Campaign 2020

[Okri]

I'd feel more comfortable believing that is impactful if Gary Peters had a bigger lead

[Big Magilla]

I'm heartened by something I heard on MSNBC yesterday.

In Michigan, a good number of voters who had voted Republican down the down in past elections, but who had decided to vote for Biden while voting Republican down ballot have now decided to vote blue all the way. They are finally disgusted not just by Trump but by the Republicans who do not stand up to him and even more so by the ones that support him to his face but talk about him behind his back who are increasingly seen as the cowards they are.

Michigan voters are especially sensitive right now because of the planned attack on their governor but this is trending nationwide.

[Sabin]

Well, we're eighteen days out from an election. On one side, we have Joe Biden, winning the Allan Lichtman keys quite handily (with Trump losing seven keys) and leading in every swing state as well as narrowing in states that shouldn't be in play. On the other hand, we have Donald Trump... a con man who will do anything in his power to stay President for reasons of ego and motivated self-interest. This election is at once the most foregone conclusion in American history as well as the most baffling and worrisome thing in my life.

Will there be a legitimate Donald Trump comeback? No. Normally, races tighten near the end. Biden is widening his lead across the board. Trump has had scarier months and crueler months, but October has been a floundering month. Hard to see him reversing anything now. Within a week, Trump's taxes came out, he had that horrific debate performance, and contracted COVID, making me wonder if the past five years has just been Icarus' journey into the sun. Add RBG's sudden passing, and Trump's opposition has never been more unified and mobilized.

So, then it's cheating then? Let's say they use suppression. Going by fivethirtyeight, Biden is basically tied in Georgia, ME-2, Ohio, leading by 2% in North Carolina, 3% in Arizona and Florida, 5% in NE-2, 6% in Pennsylvania, 7% in Nevada and Wisconsin, 8% in Michigan and Minnesota, and 10% in New Hampshire. Biden is down by 1% in Iowa and 3% in Texas. To get to 270, Republicans need to suppress at least 5% in seven states (including Nebraska and Maine), plus Pennsylvania, Nevada, or Wisconsin, while defending Iowa and Texas. That's a lot -- and their opposition is very active and funded. Is it even possible for Republicans to suppress enough to win this time? If they just suppress 2% of the vote across the board, Biden wins 319-219 which is basically a recreation of the 2012 election swapping AZ & FL for IA and OH. But (and my memory of the data is a bit fuzzy), I'm not sure the GOP could suppress 2% of the vote in 2012. Of course, the Voting Rights Act was still in effect then...

Let's say they don't use suppression. Let's say they just outright cheat on a state level. Here's a silly question: does Trump have the Republican support to do so? I'm not sure. Recently, Cornyn wrote an op-ed encouraging the President to stop lying. That caught my eye. And Tom Tillis wrote something about how North Carolinians need to elect him to put a check on "The Biden Administration." This feels like that moment we all thought was nigh back in 2016 where down-ballot contenders were essentially told "Do what you have to." With his new justice, maybe McConnell thinks he's gotten all the juice he needs from this lemon? Additionally, that would require the Supreme Court to be lock-step behind Trump's whims like we've really never seen before. In 2000, they moved to stopped a recount to protect the first results. What Trump wants them to do is something different entirely. Did Trump properly vet his three justices to stand behind him no matter what in 2020? I really don't know.

One more question: if Trump relies on all these things going right for him, who is making sure that happens? Jared? Ivanka? Is Trump making these phone calls? He's not a mastermind. His strategy has chaos and a knack for winning the day through a handful of media skills, blind chance, and incompetence of his opponent.

So, eighteen days out, a Trump victory pivots on some combination of voter suppression by over 7% across eight states, sticks and carrots to state elected reps, and the Supreme Court bending the knee.

Basically, the question is this: is Donald Trump stronger than our country's systems of governance?

One more thing... while the country is in a horrible, horrible place, it just sort of feels like we're about to move on. I didn't feel like we were done with Obama in 2012, I didn't feel like we were done with Bush in 2004, and I know that we're not done with Trump while he's alive, but I think we're about done with this iteration.

Right now, I predict that Joe Biden will beat Donald Trump 352-186, winning Ohio but not Georgia. Not a landslide. More than his boss in 2012, less than his boss in 2008, which basically is a total recreation of what we can now see is the Obama-Biden-Harris Democratic Strategy. Without fuckery, it would be higher. The history books will remember Donald Trump as a fluke, not a mastermind.

"I have the best wings!"

[Sabin]

OscarGuy wrote
The strange thing about overturning Roe is that it will ultimately be a big loser for Republicans. Without all of their evangelical bugaboos to flog voters about, their supporters might just say "we've achieved what we wanted, so go fly a kite, Pubes."

No way. Then they'll just move towards outright banning it.

Beyond that, there's no shortage of battlegrounds in which to wage a culture war. The country is getting browner and gayer -- and there are transgenders in our bathrooms!

[OscarGuy]

The strange thing about overturning Roe is that it will ultimately be a big loser for Republicans. Without all of their evangelical bugaboos to flog voters about, their supporters might just say "we've achieved what we wanted, so go fly a kite, Pubes."

