2020 Presidential Election 3: We're Down To Old White Men...And Fucking Kanye.

[Marmion]

8 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Someone has shown him the ads... 

 

For the record .  https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-coronavirus-rally-remark/ 

[apple1]

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/3/21/21189179/coronavirus-trump-intelligence-reports-warned-pandemic

Quote

US intelligence officials reportedly warned President Donald Trump and Congress about the threats posed by the novel coronavirus beginning in early January — weeks before the White House and lawmakers began implementing stringent public health measures and as the president minimized the threat posed by the virus in his tweets and public statements...

Top health officials first learned of the virus’s spread in China on January 3, US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Friday. Throughout January and February, intelligence officials’ warnings became more and more urgent, according to the Post — and by early February, much of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the CIA’s intelligence reports were dedicated to warnings about Covid-19...

...in late February, when Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said, “It’s not a question of if [community spread] will happen, but when this will happen, and how many people in this country will have severe illnesses,” Trump reportedly responded by calling Azar to complain “that Messonnier was scaring the stock markets,

For the record: No excuses. His response has been even worse than we knew.

[HerNameIsBuffy]

13 hours ago, Marmion said:

For the record .  https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-coronavirus-rally-remark/ 

I don't like when people use hyperbole to mock Trump because there is no need, there is so much quoteable material one doesn't have to weaken  the argument to make things up.

That said, Idk what Snopes' angle is on this, unless they are just splitting hairs ….but when he was saying 15 cases and will soon be down to none in conjunction with the Democrats calling his handling it of a hoax.  That's completely disingenuous.

He was absolutely saying this was NBD and the dems were hyping it up to hurt him even though it was nothing.  Semantics doesn't mean he wasn't trying to downplay the virus and lump in in with the other "hoaxes."

Just because he doesn't understand what the word hoax means doesn't mean he didn't make that inference hard.

[hoipolloi]

On 4/23/2020 at 10:48 AM, fraurosena said:

Well isn't this the ultimate irony? Using Reagan's own words to show why you should vote blue.

That's a good ad. I just hope that it resonates with the surprising number of people, R *and* D, who still worship at the shrine of Saint Ronnie.

[GreyhoundFan]

This may change the race a bit. I hope he pulls votes away from Twitler. "Rep. Justin Amash to seek Libertarian Party nomination for president"

Spoiler

Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan will seek the Libertarian Party’s nomination for president, ending months of speculation that the former Republican would run as an alternative to President Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

“Americans are ready for practical approaches based in humility and trust of the people,” Amash (I-Mich.) tweeted Tuesday evening. Two weeks earlier, he had tweeted that he was looking “closely” at a run, after denouncing a comment Trump made about presidential authority.

Amash, who turned 40 this month, was elected in the 2010 tea party wave and grew increasingly distant from Republicans as the decade went on, fending off a primary challenge from a business-backed conservative in 2014. He was deeply critical of Trump’s 2016 campaign, and even more critical of what the GOP did with control of the legislative and executive branches.

“Things have really taken a turn for the worse, in terms of the growth of libertarianism in Congress,” Amash told The Washington Post in a 2018 interview. “You have some bright spots here and there. But for the most part, the party’s become more nationalistic, more anti-trade.”

In 2019, Amash became the only Republican to call for Trump’s impeachment. Not long after, he left the party and continued to vote against spending bills, while opposing many White House priorities. He faced a tough reelection in his Grand Rapids, Mich.-based district, with Republicans and Democrats both filing against him.

At the same time, Amash faced pressure from members of the Libertarian Party to run for its nomination. The party hit a record high of nearly 4.5 million votes in 2016, with former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson leading the ticket. But there was no obvious favorite for this year’s nomination, with former Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee ending his bid this month and former judge Jim Gray, the party’s 2012 nominee for vice president, probably their best-known candidate.

Johnson welcomed Amash’s candidacy.

“I think it’s terrific,” Johnson said in a text message. “I’d have to think that his candidacy will garner a lot of attention, which will be great for the Libertarian Party.”

It’s unclear whether a bid by Amash would have a greater effect on Biden or on Trump. In 2019, a Detroit News poll found Biden leading Trump in Michigan, a state that has grown more uncertain for the president, by 12 points. With Amash as an option, Biden’s lead shrunk to six points, with some independents and Republicans moving away from the Democrat. But national polling of Amash has been sparse, and it’s unclear how many states the Libertarian Party will attain ballot access in as the coronavirus pandemic makes traditional signature-gathering impossible.

The Libertarian Party is set to meet in Austin over Memorial Day weekend to pick its presidential nominee, with the convention making its choice on May 25. While the pandemic has canceled many political events, the Libertarian Party had not moved the convention, and earlier this week Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced that the state would “reopen” on May 1.

 

[nausicaa]

7 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

This may change the race a bit. I hope he pulls votes away from Twitler. "Rep. Justin Amash to seek Libertarian Party nomination for president"

  Reveal hidden contents

Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan will seek the Libertarian Party’s nomination for president, ending months of speculation that the former Republican would run as an alternative to President Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

“Americans are ready for practical approaches based in humility and trust of the people,” Amash (I-Mich.) tweeted Tuesday evening. Two weeks earlier, he had tweeted that he was looking “closely” at a run, after denouncing a comment Trump made about presidential authority.

