Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Paranoid Android]

Judge in Pennsylvania asked Trump campaign to provide evidence of mail-in ballot fraud after it sued to prevent state from using drop boxes for mail voting

In 524 pages Trump campaign couldn't cite a single instance of mail-in voting fraud

I know this, you know this, we all know this. Now we can never say there is not one single or handful of voter fraud, but of course the stupid crap Republicans say to make this an issue.

Also I'm glad Pennsylvania did this and I know Trump is suing other states too. Just do the simple "prove it moron" and Trump will not be able to produce evidence.

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Wasn't the Clinton Foundation investigated over and over, while they turned over all their taxes openly?

Remember back int the 2016 General Election Thread here on MMO? That was one of the biggest things these "Woke Independents" always brought up. That the Clinton Foundation is dirty. Yet now thru Trump's charities, universities and whatever else, silence.

[Breccia]

Yet now thru Trump's charities, universities and whatever else, silence.

Of course there's silence. They don't exist.

[Edge-]

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/dona...ry?id=72484552

So uh...I guess Trump's having his brothers funeral at the White House. Not sure why, he's not someone of national importance and there doesn't seem to be much precedent for this.

But hey, if you can do whatever the fuck you want without consequence, why not enjoy it?

[Felya]

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/dona...ry?id=72484552

So uh...I guess Trump's having his brothers funeral at the White House. Not sure why, he's not someone of national importance and there doesn't seem to be much precedent for this.

But hey, if you can do whatever the fuck you want without consequence, why not enjoy it?

Any idea what got him? They are going to have a funeral, where no one mentions what disease killed him?

[Benggaul]

45,341 new cases, again about 10k fewer than last week.

California: 6,055 new cases; 135 deaths
Texas: 5,184 new cases; 204 deaths
Fuck Florida.
Georgia: 2,759 new cases; 55 deaths
North Carolina: 1,881 new cases; 24 deaths
Illinois: 1,832 new cases; 27 deaths
Tennessee: 1,375 new cases; 36 deaths
Ohio: 1,126 new cases; 22 deaths
Missouri: 1,125 new cases; 18 deaths
Nevada: 556 new cases; 38 deaths (new record)

Including Nevada this time just to show that the troubles aren't entirely over there either. New cases have been relatively low for a while, but they're still dealing with the aftermath. The same can be said of Arizona who has been under 1k new cases all week but is still averaging 50 deaths a day. Cases continue to fall (not entirely due to a lack of testing/reporting) as the second half of August speeds along but the US is still contending with a shitton more new cases daily than any "first world" nation should be.

Deaths crept over 1k again, barely, at 1,090--a couple hundred fewer than last Thursday--putting the total at 177,424. Ending August above 180k deaths is all but unavoidable now and it'll likely be closer to 185k all-told. Given that--even with the precautions many school districts have put in place--there's bound to be an uptick nationwide as more and more schools open we are also bound to see an uptick in deaths again. Maybe not so many from the students themselves, but definitely from their older family members as they bring it home and to faculty and staff. @Breccia, take care of yourself.

Stay safe, folks.

[Deja Thoris]

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/dona...ry?id=72484552

So uh...I guess Trump's having his brothers funeral at the White House. Not sure why, he's not someone of national importance and there doesn't seem to be much precedent for this.

But hey, if you can do whatever the fuck you want without consequence, why not enjoy it?

In the grand scheme of things, so what?

[Breccia]

Breccia, take care of yourself.

I'm teaching online courses this semester. However, my own campus, which is in the redneck part of NYState, has a split -- some teachers are doing in-person with extra Cuomo-approved safeguards. Simply put, as a result of this, I'll be teaching from home instead of my office. We're seeing this shit unfold live in colleges whose names we actually recognize, not Bumblefuck Instute of Tracter Repair and Cornhole. I love where I work, I do, but I love not vomiting to death more.

[Benggaul]

In the grand scheme of things, so what?

Well, he's politicizing the death of his own brother, so I guess in the grand scheme of things it's a depth I never even knew existed.

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I'm teaching online courses this semester. However, my own campus, which is in the redneck part of NYState, has a split -- some teachers are doing in-person with extra Cuomo-approved safeguards. Simply put, as a result of this, I'll be teaching from home instead of my office. We're seeing this shit unfold live in colleges whose names we actually recognize, not Bumblefuck Instute of Tracter Repair and Cornhole. I love where I work, I do, but I love not vomiting to death more.

