Trump, rather than pro-Biden. So, running a wave of positive, pro-Biden ads makes a lot of sense.
mrmoshpotato
@catclub: Kinda defeats the exercise aspect of dog walking, doesn’t it? (I mean exercise for the hound.)
Jeffro
@Baud: really? Bummer. I thought it was created by some wit here. =)
Gin & Tonic
@Karen S.: My 96-year-old mother in law is still in her home, and will only leave there on a gurney. Her husband was hospitalized and then went into a “rehab” facility a couple of years ago, where he died. So it’s largely up to my dear wife, who goes there weekly, on average, plus a caregiver who comes in daily to do the cleaning, drives her to medical appointments, does the grocery shopping, etc. She’s still largely alert and aware, and as I noted here, had my dear wife fill out her absentee ballot last week – the day it arrived – with a dismissive wave and an instruction: “all Democrats.”
But being in her home is critical to her, and allows my dear wife to visit whenever necessary. It has its challenges, but is better than any available alternative.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: Yeah, but when she tweets about skull-fucking a kitten….
mrmoshpotato
@Jeffro: It was a tweet from 2015.
Hungry Joe
Progress: One of my swing-state Bernie Bros relatives — he voted for Jill Stein in ‘16 and declared he’d never vote for Biden because “he’s a corporatist warmonger” — now says he MAY vote for Biden because, long-term, Biden might (!) be better for his family.
My mom, who’s 98 and doing pretty well in a retirement home, can’t wait for her ballot to arrive so she can vote for Joe. She has only one complaint about her situation: “Almost everyone here,” she semi-whispers (lest someone somehow overhear, I guess), “is a REPUBLICAN.” For political companionship she watches Rachel Maddow.
Baud
@Hungry Joe:
Dude, tell her to start hanging out here. She’s a little young for this crowd, but she can talk to Goku.
Capri
@Hoodie: When my son was doing his psychiatry rotation he met a woman who was also convinced that her husband was having an affair. He said that to talk to her she was absolutely rational and persuasive. She was at an in-patient facility because she was so upset at her husband’s fictional affair that she had attempted to murder him three times.
mrmoshpotato
@Hungry Joe:
Surprised he didn’t go with the tried-and-
true-fucked-us-over “Hillary’sBiden’s a corporate whore!”Ken
@Capri: Maybe she was correct about the affair?
Baud
@Ken:
Yeah, that had plot twist written all over it.
narya
@Hungry Joe: Sounds like my (85- and 90-year-old) parents; except they also track the avowed atheists/non-religious types. My mom got hearing aids a couple of weeks ago (dad has had them for decades). She was complaining that a pair of her sneakers were squeaking on the floor, to which my father replied, “They’ve ALWAYS done that.” They are in PA, so eagerly awaiting their ballots.
sanjeevs
@sherparick: This morning’s poll has Biden up 57-41.
Biden is widening the lead by adding undecideds. Getting Trump to lose voters is almost inpossible -his approval has always been mid to low forties,
So Biden’s strategy seems sensible.
Ken
@sanjeevs: I don’t think I’ve ever seen 2% undecided. Certainly not with nearly a month to go.
Betty Cracker
@NotMax: Watched some of the Hitler Chronicles on your recommendation, and I hardly slept a wink! Uh, thanks? :)
Strange how it’s so much more compelling with color film. I didn’t think that would affect me so much since I’m an old TV and movie fan. But it does make it seem so much more immediate somehow.
Hungry Joe
@mrmoshpotato: He told me that Hillary was worse than Trump because “she would have gotten us into a war.” Apparently there are far-, far-left loon sites and podcasts that one can get sucked into; he has fallen for some pretty out-there conspiracy theories. I responded to his possible move toward Biden with gentle, supportive encouragement: no point in saying, “Well, YEAH, you idiot.” Because he’s not an idiot. And a vote’s a vote.
Salty Sam
Very cool! In my high school years I lived only a quarter mile from the RU campus, and we used to use that huge parking lot at the football stadium to launch model rockets. Thanks for the nice memory.
Kay
Same old flim-flam. If Democrats take the political downside from supporting Roe, shouldn’t Republicans take the political downside from opposing it? They plan to both oppose and support Roe while jamming thru a far Right nominee?