Anyway, I see certain high court decisions being codified into law rather than risking them being overturned. Express rules regarding abortion, legal gay marriage, voting rights legislation, marijuana legalization, etc. These are all things that I think Pelosi, Biden, and Schumer will want to enshrine into law to make it all the more difficult for the court to take away. Sure, they might still try to strike down the law, but at that point or if they do overturn Roe (more than 70% of American oppose this) would also give Democrats all the impetus they need to pack the court. It's better to react to an adverse decision in this way earning great respect from the public than to do it before something bad happens and realize that it will be nothing more than a battering ram used against them in 2022.

[Big Magilla]

Yes, it's all of those things but first things first.

[Sonic Youth]

The plot becomes clearer.

The rush to install Barrett as the ninth justice on the Supreme Court isn't about the eventual overturning of Roe v Wade or even the imminent overturning of the Affordable Care Act.

Well no, it's about those things too.

It may be about throwing the election to Trump as well, but it's looking more and more like an unlikely scenario. Republicans know by now that they're going to lose big, so they'd like one final, lasting victory before their power is taken away from them. The Supreme Court battle is worth a temporary loss of executive and congressional power. They can always get those back in a few years, and besides, it's worth any sacrifice to overturn Roe.

[Big Magilla]

The plot becomes clearer.

The rush to install Barrett as the ninth justice on the Supreme Court isn't about the eventual overturning of Roe v Wade or even the imminent overturning of the Affordable Care Act. It's to repeat the 2000 Florida Supreme Court decision to stop the recounting of the Florida vote and give the election to Bush when Gore had won the popular vote and was close to winning the recount in Florida which would have given him the electoral win as well.

Barrett if she wins, and she likely will, will be the third member of Bush's 2000 legal team on the Supreme Court. She'll be ready, willing and able, they think, to replay the 2000 Republican dirty tricks and declare Trump the winner in any and all close races. It was Roberts who edited the contributions of all fifty Republican lawyers who worked on the 2000 brief for presentation to the court with Kavanaugh and Barrett two of the researchers.

This can't be a close election. Biden has to win decisively.

https://www.msnbc.com/all-in/watch/chri ... 3865541682

[OscarGuy]

Unless he dies.

[Sonic Youth]

The South Caroline debate has been cancelled because Graham refused a COVID test.

But the SCOTUS hearings will go on.

[Okri]

The South Caroline debate has been cancelled because Graham refused a COVID test.

[Mister Tee]

I, of course, didn't watch the debate. I'm only going by what other people said. I feel very informed.

Same. My only contact with debates is looking at a few Twitter account reactions.

So, where we are today: The president is COVID-infected and pumped up with drugs that can be mind-altering. He and his doctor claim he's recovering, but no one believes a word they say and there's no empirical evidence. The White House is a COVID cluster on par with that church choir we heard so much about months ago, but no one is allowed to do the tracing that would limit its further spread. Meantime, a militia group in Michigan has been caught trying to kidnap the governor because she DOES take COVID seriously. (Great quote from MI AG Dana Nessel, when asked if she has a strong conspiracy case: "I'll take the weakest conspiracy case over the strongest homicide case.") Oh, and in "the recovering economy" news, first-time unemployment claims once again -- as every week since March -- exceeded the worst week's numbers during the 2008/9 meltdown.

And the part that scares me most? Remember all those people who, during Obama's first months, were out screaming "I want my country back"? They don't find any of this alarming in the least. It's what they wanted.

[Okri]

I, of course, didn't watch the debate. I'm only going by what other people said. I feel very informed.

I laughed in recognition.

[Sonic Youth]

It's simple. Pence needed to broaden the Trump base. This was his only chance to do it, and possibly the last chance in general. He didn't. Kamala probably didn't either, but she didn't need to.

I, of course, didn't watch the debate. I'm only going by what other people said. I feel very informed.

[Sabin]

My sense of the debate is Kamala Harris won but Mike Pence escaped. If you look like you're escaping, you're losing. He's a brilliant bullshitter but I think the country has caught on to the lies. Pence is a very underrated communicator who keeps finding better lines of bullshit to spin than he really should be able to, but it's hard to see how he moves the needle much. I'm sure it's possible to make the case that because he wasn't destroyed, in some way he won. But also a fly landed on his head, he had pink eye (COVID!!!), and generally just looked kinda gross. Maybe we're all just too conditioned to thinking that Trump is bulletproof to realize "Hey, this shit isn't working anymore."

On the other hand, this was Kamala Harris' introduction to the American people and it was a fine one. I think there are areas where she could've done better. There's still something about her abilities that give me a little bit of pause, like the fact that I can occasionally see her mind racing. But she didn't put anybody off and she looked like a President. And if you watch a VP debate and you think "That person is going to be the President someday," that person probably won. I don't love that all her big moments involved telling Mike Pence not to interrupt her but my sense is that Harris could very easily be on every Democratic ticket for the rest of the decade so she'll have plenty of time to grow into her role.

I found the VP debate a little confusing until I realized "Oh, the moderator is again doing a bad job." Susan Page wasn't as visibly feckless as Chris Wallace but she let question after question go un-answered by Mike Pence.