I thought I remembered you saying you were teaching from home, but wasn't entirely sure. I'm glad you have that option.

[Thepersona]

I'm teaching online courses this semester. However, my own campus, which is in the redneck part of NYState, has a split -- some teachers are doing in-person with extra Cuomo-approved safeguards. Simply put, as a result of this, I'll be teaching from home instead of my office. We're seeing this shit unfold live in colleges whose names we actually recognize, not Bumblefuck Instute of Tracter Repair and Cornhole. I love where I work, I do, but I love not vomiting to death more.

My dude, please stay safe. Even with all the precautions, i've seen how idiotic some people can be.

[Breccia]

I thought I remembered you saying you were teaching from home, but wasn't entirely sure.

You shouldn't have been sure, I wasn't sure myself. I wanted to teach from the office, with better access to a stable connection and more materials to use. But after the last few staff meetings, I'm giving up on that idea.

Outbreaks are reported at Michigan State, Auburn and U. of Mississippi in addition to other names I've posted before.

Given the current status of the virus in our country — particularly what we are seeing at other institutions as they re-populate their campus communities — it has become evident to me that, despite our best efforts and strong planning, it is unlikely we can prevent widespread transmission of COVID-19 between students if our undergraduates return to campus,

-- MSU's President

Near as I can tell, after reading these stories, most of the students at these placed didn't really want to go back yet. Again, it bears repeating, this is a clusterfuck. Where I live is one of the safest parts of the country right now, but I'm still not taking chances.

[Deja Thoris]

Well, he's politicizing the death of his own brother, so I guess in the grand scheme of things it's a depth I never even knew existed.

How is it politicising it? Just seems like a convenience / COVID thing to my mind. Of course it can be twisted into some nefarious shit but he does enough of that already that theres no need to twist stuff.

I detest Trump and everything he stands for but it feels like some outrage is manufactured.

[Benggaul]

How is it politicising it? Just seems like a convenience / COVID thing to my mind. Of course it can be twisted into some nefarious shit but he does enough of that already that theres no need to twist stuff.

I detest Trump and everything he stands for but it feels like some outrage is manufactured.

Because the White House is not a place for family funerals. How is it convenient to transfer the body to DC? How is it in any way executed "with COVID" in mind given that there will be more people in the White House--where they should be doing their best to keep it OUT--and not at some private family ceremony? It's not. It's purely a political move made to garner sympathy because he's awful at it. Fuck him and fuck making excuses for him.

[Breccia]

My dude, please stay safe. Even with all the precautions, i've seen how idiotic some people can be.

Yeah, I...yeah. It's worse than that. Usually my parents, now in their seventies, come to visit on a four-day weekend in mid-October. I'm not looking forward to the conversation where I have to tell them "No, if you visit you might literally die".

Okay, enough about me. Back on topic. Pelosi has publicly said she won't be voting on extending unemployment benefits--

"What?"

Because she actually feels she's making progress towards literally anything that both McConnell and Trump might agree on, and therefore, get at least some relief to the old, sick, and poor, while the GOP hands money to companies instead. Incidentally, the PPP program might be partly/fully responsible for so many jobs recovered, but, um, that's ended, so either expect unemployment to go back up or work with Pelosi already. Pelosi also said that trying to pass a solo unemployment bill would fail, and I get that -- the GOP would never let that through, claiming "but then nobody would return to work!" while leaving out the part about there being no jobs.

This is now twice Pelosi has extended an olive branch. She met Trump in the middle reducing $3 trillion to $2 trillion, Trump refused, and would rather take funds out of FEMA to help 11 out of 50 states. "It's better than nothing" isn't even a valid defense when there was a much better offer available, that he refused to take. And now, this. Funny how the "do-nothing" Democrats are the ones actually making plans and bargaining, while Trump is trying to take credit for things going well when all he's done is turn things down.

This, by the way, is what the Party of No looks like. At least in 2014, it was about stopping Obama from taking a good economy and making it better. Now, they're taking a failing economy and holding it down. Has anyone seen McConnell's plan? Has McConnell put one out there? I've personally posted a list of things he said he wouldn't vote for, but there doesn't really seem to be a Senate GOP plan except "Let Trump and Pelosi find something".

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We have more from the USPS. It's exactly what you think it is.

The former vice chairman of the U.S. Postal Service board of governors and inspector general accused Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin of trying to politicize the independent agency during testimony before lawmakers on Thursday.