Amash, who turned 40 this month, was elected in the 2010 tea party wave and grew increasingly distant from Republicans as the decade went on, fending off a primary challenge from a business-backed conservative in 2014. He was deeply critical of Trump’s 2016 campaign, and even more critical of what the GOP did with control of the legislative and executive branches.

“Things have really taken a turn for the worse, in terms of the growth of libertarianism in Congress,” Amash told The Washington Post in a 2018 interview. “You have some bright spots here and there. But for the most part, the party’s become more nationalistic, more anti-trade.”

In 2019, Amash became the only Republican to call for Trump’s impeachment. Not long after, he left the party and continued to vote against spending bills, while opposing many White House priorities. He faced a tough reelection in his Grand Rapids, Mich.-based district, with Republicans and Democrats both filing against him.

At the same time, Amash faced pressure from members of the Libertarian Party to run for its nomination. The party hit a record high of nearly 4.5 million votes in 2016, with former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson leading the ticket. But there was no obvious favorite for this year’s nomination, with former Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee ending his bid this month and former judge Jim Gray, the party’s 2012 nominee for vice president, probably their best-known candidate.

Johnson welcomed Amash’s candidacy.

“I think it’s terrific,” Johnson said in a text message. “I’d have to think that his candidacy will garner a lot of attention, which will be great for the Libertarian Party.”

It’s unclear whether a bid by Amash would have a greater effect on Biden or on Trump. In 2019, a Detroit News poll found Biden leading Trump in Michigan, a state that has grown more uncertain for the president, by 12 points. With Amash as an option, Biden’s lead shrunk to six points, with some independents and Republicans moving away from the Democrat. But national polling of Amash has been sparse, and it’s unclear how many states the Libertarian Party will attain ballot access in as the coronavirus pandemic makes traditional signature-gathering impossible.

The Libertarian Party is set to meet in Austin over Memorial Day weekend to pick its presidential nominee, with the convention making its choice on May 25. While the pandemic has canceled many political events, the Libertarian Party had not moved the convention, and earlier this week Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced that the state would “reopen” on May 1.

 

Doubtful. Nearly all metrics show it will pull away Never Trumpers and reluctant Dems who would have voted for Biden. 

At this point the Trump camp is basically a die-hard personality cult and the Biden camp is a loose coalition of groups only united in their opposition to Trump. Any third-party candidate will pull votes from Biden, not Trump. And Amash would likely pull a lot of votes in Michigan, which is pretty key to Biden winning. 

I really like Amash. I agree with him on a lot more than I do with Biden (barring the abortion issue). But this is not the time for this. However, he has only said he is opening an exploratory committee to gauge the reaction to his running. Hopefully he is smart enough to see that this is not a good idea. 

[fraurosena]

Joe Biden has issued a statement on the sexual harassment allegation against him:

Statement by Vice President Joe Biden

Quote

April was Sexual Assault Awareness Month. Every year, at this time, we talk about awareness, prevention, and the importance of women feeling they can step forward, say something, and be heard. That belief — that women should be heard — was the underpinning of a law I wrote over 25 years ago. To this day, I am most proud of the Violence Against Women Act. So, each April we are reminded not only of how far we have come in dealing with sexual assault in this country — but how far we still have to go.

When I wrote the bill, few wanted to talk about the issue. It was considered a private matter, a personal matter, a family matter. I didn’t see it that way. To me, freedom from fear, harm, and violence for women was a legal right, a civil right, and a human right. And I knew we had to change not only the law, but the culture.

So, we held hours of hearings and heard from the most incredibly brave women — and we opened the eyes of the Senate and the nation — and passed the law.

In the years that followed, I fought to continually strengthen the law. So, when we took office and President Obama asked me what I wanted, I told him I wanted oversight of the critical appointments in the Office on Violence Against Women at the Department of Justice and I wanted a senior White House Advisor appointing directly to me on the issue. Both of those things happened.

As Vice President, we started the “It’s on Us” campaign on college campuses to send the message loud and clear that dating violence is violence — and against the law.

We had to get men involved. They had to be part of the solution. That’s why I made a point of telling young men this was their problem too — they couldn’t turn a blind eye to what was happening around them — they had a responsibility to speak out. Silence is complicity.

In the 26 years since the law passed, the culture and perceptions have changed but we’re not done yet.

It’s on us, and it’s on me as someone who wants to lead this country. I recognize my responsibility to be a voice, an advocate, and a leader for the change in culture that has begun but is nowhere near finished. So I want to address allegations by a former staffer that I engaged in misconduct 27 years ago.

They aren’t true. This never happened.

While the details of these allegations of sexual harassment and sexual assault are complicated, two things are not complicated. One is that women deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, and when they step forward they should be heard, not silenced. The second is that their stories should be subject to appropriate inquiry and scrutiny.

Responsible news organizations should examine and evaluate the full and growing record of inconsistencies in her story, which has changed repeatedly in both small and big ways.