I’d ask but we’re not permitted to ask any questions of this nominee. She and her supporters have preemptively declared any examination of her work off limits in a blatant attempt to silence critics.
She’s a public employee. We’re permitted to ask about her work.
Splitting Image
@sherparick:
The news media’s laser-like focus on everything Trump says and everything Trump does has obscured what is one of the weirdest things about this election cycle: Biden’s approval ratings have been rising since the start of the year.
In a normal election year, both candidates’ approval ratings tend to drop as their respective negative ads do their work. Since Biden’s approval has actually been rising, I’d say he only needs to keep doing what he is doing and trust his instincts. Trump’s negative ads aren’t working. And there isn’t much point in Biden going negative at this stage of the game, since Trump is doing most of his work for him. Every time Trump appears in public now is an ad for Biden.
JPL
CNN is showing the entire Michele Obama video. For those that want CNN to talk about Joe more, they just go their wish.
Immanentize
@Betty Cracker:
Again with the Godwin stuff! ?
WWI
1918 flu pandemic
Roaring ’20s (and Babylon Berlin)
Economic Depression
morality play right wing backlash.
WWII
We are living in the times of zip file history:
ALL TIMELINES ARE COMPRESSED
Immanentize
@Salty Sam: ??
Hungry Joe
@Betty Cracker: WWII colorized film hits me the same way. I love black & white — it can strip away extraneous distractions, set its own mood — but most of that old footage was in black & white not because that was the filmmaker’s decision, but because shooting in color was so much harder, and so much more expensive.
Ken
One side-effect of upward of 60% of the public thinking everything Trump says is a lie is that every attack he makes helps convince people Biden’s a great guy.
Bobby Thomson
@Splitting Image: Yes. Even in 2016, Trump’s popularity rose when he got off Twitter and out of the news. The more people see him, the less they like him, but he can’t run a Rose Garden campaign with weeks left. Joe just has to stay healthy.
Immanentize
@Splitting Image:
I’ll add, I think it’s too late for any Bill Barr concocted legal scandal that won’t instantly blow back against Trump. As Kay says, they lie about everything! Everyone knows this. A minority of the population thinks this is a virtue. But that doesn’t help when they tell the next unbelievable lie.
Ken
A few months ago, a historian noted that his colleagues are re-examining the roaring 20s. Now that they’ve had personal experience of a pandemic, they have more insight into the psychological motivations of everyone wanting a party.
Jeffro
@Bobby Thomson: I hope that Biden & Harris consider passing on their remaining debates (Biden especially). Their health is *the* thing right now.
If they go ahead, then trumpov & Pence absolutely MUST produce negative Covid tests just before the debate. Same with the audience members. And masks are just a given.
They’ll suffer not a single lost vote if they cancel, or even if they have to walk out mid-debate due to trumpov family members removing their masks, etc.
Karen S.
@Immanentize: My mom was in the hospital and then a nursing home rehab facility in February and March. The last week she was in rehab, we couldn’t go see her because the first of the many pandemic-related restrictions to come hit senior facilities first. I was so glad when she was discharged home when she was. I’m sorry to hear of your situation with your mother.
H.E.Wolf
http://electoral-vote.com
has a lot of good topics this morning.
Betty Cracker
Chotiner’s tweet above:
So true.
The Trump campaign’s stupidity helps too. I’ve been anxious about certain lines of attack Trump could use against Biden that would possibly a) generate dumb media takes that are favorable to Trump, and b) alienate some voters we need to show up.
But the Trump nitwits are diseased and flailing, millions have already voted, Trump remains focused on his cult despite math, and there are only 28 days left. Here’s hoping we can hang in there for four more weeks.
Salty Sam
This really resonates with me- one of the saddest parts of watching my mom deal with her declining health is that she no longer has the stamina to play in the kitchen. She was a prolific cook and entertainer- she and dad ran a B&B in the early days of that business, and hosted some amazing events. She passed that love of cooking to me as well. One our shared memories is watching Julia Child together.
I have a difficult enough time dealing with how she has drifted into the right wing alternate universe, thanks to Faux News, but when I do talk with her and she laments that she barely has the energy to make a PB&J sandwich, it breaks my heart.
Immanentize
@Ken: they can study me — I feel trapped and I want to party, dance, drink, etc. And those days are mostly in my rear view mirror.