David Williams, a former Postal Service inspector general who resigned in April as the vice chairman of the agency's board of governors, said that he stepped down from his role because he felt the Treasury Department was trying to make the traditionally apolitical agency a "political tool."

“I resigned from the board of governors because I was convinced that its independent role had been marginalized and that representations regarding an independent Postal Service for the nation were no longer truthful," Williams said during a forum hosted by the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

“By statute, the Treasury was made responsible for providing the Postal Service with a line of credit,” Williams said. “The Treasury was using that responsibility to make demands that I believed would turn the Postal Service into a political tool, ending its long history as an apolitical public infrastructure.”

Williams said that Mnuchin "insisted" that all GOP appointees to the Postal Service board of governors and the Postal Regulatory Commission "kiss the ring" before confirmation and kept close tabs on labor agreements, price increases and volume discounts given to customers like Amazon and UPS.

Williams, one of the board's designated Democratic members, served on the board of governors for nearly two years until his resignation and before that was the agency's inspector general for 13 years.

Williams said that an executive hiring firm was contracted to recommend a candidate for the position of postmaster general, but the GOP donor who ultimately got the job, Louis DeJoy, was instead introduced late in the process by John Barger, another member of the Postal Service's board of governors who was appointed by President Trump.

Williams said that DeJoy "didn't strike me as a serious candidate" and that Barger helped him finish a number of sentences during the interview process.

Just to make that clear: an IG resigned in protest, because Trump was trying to use the USPS as a weapon against people he didn't like, and nominated someone to run it who was so incompetent they sometimes didn't complete sentences.

And he said it all under oath.

[Deja Thoris]

Because the White House is not a place for family funerals.

Thats like, your opinion.

And I'm not making excuses for him. You sound like those twats from 20 years ago with their "If you're not with us you're against us rhetoric" that made it impossible to speak out on the war without it being seen as unpatriotic or extreme.

Gee, wonder why theres no real discourse and only hate when politics comes into the picture. I could just as easily say "Fuck people turning literally everything he does into some mountain", this is a molehill"
I understand getting riled up about COVID / the post office / almost everything else but Jesus Christ, this incessant bleating just polarises people.

[Thepersona]

Yeah, I...yeah. It's worse than that. Usually my parents, now in their seventies, come to visit on a four-day weekend in mid-October. I'm not looking forward to the conversation where I have to tell them "No, if you visit you might literally die".

I understand you. My parents are both elderly people, and my father has high blood pressure AND diabetes.

[Breccia]

Florida is the fifth US state to have 10,000 deaths.

[Benggaul]

Thats like, your opinion.

And I'm not making excuses for him. You sound like those twats from 20 years ago with their "If you're not with us you're against us rhetoric" that made it impossible to speak out on the war without it being seen as unpatriotic or extreme.

Gee, wonder why theres no real discourse and only hate when politics comes into the picture. I could just as easily say "Fuck people turning literally everything he does into some mountain", this is a molehill"
I understand getting riled up about COVID / the post office / almost everything else but Jesus Christ, this incessant bleating just polarises people.

Sure. My opinion. On something that's really fucking obvious. But thanks for the false equivalency, ad hominems and other bullshit.

There's no good reason for him to hold this family funeral at the White House apart from optics. Period. It's the same as him walking to a church to hold a bible upside down. He needs pictures of him looking solemn in front of austere settings instead of his usual clown show.

Tell you what, if there AREN'T photos of him released from the funeral or video of his totally sincere eulogy that only references his brother once or twice in between brags about his own accomplishments I'll come right back on here and apologize directly to you, mmkay? Until then I think the evidence of the past 40 (not a typo) years is proof enough that Trump does nothing without the aim that it will benefit him or his image in some way.

[unfilteredJW]

Thats like, your opinion.

And I'm not making excuses for him. You sound like those twats from 20 years ago with their "If you're not with us you're against us rhetoric" that made it impossible to speak out on the war without it being seen as unpatriotic or extreme.

Gee, wonder why theres no real discourse and only hate when politics comes into the picture. I could just as easily say "Fuck people turning literally everything he does into some mountain", this is a molehill"
I understand getting riled up about COVID / the post office / almost everything else but Jesus Christ, this incessant bleating just polarises people.

He's going to use his brother's corpse as a chance to hold a rally at the White House.

Yeah, it's my opinion too.