But this much bears emphasizing.

She has said she raised some of these issues with her supervisor and senior staffers from my office at the time. They — both men and a woman — have said, unequivocally, that she never came to them and complained or raised issues. News organizations that have talked with literally dozens of former staffers have not found one — not one — who corroborated her allegations in any way. Indeed, many of them spoke to the culture of an office that would not have tolerated harassment in any way — as indeed I would not have.

There is a clear, critical part of this story that can be verified. The former staffer has said she filed a complaint back in 1993. But she does not have a record of this alleged complaint. The papers from my Senate years that I donated to the University of Delaware do not contain personnel files. It is the practice of Senators to establish a library of personal papers that document their public record: speeches, policy proposals, positions taken, and the writing of bills.

There is only one place a complaint of this kind could be — the National Archives. The National Archives is where the records are kept at what was then called the Office of Fair Employment Practices. I am requesting that the Secretary of the Senate ask the Archives to identify any record of the complaint she alleges she filed and make available to the press any such document. If there was ever any such complaint, the record will be there.

As a Presidential candidate, I’m accountable to the American people. We have lived long enough with a President who doesn’t think he is accountable to anyone, and takes responsibility for nothing. That’s not me. I believe being accountable means having the difficult conversations, even when they are uncomfortable. People need to hear the truth.

I have spent my career learning from women the ways in which we as individuals and as policy makers need to step up to make their hard jobs easier, with equal pay, equal opportunity, and workplaces and homes free from violence and harassment. I know how critical women’s health issues and basic women’s rights are. That has been a constant through my career, and as President, that work will continue. And I will continue to learn from women, to listen to women, to support women, and yes, to make sure women’s voices are heard.

We have a lot of work to do. From confronting online harassment, abuse, and stalking, to ending the rape kit backlog, to addressing the deadly combination of guns and domestic violence.

We need to protect and empower the most marginalized communities, including immigrant and indigenous women, trans women, and women of color.

We need to make putting an end to gender-based violence in both the United States and around the world a top priority.

I started my work over 25 years ago with the passage of the Violence Against Women Act. As president, I’m committed to finishing the job.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

An excellent op-ed: "Pete Buttigieg: China wants four more years of Trump"

Spoiler

President Trump is resorting to a desperate reelection strategy: To deflect blame for his own failure to address the coronavirus crisis, and in the hope that the public will forget his initial instinct — complete with praise for the “transparency” of China’s pandemic response — he’s doing everything he can to miscast former vice president Joe Biden as Beijing’s “dream candidate.”

On Wednesday, Trump told the Associated Press that “China will do anything they can to have me lose this race.” He made the same claim in the White House East Room on Thursday. He now insists that in a dangerous world, he’s all that stands between China and geopolitical dominance — and that China’s leadership is shaking at the prospect of having to deal with him for four more years.

He’s got it backward. Trump is China’s dream candidate, and its government would be more than happy to deal with him for four more years. In his first term, the president hasn’t brought China to its knees: He’s made it stronger.

Behind its propaganda vaunting “win-win” cooperation and a “community of common destiny,” the Communist Party of China and Chinese President Xi Jinping have long aspired to catch up with and then surpass the United States technologically, economically and militarily. Although China has the world’s No. 2 economy, it has yet to match American strength, innovation, values and alliances. But amid the chaos that Trump has sown, a window has opened for China to undercut those advantages, and to hold out its dictatorship as a more stable and attractive alternative to our sometimes-messy democracy.

The Trump administration has failed to meet the technological challenge posed by China. According to a Council on Foreign Relations task force on innovation and national security, “despite bipartisan support for broad technology competition with Beijing, the White House has failed to work with Congress to increase federal support for basic R&D and has adopted an incremental and limited approach to supporting the development of frontier technologies.” Meanwhile, Trump’s backward immigration policies have threatened our ability to compete for global talent when we need it most. This, at precisely the moment China has surged investment in these areas. According to a Brookings Institution analysis, China has more than quadrupled the number of undergraduate science and engineering degrees granted by its universities, from 360,000 in 2000 to 1.7 million in 2015. According to Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, the Chinese government is probably investing at least as much in artificial intelligence as the United States in a drive to become “the world’s primary AI innovation center” by 2030.

The president’s vaunted “phase one” trade agreement, on the heels of a trade war that cost tens of billions of dollars and pushed many American farmers into bankruptcy, is unlikely to even recoup its own costs, and has made no real progress on the original casus belli: the theft of intellectual property and unfair subsidies. Trump took the heat off while China continues to engage in intellectual property theft and double down on distortionary subsidies in strategically critical technologies, like advanced semiconductors.

Trump has also written China a blank check on human rights abuse. As the world learns more about what is happening in Xinjiang — possibly the largest internment of a religious or ethnic group since World War II — Trump has been silent. When Jewher Ilham, a Uighur activist, was invited to the White House last year, and tried to explain the plight of Uighurs in Xinjiang, the president asked: “Where is that? Where is that in China?” And then he could then only muster this halfhearted assessment: “That’s tough stuff.” And as the Beijing-backed authority in Hong Kong cracked down on protesters in November, Trump said that he was “standing with President Xi.”