JPL
What if trump’s new plan is to cause the virus to spread so rapidly, no one can vote. Then contest the election cuz his supporters couldn’t vote.
germy
Cuomo was expressing his frustration during yesterday’s press conference.
Fortunately, police behaved peacefully, despite the fierce resistance from the ultra-Orthodox.
Immanentize
@H.E.Wolf: Yes, but is Dorothy Winsor’s husband again featured? If not, meh.
Immanentize
@germy: Replace “ultra-Orthodox” with “BLM protesters” for a completely different police response.
H.E.Wolf
A salute to all who are helping with their parents’ care. Although it happens in every generation, it is very visible this year… as is the love which underlies it. xoxo
Peale
@MattF: Yep. We’ve got to get them to fall in love with him a little so they don’t turn around and vote the scum back in in two years.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Glad to hear you too find it compelling.
mrmoshpotato
@JPL:
Counterpoint: He’s a manbaby who fell face-first into the presidency and thought the position would make everyone love him. He never intended to do the actual job but now he’s confronted with a disaster that he can’t call a loser on Twitter, or grab by the pussy and threaten to sue unless it goes away. And, worst of all – to him – the virus has come to punch him in the face.
Jay C
@Betty Cracker:
Also, a Presidential campaign is really helped much, when, in addition to the supporters being (or being seen as) “ diseased and flailing” the candidate is, as well.
57-41-2 with just four weeks left?
I have the feeling that there is a little room for slippage there for Joe/Kamala (which I am sure the MSM will jump on like rabid hyenas), but I’d take a 55-45 win Nov 3 – especially if those numbers hold up for downticket races nationwide- without too much complaint.
Except, maybe, for not icing Mitch McConnell.
mrmoshpotato
@Peale: Or – and hear me out – we spend the next 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years electorally beating the living shit out of the POS GOP.
Sounds good to me for a 40+ year POS party that’s done so much damage and always escapes with minimal to no consequences.
Ohio Mom
John S. @20:
“And then there’s my autistic teenage son, who at this point it’s hard to say whether or not he will be able to live on his own at some point in the future.”
I have an autistic 23 y.o. and have been obsessing on the same question lately. Having to put the kibosh on most of his community activities in order to protect us, his high-risk parents, has been very painful for me. I thought we were doing a good job of launching him and now I’m making him stay home. I hope he can catch-up when this is over.
The main advice I have for you, as someone a little further along — and you may have already done this — is open a STABLE account (and comparison shop, some states allow non-residents to use their programs, each state offers slightly different options); and find a good elder-care attorny to put the entire family’s affairs in order, and to walk you through guardianship/POA options.
That’s not the sum total of what I’ve learned so far but they are good starting points because they have a beginning, middle and end; you can check them off a list. Unlike say, Will my kid ever understand money? Will he ever master enough social graces to manage himself in the workplace? Etc., etc.
Leto
@Hungry Joe: @Betty Cracker: @NotMax:
FREDERIC LUMIERE (WWII IN HD)
Short interview explaining some of the technical side of how they brought WW2 in Color to life.
Kay
“A3P has assembled a battle-tested team of sharp, aggressive legal professionals who will help us do whatever it takes to push Judge Barrett’s nomination over the finish line by the end of October.”
Such confident conservatives. Jamming thru the far Right nominee with no debate and no questions permitted in a mad rush before voters throw them out on their asses.
They know the public doesn’t want this judge. They don’t care.
BC in Illinois
@rikyrah:
Someone responded to that tweet, saying, “I’ve had to look at people from behind plexiglass since May.” And they’re right.
At Walgreens, MotoMart, Chinese food take-out, the local bookstore, StL County Board of Elections . . . . plexiglass everywhere.
Except where Pence, the head of the Covid task force, lives and works.
I can truly believe that he’s never encountered a plexiglass screen in his daily life.
Ruckus
@Quinerly:
In some ways it’s sad that trump is decompensating before our eyes, many don’t get to see that in their parents, the daily loss of physical abilities, the decline in mental awareness, sometimes the anger at how your life isn’t the same and never will be again. That the end is near and getting closer for him. And he knows it, even if he can’t say/believe/understand it. Someone with his massive level of crap does tend to push any feelings of sorrow right out of one’s mind. Them holding the nuclear codes and being such an ass does tend to wipe out any concept of caring. At all. What we are seeing isn’t that unusual for someone with his glaring faults and inabilities to even pretend to be human as they age out. He’s never really pretended to be human for most of his life and put himself in a position that everyone, not just in his sphere but in the world can see what a fucking ass he really is. And I’d bet on some level, he knows. Which is oddly satisfying. Said satisfaction passes easily. Rarely has someone just getting old and near the end of life been so dangerous to so many people.