[Rasulis]

Birx Stokes Hopes That Key Hospital Data Tracking Will Soon Return To CDC

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working "to build a revolutionary new data system" for COVID-19 hospital data collection that the CDC will run upon completion, according to Dr. Deborah Birx of the White House Coronavirus Task Force.

Birx's comments this week come a month after the Trump administration mandated that hospitals sidestep the agency and send critical information about COVID-19 hospitalizations and equipment to a different federal database managed by the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC.

The July decision was met with an avalanche of criticism from medical institutions and public health groups. Weeks after the new reporting system was rolled out, the data were shown to be rife with inconsistencies and updated erratically.

The announcement sparked hope among some public health advocates that the current, controversial system of reporting hospital data around COVID-19 would soon be canceled and that data collection would be restored to the CDC.

Birx made the remarks Monday during a visit to the Arkansas Governor's Mansion, but she did not provide a time frame for the change.

Having the CDC run data collection again "would help us tremendously in getting back on track with respect to reporting and understanding what's happening with this pandemic across the region, the state and the nation," said Dr. Vineet Chopra, chief of the division of hospital medicine at the University of Michigan and a member of a federal advisory committee on hospital infection prevention.

Last month, the White House told hospitals to stop reporting critical data into a CDC system they had used since the beginning of the pandemic, which was analyzing the data and posting thrice-weekly updates on a CDC website. Instead, hospitals have had to start reporting information on how many intensive care beds were available, for example, and how much personal protective equipment was in stock to a newer system built by a private contractor, TeleTracking, or directly to their state health departments. Both tracks bypass the CDC and provide the data directly to HHS.

Hospitals were given a few days' notice to adopt the reporting change. They were told that compliance with the new reporting tools would determine their access to the federal supply of remdesivir, one of the few drugs proven to work against COVID-19.

"Many hospitals, ours included, have struggled to use the new system," Chopra said, "and also to understand how best to extract data from it and use it to understand capacity, use rates [for protective equipment], and the prevalence of infection."

HHS officials insisted the new system would be quicker and provide more complete data. But an NPR analysis showed that weeks after the data collecting change, information posted to the public HHS site was spotty, incomplete and riddled with errors.

Birx said Monday the information collected through the HHS reporting system is proving useful. "For the first time every day, I can see every new admission across the country, and that has been extraordinarily important," she said.

Still, she described the reporting system as "interim." When the final system is ready, she said, that "[the data reporting function] can be moved back to the CDC, and they can have that regular accountability with hospitals relevant to treatment and PPE."

HHS said Birx's comments do not constitute a shift in policy. "The process for COVID-19 data reporting has not and is not changing," said a statement from Michael Caputo, HHS assistant secretary for public affairs, in an email to NPR.

Last month's abrupt change in data collection caused ruptures to the validity and accuracy of the data during a critical time in the pandemic, said Lisa M. Lee, former chief science officer for public health surveillance at the CDC and now an associate vice president at Virginia Tech.

If the CDC were put back in charge of the data "for the long haul, we would have a much better system," she said, "[because] we have professional surveillance scientists at CDC and public health professionals who have the expertise to handle data that are this complex."

This administration is run by a bunch of morons. In the first place, who in their right mind would change decades old reporting system, flawed as it was, in the middle of a freaking pandemic. Now they are going back to the old system because their new one sucks.

Covid-19 Data Will Once Again Be Collected by CDC, in Policy Reversal
Hospitals will return to reporting new cases to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Trump administration says, after shift to Health and Human Services led to delays and data problems

[Paranoid Android]

JUST IN: Trump says he will send law enforcement, US attorneys to polls in November to prevent voter fraud https://t.co/83axt3nNCD https://t.co/VPemqLh7Ow

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1...021559809?s=19

Hey look at this authoritarian piece of bleep.

So I wonder which polling places will be covered? I'm sure every polling place will be handed evenly (sarcasm).

People want to tell me to get off the ledge that this is likely illegal or a definite overreach or as usual this is Trump just talking. But that is the frickin problem.

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JUST IN: Trump says he will send law enforcement, US attorneys to polls in November to prevent voter fraud https://t.co/83axt3nNCD https://t.co/VPemqLh7Ow

https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1...021559809?s=19

Hey look at this authoritarian piece of bleep.

So I wonder which polling places will be covered? I'm sure every polling place will be handed evenly (sarcasm).

People want to tell me to get off the ledge that this is likely illegal or a definite overreach or as usual this is Trump just talking. But that is the frickin problem.