No American political figure has done more to weaken our security alliances. For decades, Beijing has railed against what Chinese analysts call “Cold-war relic” and “zero-sum” U.S. alliances. It’s no mystery why they see it that way: America’s historic alliances and partnerships include around two-thirds of the world’s defense investment, forward-positioned troops around the globe, and the economic and political influence that follows. China’s most notable alliance today is its client-state relationship with North Korea. Trump has made a big show of his friendship with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un — with nothing to show for it — while reiterating his long-standing support for withdrawing American troops from South Korea, a long-standing Chinese Communist Party goal. Against allies, Trump has threatened tariffs, turned burden-sharing talks into protection rackets and said that some of our European friends — including countries that fought alongside us in Afghanistan for years — are “worse than China.” Breaking faith with Europe has made it harder for key allies to say no to China’s Huawei as a provider for 5G wireless networks, lest they be seen as buckling to a bullying Trump. With four more years, little will be left of generations of American diplomacy and alliance-building.

The Trump administration has also showed little regard for the nonpartisanship and professionalism that characterize, and sustain, our military. The Navy, already shaken by Trump’s interference in the war-crimes case of Navy SEAL Edward Gallagher, then witnessed the firing of Navy Capt. Brett Crozier for sounding an alarm about the health of the sailors under his command. China’s propaganda apparatus wasted little time in taking advantage, drawing comparisons between Crozier and Li Wenliang, the Chinese physician who was punished, and subsequently died of covid-19, after trying to warn the world about the outbreak.

Finally, Trump has freely surrendered U.S. power and influence in international institutions, withdrawing representation and offering no serious plans for reform. From the U.N. Human Rights Council to the International Telecommunication Union, the American leadership vacuum effectively leaves Beijing to rewrite the rules and standards that could frame ideological and technological competition with China for decades. All this, while China is moving to recast the basic architecture of the Internet and tilt technological standards to favor its own firms and authoritarian values. And Trump’s response to Beijing’s pressure on the World Health Organization has been to threaten to withdraw funding, which would surrender it to even greater Chinese influence.

Trump would have us believe that he, and only he, will defend America from China’s malfeasance. In reality, his incoherence, bluster and, at some critical moments, retreat, have handed Beijing a historic opportunity to assert itself in the global hierarchy. As professor Yan Xuetong, a leading Chinese strategist, has put it, “Trump has undermined the U.S.-led alliance system, which has improved China’s international environment.” Yan has also assessed that “Since Trump took office, China’s relations with U.S. allies including Japan have generally improved. Actually I think China is seeing the best strategic opportunity since the end of the Cold War.” The coronavirus has only raised the stakes. In the present crisis, as Chinese nationalist writer Li Guangman recently put it, Beijing sees a “watershed … dividing the old and new global order.” In other words, more of the same could deliver a decisive advantage for China’s authoritarian model, at the expense of the openness and democracy that America at its best has stood for.

As a strategic competitor, China welcomes a polarized, paralyzed America. Trump’s answer has been a raft of policies that play into China’s long-range plans while lashing out more recently with rhetoric that encourages bigotry and a surge of hate crimes directed against Asian Americans. Beijing sees an opportunity to call into question the American project, and liberal democracy itself. One thing they’re banking on is four more years of Trump.

 

[SPHASH]

13 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

An excellent op-ed: "Pete Buttigieg: China wants four more years of Trump"

  Reveal hidden contents

President Trump is resorting to a desperate reelection strategy: To deflect blame for his own failure to address the coronavirus crisis, and in the hope that the public will forget his initial instinct — complete with praise for the “transparency” of China’s pandemic response — he’s doing everything he can to miscast former vice president Joe Biden as Beijing’s “dream candidate.”

On Wednesday, Trump told the Associated Press that “China will do anything they can to have me lose this race.” He made the same claim in the White House East Room on Thursday. He now insists that in a dangerous world, he’s all that stands between China and geopolitical dominance — and that China’s leadership is shaking at the prospect of having to deal with him for four more years.

He’s got it backward. Trump is China’s dream candidate, and its government would be more than happy to deal with him for four more years. In his first term, the president hasn’t brought China to its knees: He’s made it stronger.

Behind its propaganda vaunting “win-win” cooperation and a “community of common destiny,” the Communist Party of China and Chinese President Xi Jinping have long aspired to catch up with and then surpass the United States technologically, economically and militarily. Although China has the world’s No. 2 economy, it has yet to match American strength, innovation, values and alliances. But amid the chaos that Trump has sown, a window has opened for China to undercut those advantages, and to hold out its dictatorship as a more stable and attractive alternative to our sometimes-messy democracy.

The Trump administration has failed to meet the technological challenge posed by China. According to a Council on Foreign Relations task force on innovation and national security, “despite bipartisan support for broad technology competition with Beijing, the White House has failed to work with Congress to increase federal support for basic R&D and has adopted an incremental and limited approach to supporting the development of frontier technologies.” Meanwhile, Trump’s backward immigration policies have threatened our ability to compete for global talent when we need it most. This, at precisely the moment China has surged investment in these areas. According to a Brookings Institution analysis, China has more than quadrupled the number of undergraduate science and engineering degrees granted by its universities, from 360,000 in 2000 to 1.7 million in 2015. According to Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology, the Chinese government is probably investing at least as much in artificial intelligence as the United States in a drive to become “the world’s primary AI innovation center” by 2030.