Citizen Alan
@Immanentize: When FDR said that, nazis did not constitute 40% of the electorate.
PST
@Gin & Tonic: My 96-year-old mother-in-law is still living alone in the house where she lived when my wife was born. We were very pleased on our last couple of visits to see that her old neighborhood in Toledo still runs about 10 to 1 Biden over Trump yard signs. Her health and resilience are remarkable. I am afraid that if she knew how to use Twitter, she would have been banned by now for expressing views like John is alleged to have done.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Immanentize: That’s the attitude!
Kay
Texas would be an earthquake. I know it’s a longshot but it wouldn’t just change things for the GOP, it would fundamentally change Democratic maps and campaigns.
In a very real way it’s good for the country. For so long we were stuck in this pattern of contesting the upper midwest and Florida as if 60 year old white people were the only people who mattered. That’s not representative of the country.
Ruckus
@sherparick:
This.
Biden/Harris best contribution to all of this is to act actually human, to give a bit of hope that not all politicians are self centered assholes. Because the current malmisadministration certainly can’t give any impression in that universe.
Roger Moore
@sherparick:
I agree that Biden should be focusing on positive ads, and for two reasons:
Ken
BTW for those who were wondering, the package insert for dexamethasone:
Omnes Omnibus
@sherparick:
French military advice. From the master, Napoleon. “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”
PST
@Bobby Thomson:
It’s his number one job. Everything else must take a back seat. I had getting through the first debate without taking a serious hit as a distant second, but I’m not very worried about the others (if there are others). Trump can double dog dare him to risk exposure to COVID all he wants. No one cares.
Danielx
@rikyrah:
One of several reasons Pence elected to become the shitgibbon’s VP candidate – he was going to get beaten like a rented mule in the gubernatorial election that fall. Even Indiana’s benighted citizenry had tired of his evangelical ass.
prufrock
@Betty Cracker: They are exactly the same as a wingnut that you would argue with on social media. There have been times I’ve indulged the devil on my shoulder and gotten out of the boat. I’ll post something, and looking over it I’ll think that certain parts of my point are a little lacking in support, or might lean too much on a potential fallacy.
I’ve never had a wingnut catch any of them! They are blind to logical failings and unsupported arguments because that is all they ever use!
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Omnes Omnibus: Pretty sure the ancient Chinese also were on to that one too…
“Do nothing” is often the strategically sound course of action.
trollhattan
@Betty Cracker:
I continue being baffled by Trump’s ineffective flailing against Biden since he won the nomination, given Biden was the Dem Trump has most feared running against (as evidenced by the Ukraine shenanigans, Hunter Biden being the most corrupt political child evah, etc.).
The best he’s got is old Joe is old? Look in the mirror recently, Donny? [I should not presume there’s a reflection.]
Warblewarble
No need for a negative anti tRUMP ad campaign .He is running that just fine. Need more dogs,a Biden Harris BEST IN SHOW rosette would be wonderful.
WaterGirl
@sanjeevs: To me, the most noteworthy thing about those numbers is that 57 + 41 = 98, so that’s only 2% with no opinion.
Where there were still 6 or 8 or 10% undecided, I found that very worrisome even if the numbers for Biden looked great compared to Trump.
NotMax
Nothing jackals don’t already know but Fred Kaplan lays it out well.
WaterGirl
@JPL: What Michelle Obama video? Gosh, a girl can’t even go to bed at night without missing something!
StringOnAStick
@Citizen Alan: That’s a huge issue but a smaller portion of that 40% identify as nazi. My dad the 88yo RW nut job would punch you in the face of you called him a nazi, even though everything about his political beliefs makes him one. The label is so offensive though that you never know what isolated event can wake people up. My dad never will because his level of authoritarianism would have made him very useful to Hitler or Stalin, but some are opening their eyes.
I was at a socially distanced letters to voters get together last night (we’ve done 600), and one women told us that her RW parents are going to vote straight R but leave the president vote blank. So, even some hard core R’s can no longer stomach him.