The president’s vaunted “phase one” trade agreement, on the heels of a trade war that cost tens of billions of dollars and pushed many American farmers into bankruptcy, is unlikely to even recoup its own costs, and has made no real progress on the original casus belli: the theft of intellectual property and unfair subsidies. Trump took the heat off while China continues to engage in intellectual property theft and double down on distortionary subsidies in strategically critical technologies, like advanced semiconductors.

Trump has also written China a blank check on human rights abuse. As the world learns more about what is happening in Xinjiang — possibly the largest internment of a religious or ethnic group since World War II — Trump has been silent. When Jewher Ilham, a Uighur activist, was invited to the White House last year, and tried to explain the plight of Uighurs in Xinjiang, the president asked: “Where is that? Where is that in China?” And then he could then only muster this halfhearted assessment: “That’s tough stuff.” And as the Beijing-backed authority in Hong Kong cracked down on protesters in November, Trump said that he was “standing with President Xi.”

No American political figure has done more to weaken our security alliances. For decades, Beijing has railed against what Chinese analysts call “Cold-war relic” and “zero-sum” U.S. alliances. It’s no mystery why they see it that way: America’s historic alliances and partnerships include around two-thirds of the world’s defense investment, forward-positioned troops around the globe, and the economic and political influence that follows. China’s most notable alliance today is its client-state relationship with North Korea. Trump has made a big show of his friendship with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un — with nothing to show for it — while reiterating his long-standing support for withdrawing American troops from South Korea, a long-standing Chinese Communist Party goal. Against allies, Trump has threatened tariffs, turned burden-sharing talks into protection rackets and said that some of our European friends — including countries that fought alongside us in Afghanistan for years — are “worse than China.” Breaking faith with Europe has made it harder for key allies to say no to China’s Huawei as a provider for 5G wireless networks, lest they be seen as buckling to a bullying Trump. With four more years, little will be left of generations of American diplomacy and alliance-building.

The Trump administration has also showed little regard for the nonpartisanship and professionalism that characterize, and sustain, our military. The Navy, already shaken by Trump’s interference in the war-crimes case of Navy SEAL Edward Gallagher, then witnessed the firing of Navy Capt. Brett Crozier for sounding an alarm about the health of the sailors under his command. China’s propaganda apparatus wasted little time in taking advantage, drawing comparisons between Crozier and Li Wenliang, the Chinese physician who was punished, and subsequently died of covid-19, after trying to warn the world about the outbreak.

Finally, Trump has freely surrendered U.S. power and influence in international institutions, withdrawing representation and offering no serious plans for reform. From the U.N. Human Rights Council to the International Telecommunication Union, the American leadership vacuum effectively leaves Beijing to rewrite the rules and standards that could frame ideological and technological competition with China for decades. All this, while China is moving to recast the basic architecture of the Internet and tilt technological standards to favor its own firms and authoritarian values. And Trump’s response to Beijing’s pressure on the World Health Organization has been to threaten to withdraw funding, which would surrender it to even greater Chinese influence.

Trump would have us believe that he, and only he, will defend America from China’s malfeasance. In reality, his incoherence, bluster and, at some critical moments, retreat, have handed Beijing a historic opportunity to assert itself in the global hierarchy. As professor Yan Xuetong, a leading Chinese strategist, has put it, “Trump has undermined the U.S.-led alliance system, which has improved China’s international environment.” Yan has also assessed that “Since Trump took office, China’s relations with U.S. allies including Japan have generally improved. Actually I think China is seeing the best strategic opportunity since the end of the Cold War.” The coronavirus has only raised the stakes. In the present crisis, as Chinese nationalist writer Li Guangman recently put it, Beijing sees a “watershed … dividing the old and new global order.” In other words, more of the same could deliver a decisive advantage for China’s authoritarian model, at the expense of the openness and democracy that America at its best has stood for.

As a strategic competitor, China welcomes a polarized, paralyzed America. Trump’s answer has been a raft of policies that play into China’s long-range plans while lashing out more recently with rhetoric that encourages bigotry and a surge of hate crimes directed against Asian Americans. Beijing sees an opportunity to call into question the American project, and liberal democracy itself. One thing they’re banking on is four more years of Trump.

I

 

[SPHASH]

Tara Reade is full of shit.  Why didn't she come forward in 2008 when Biden was running for VP.  It's also been reported that Obama was a very thorough vetter so if Tara filed a complaint Obama would have found it.  

[JMarie]

I am absolutely trying to be sensitive here.  I do realize that sexual assault victims are not comfortable talking about their experiences, and if they do choose to discuss, it often will be months, years, or even decades later.  That being said, I am suspicious of the timing of Reade's announcement. Was she waiting to see if Biden would get the Democratic nomination? Or was it to lessen the focus on Trump's abysmal COVID-19 response? Then I read this... hmmm.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2020/04/29/joe-biden-sexual-assault-allegation-tara-reade-column/3046962001/

Quote

During 2017 when Reade was praising Biden, she was condemning Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s efforts to hijack American democracy in the 2016 election. This changed in November 2018, when Reade trashed the United States as a country of “hypocrisy and imperialism” and “not a democracy at all but a corporate autocracy.” 

Reade’s distaste for America closely tracked her new infatuation with Russia and Putin. She referred to Putin as a “genius” with an athletic prowess that “is intoxicating to American women.” Then there’s this gem: “President Putin has an alluring combination of strength with gentleness. His sensuous image projects his love for life, the embodiment of grace while facing adversity.”

In March 2019, Reade essentially dismissed the idea of Russian interference in the 2016 American presidential election as hype. She said she loved Russia and her Russian relatives — and "like most women across the world, I like President Putin … a lot, his shirt on or shirt off.” 

Though I admit that when Tara Reade's name started popping up in the news, I at first thought it was Tara Reid from the American Pie movies. And it looks like I'm not the only one.

https://nypost.com/2020/05/02/tara-reid-wants-everyone-to-stop-confusing-her-with-tara-reade/

Quote

While Reade made her initial accusations public in March during an interview with podcast host Katie Halper, the media was slow to pick it up. It wasn’t until mid-April that Reid started getting Twitter attacked:

On April 15 @PrimetimePurity wrote: “Tara Reid has had countless opportunities to grow as an actress. She’s been in the industry for more than twenty years. But instead, she insists on starring in five Sharknado movies. Now, she’s claiming that Joe Biden sexually assaulted her. It. Won’t. Work. #Resist.”

 

Edited May 3, 2020 by JMarie
additional stuff!

[AmericanRose]

As a survivor myself, I understand waiting to publicly say anything until someone is in a prominent public office.

But... VP is literally one heartbeat away from President, so... the timing seems strange.

"She referred to Putin as a “genius” with an athletic prowess that “is intoxicating to American women.” 

First, ew. Second, I think that's the way Trump wants to be described.

[RosyDaisy]

So, we have 2 presidential candidates who have accusations of sexual harassment/assault against them.  We're screwed.  The allegations against Biden, whether true or not, have probably just guaranteed 4 more years of Trump.  

Do I believe Tara Reade?  Maybe.  As a victim myself, I don't automatically dismiss any claims of sexual harassment/assault.  It doesn't matter who the victim or the accused are or when the accusations are made.

Again, we're screwed.

[JMarie]

2 hours ago, AmericanRose said:

As a survivor myself, I understand waiting to publicly say anything until someone is in a prominent public office.

Again, why wait until now? Biden was the vice president for eight years.  That's a pretty prominent public office.

[sableduck]

23 hours ago, RosyDaisy said:

So, we have 2 presidential candidates who have accusations of sexual harassment/assault against them.  We're screwed.  The allegations against Biden, whether true or not, have probably just guaranteed 4 more years of Trump.  

Do I believe Tara Reade?  Maybe.  As a victim myself, I don't automatically dismiss any claims of sexual harassment/assault.  It doesn't matter who the victim or the accused are or when the accusations are made.

Again, we're screwed.

I am also not going to automatically dismiss any claims either.  Regardless of this, it’s a fact that Biden has a history of making women uncomfortable.

It irritates me beyond belief that there were so many better Democratic candidates.  

[Alisamer]

2 hours ago, sableduck said:

It irritates me beyond belief that there were so many better Democratic candidates.  

Same. I'm still voting for him, though. Given a choice between "known to make women uncomfortable" and "I just grab them by the pussy" I'll go with Biden.

Edited May 4, 2020 by Alisamer
clarity

[Marmion]

Quote

Governor Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan has spoken out in support of Joe Biden, telling CNN that when it comes to accusations of sexual assault, “not every claim is equal”.

“We need to give people an opportunity to tell their story,” Whitmer said. “Then we have a duty to vet it.”   “Just because you’re a survivor doesn’t mean that every claim is equal,” she argued. “It means we give them the ability to make their case. And then to make a judgment that is informed.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/may/03/gretchen-whitmer-backs-joe-biden-sexual-assault?  

[RosyDaisy]

Is anybody else surprised that Trump more or less defended Biden?  I would think he would pounce on that and drag Biden through the mud.  Also, I hope the allegations are being investigated properly.  To not so so would be very hypocritical and unfair.  Anyway, I'm still voting for Biden.  Trump is just...well...Trump.

Edited May 5, 2020 by RosyDaisy

[GreyhoundFan]

The twitler campaign says the quiet parts out loud:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

An excellent ad:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

I've been clear all along that I'm not Biden's biggest fan. He wasn't in my top five Dem nominees. However, he is now the presumptive nominee and I will vote for him.

I believe Tara Reade has a right to be heard and her information considered. However, some of the things I've read have made me question her. I have little doubt that he probably said (and possibly did) some inappropriate things, nobody else will ever know if things got to the level she is now alleging. 