Omnes Omnibus
@Citizen Alan: @StringOnAStick: Hoover got nearly 40% of the vote in 1932.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Hungry Joe: You do realize all the WWII films were all done for propaganda purposes, that’s why they are always filled with cool stuff like SS Tiger tanks and not horses pulling WWI era artillery.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
That picture of Trump standing tall and saluting ’cause he beat COVID is interesting; as others noted Trump is clearly trembling with exertion and gasping for air in the video, yet it sounds like The Base has fixated on the still image. Apparently Brent the Maga comedian is right, the Base can only be bothered with single picture and don’t have the attention span for anything more.
Andrew
I would love to see Trump on the balcony fall to the level of Mr. Hilter on the balcony:
https://montypython.fandom.com/wiki/Mr_Hilter_and_the_North_Minehead_by-election
Kay
11!
Those are the shy Biden voters.
ballerat
@John S.:
Thank you for that. I find it inspiring and it puts my dissatisfaction with my own less challenging life in better perspective. Perhaps I am not yet looking in the right places for my own joy and satisfaction. And truthfully, perhaps I have not even tried.
Eunicecycle
I know I’m not the first to say this, but if Trump is defeated he could run again in 2024. Ugh. More reason to make sure he’s so busy with civil and criminal cases he doesn’t have time. And to drive his numbers so low he is humiliated.
Hungry Joe
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: … and that propaganda was effective: I only recently learned about horses in WWII.
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Ken: Of course in Trump’s case how do we tell the difference between side affects of the steroid, and his regular bat-shit behavior??
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Kay: Oh please! Oh Please! Texas would be amazing. Might be time for me to kick a little to the Flip the Texas State House , Act Blue fund! Which benefits ( 9 seats would flip the Texas State house to the Dems ):
Kay
@EmbraceYourInnerCrone:
First day of early (in person) vote in Ohio:
Franklin County is one of the D counties.
Kay
@EmbraceYourInnerCrone:
About a year after Trump was elected I found out he wasn’t that popular in Texas, which immediately made me like Texans more. I know they’re still Republicans but they seem to have SOME standards, so good for them.
Ken
I suspect the campaign strategy meeting went something like this:
STAFF: Mr President sir, we are pretty sure Joe Biden will be the nominee, and have convened this four-hour meeting to develop a multi-part strategy that will identify and hit at all his weaknesses.
TRUMP: He’s Sleepy Joe. We’re done here.
Ken
Ugh for us, but triple-ugh for the Republicans, and quintuple-ugh for any Republicans who were thinking of running. Even if he doesn’t run, he’ll be standing (well, sitting and wheezing) on the sidelines tearing down everything the Republican candidates do.
Assuming as always he’s alive and not in prison, or the really nice memory-care center his kids commit him to.
D Gardner
@Karen S.: Your parents are obviously quality people; look who they produced! Thanks for sharing such a heartfelt and oddly optimistic moment in this madness.
sdhays
@Citizen Alan: True. Our own home-grown Nazis, the white supremacists, composed a much, much higher portion of the electorate.
sdhays
@Ken: Assuming he survives his current illness (and I wouldn’t place any bets on that since he seems to be in charge of his own treatment), I really don’t think he’s going to have it in him to run again for public office, especially in 4 years.
ETA: I’m sure Ivanka and/or Don Jr. are making plans already.
Elizabelle
@Eunicecycle:
Could you be the last to say this? Pretty please?
Don’t understand the borrowing trouble from the future impulse. Isn’t 2020 hard enough??
And yes, legal trouble and trial prep up the wazoo for Trump. Forever until he kicks. Bring it on.
trollhattan
@Elizabelle:
Sure, Carter could have run again in 1984 and George HW Bush could have run again in 1996 but nobody drafted them and they didn’t make themselves available. Trump’s past his sell-by date.
Sasse-Haley 2024?
Elizabelle
@trollhattan: I just want to get through 2020. May the Republicans find themselves radioactive, for a long, long time.
We need to get after their media enablers. Hard. No resurrecting the GOP so quickly this time. They did not get their time in the wilderness.
This is not a 50/50 country.
Noname
@John S
@ballerat: Thank you for saying this. I was trying to reply and couldn’t find the right words but you did.