What I find so questionable is the timing. Biden was very thoroughly vetted for VP. Anything of this level should and would have been brought to light at that time. Now, suddenly when he's in a position to defeat the worst creature to ever take over the US, she comes forward. Also, her team is more than somewhat suspicious:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

This is an interesting article about the social engagement differences in each campaign. The Dems need to step it up, pronto. "The Trailer: I signed up as a Trump supporter, then a Biden supporter. Here's what happened next."

Spoiler

In this edition: Watching 2020 as a super-engaged Trump (and Biden) voter, watching the legal battles over stay-at-home orders, and watching what happens to New York's presidential primary, which may or may not happen.

Guilty pleas just aren't what they used to be, and this is The Trailer.

On the 48th day of quarantine, as traditional presidential campaigning became a gauzy memory, I immersed myself in the worlds created by the campaigns of Joe Biden and President Trump. I downloaded both campaigns' apps — TeamJoe and Trump 2020, respectively — and agreed to get notifications. I created a Twitter list consisting of nothing but official campaign accounts and checked in a few times a day. What I found: The Republican effort was designed to keep supporters energized, inspired and sometimes angry. The Democratic effort was genteel and gave me much less to do.

Signing up for the Trump app subscribed me to not one, but two automated text chains. The first came in from the Trump campaign within seconds of sign-up, informing me that I had just gotten “Reward Access Unlocked,” thus qualifying me to “earn points & meet Pres Trump during the campaign in fall.” One minute later, the Republican National Committee thanked me for joining the “team,” and asked whether I could let the president “know what you think of this week's accomplishments.” 

Following the first link took me back to the Trump campaign page; following the second gave me a yes or no poll on whether I approved of the president, with space to write about why. I didn’t go further than that, but two hours later, the RNC texted with news: “You were 1 of the 25 President Trump selected for a 5X-MATCH EXTENSION! The other 24 patriots already donated, now it's your turn.” 

Not wanting to be left out, I clicked through to a page powered by WinRed, the newish Republican donation portal. A photo of the president pointing at me like Uncle Sam was displayed next to a pitch that had become even more urgent: “This offer is only available for the NEXT HOUR, so you need to act fast. Please contribute ANY AMOUNT in the NEXT HOUR and your gift will be 5X-MATCHED!” A $100 donation button was already colored in, and a box that would have made this a “monthly recurring donation” was already checked. When I tried to click away, a window popped up warning me, in vain, that the offer was about to expire.

All of that happened within two hours. The Biden campaign did not contact me until seven hours after I’d downloaded the app, finally texting me in the late afternoon. “It's Joe Biden and I owe you my sincere thanks, David,” the account wrote. “You all have been so great to this campaign.” (You all?) “I've been calling donors and it's so great to thank people personally. I'm calling more this week who are helping us start May strong. If you aren't a May donor yet, you can chip in here and I might be calling you soon.” 

Following that link, I was offered a shot at “a video call from Joe” and told that the “average gift is only $25.” A form to fill in an exact donation amount was left blank; a box that would make this a one-time donation, not a recurring one, was already checked.

Over the next few days, it was easy to forget that the Biden app existed. Push texts were infrequent, and unlike the Trump app, the Biden app didn't let me track virtual campaign events. (That was on the website.) TeamJoe offered me a few options and news items, all of which directed me from the app back to the campaign website. For 24 hours, the top news item was a new Biden campaign pledge, which I could take, committing myself to “empathy,” “keeping the faith,” “humility,” and “no malarkey,” among other nice things. If I wanted to volunteer, the app made it easier, but not addictive.

Trump 2020 did not let me go so easily. A news feed let me read the latest messaging, just as it would appear to a reporter on the media list, or the campaign's curated tweets, which prioritized big names like campaign manager Brad Parscale. An “engage” button educated me on ways to “fight with President Trump,” from hosting a “MAGA Meet Up” to joining the campaign finance committee as a high-dollar bundler. Sharing the app with a friend would award me 100 points, while sharing any news item to Twitter or Facebook would give me a single point. A good prize, like expedited entry at any to-be-scheduled rallies, cost 25,000 points.

The “gamified” Trump app has made some Democrats nervous, not least because Biden hasn't tried to compete with it. Everything that came from the Trump campaign had an act-fast, as-seen-on-TV feeling; nothing from the Biden campaign did. Biden's campaign texted me a poll (“Are you planning to vote for Joe Biden in the general election in your state?”) and a longer “strategy survey,” asking if I wanted to volunteer and what issues I cared about. 

The Trump campaign and the RNC, in the same time period, invited me to “the Trump 100 Club” (“offer permanently expires in SIX HOURS”), a “2020 sustaining membership” with the campaign, and a poll that claimed the president had closed “ALL borders to Keep America Safe.” (While citizenship applications have been halted, and while resources have been sent to the Mexican border, the nation's borders are not closed.)

All of this fit snugly with the rest of the campaign's other media and messaging. The point of the Trump app, social media accounts and Web TV was not just to keep me informed — it was to replace some of the news I might be getting from other outlets. “Forget the mainstream media,” went one ad that played at the start of the daily Trump video broadcasts. “Get your facts from the source.” 

On the app was a world where the president's agenda was so obviously successful that the media and Democrats had to lie and smear to cover it up. Trump video content was varied but reliable. “War Room Weekly” would deliver updates on campaign organizing and messaging. “Triggered!” brought Donald Trump Jr. together with special guests, for a free-flowing conversation about unfair treatment of conservatives. Shows hosted by presidential daughter-in-law Lara Trump or former Fox News host Kimberly Guilfoyle, Trump Jr.'s girlfriend, had segment/commercial/segment formats that felt just like cable TV. 

Much like swaths of Fox News or the president's increasingly favored outlet, One America News, the shows mixed information about the Trump record with denunciations of a mainstream media that they said refused to cover it fairly. On the “Latinos for Trump” broadcast, derision of “sleepy Joe Biden,” a candidate who can “barely keep his eyes open,” was dispatched with quickly, so the guests could talk about the president's offers to Latino voters — antiabortion policies, border security and, until recently, record low unemployment.

“President Trump built the greatest economy in the history of the world, until the coronavirus artificially interrupted it,” Guilfoyle said.

The Biden campaign had its own programming, but the tone couldn't have been more different. Its own Cinco de Mayo broadcast, “Todos con Biden,” started with a special message from the candidate about how “families belong together.” (Trump himself did not record new content for any of the Trump Web videos I watched.) The content, with guests including actor John Leguizamo and former Labor secretary Hilda Solis, packaged updates on coronavirus infections with condemnations of a president with “values that are unrecognizable to us,” according to Rep. Veronica Escobar of Texas.

I had more company watching Trump content than I did watching Biden content. As of Thursday morning, the Biden campaign's Cinco de Mayo broadcast had clocked 7,000 views on YouTube and 180,000 on Facebook, while the Trump campaign's had clocked 11,000 and 900,000 views, respectively. Trump's campaign has 29 million followers on Facebook, while Biden's has less than 2 million. Biden got a higher percentage of his active supporters to tune in, but Trump had exponentially more supporters to draw from.

In some ways, the Biden campaign is years behind on this kind of engagement. By this point in the 2012 campaign, Obama's team had established a popular video series in which deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter shared good news and debunked Republican attacks. There's no such block-and-tackle effort from the Biden social media experience, apart from the occasional tweet responding to the Trump campaign — and no Trump-style points for helping get the message out.

An episode of “Triggered,” which took its title from Trump Jr.'s best-selling book, makes it hard to imagine why anyone wouldn't vote for the president. Wednesday's episode with Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio and Trump Jr. began with the president's son regretting that he did not do more to defend Michael Flynn, the retired general who resigned as Trump's first national security adviser and pleaded guilty to lying to FBI investigators.

“It's terrible, and no one knows this better than you and the president,” Jordan said. “I mean, what you had to go through, your entire family — the 20 hours you had to sit there, to be interrogated.”

“It was almost 30, but who's counting?” Trump asked. “What's 10 hours of a perjury trap between friends?”

For more than an hour, Trump Jr., Jordan, mixed martial artist and “The Apprentice” contestant Tito Ortiz and former Navy SEAL Rob O'Neill riffed on the news. O'Neill, who famously fired the shot that killed Osama bin Laden, was the first of them to mention the pandemic, in the context of ways that Democrats were trying “to get their party in power” by capitalizing on crisis and division. If I'd read only headlines about the campaign this week, I might have been surprised by the Justice Department's decision to drop the Flynn case. Because I watched “Triggered,” I understood the politics, and how much it meant to Trumpworld, instantly.

Biden's broadcasts didn't really discuss media coverage, which isn't surprising; polling shows that Democratic voters trust mainstream news outlets, and Republican voters don't. The result was that Trump campaign content was more involving, and even gripping, something easy to imagine as a cable TV program. Biden campaign content was not. The Democrat is belatedly staffing up to grow his online presence, but the result may look like what I saw this week: two campaigns operating in different realities, in different tones, with their voters consuming information that the other side will never see.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Because MAGAts don't follow the law:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

This is a good read:

 

[JMarie]

I don't put a lot of faith into polls, but this one makes me smile.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/elections-2020/biden-opens-9-point-lead-over-trump-in-senate-battlegrounds-poll/ar-BB13NxNg?ocid=spartanntp

Quote

Former Vice President Joe Biden has opened up a 9-point lead over President Trump in six states where Republican senators face difficult reelection battles this fall, according to a new poll.

The survey from Hart Research Associates finds Biden at 50 percent and Trump at 41 percent among voters sampled in Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Maine, Montana and North Carolina.

Trump won four of those states in 2016, with the exception of Maine and Colorado. All six states feature vulnerable GOP incumbents: Sens. Marth McSally (Ariz.), Cory Gardner (Colo.), Joni Ernst (Iowa), Susan Collins (Maine), Steve Daines (Mont.) and Thom Tillis (N.C.).

The poll found the Democratic challengers leading the Republican incumbents by a margin of 46 to 41. Republicans currently hold 53 seats in the Senate, meaning Democrats need to flip four to win back a majority.