Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Thekri]

In those posts I never equated BLM with Rioters or BLM with Democrats. And if that's what you saw, then you're delusional as hell.

Again, my point exactly. Your entire "argument" is just "insinuating" things that you don't say out loud. It isn't nearly as clever as you think it is. You go on rants about dangerous mobs, rioting, and threats to "our culture". You shadowbox with nebulous organizations like "Antifa". You refer to "Creepy Joe" without actually defining the gross conspiracy theories that go with it.

If Rioters are not associated with BLM, or democrats, then great. We agree. That makes them irrelevant to a political discussion, and we can safely ignore them entirely, because they don't have a political cause.

So to be clear here, since you hate being tied to anything, are you saying that BLM and rioters are completely separate things? That one is a social and political movement to address a specific issue, and the other is petty criminal activity? Are you definitively stating that Democrats are not supporting rioting? Because if you are saying that, that is fantastic.

But of course you won't say that. Because you never "Say" anything. You just pop in to imply stuff.

[Breccia]

Here's an interesting article whose headline I'll paraphrase.

Biden is too boring for Trump's attacks to work

Here's the real headline:

Trump's throwing everything at Biden but nothing is sticking

Donald Trump and his campaign have spent months deploying a series of attacks on Joe Biden, depicting him as weak, unfit and a tool of leftists.

But as Biden rises in the polls, it's becoming increasingly clear that the attacks are not sticking. As such, Trump's mission to define Biden to voters has proven difficult.

Republican and Democratic strategists who spoke with NBC News said it's been tough sledding for the president in blasting his Democratic rival for several reasons.

First, Biden has remained low-key during the pandemic, while Trump's handling of it is closely examined daily, they said. Biden is also viewed more favorably than 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, who was under investigation during the campaign.

Perhaps most important, Trump was the outsider challenger last time around. Now, he's an incumbent with a record.

*takes victory lap*

"In 2016, he had a very clear message and very clear action items," said Matt Gorman, vice president at the GOP consulting firm Targeted Victory. "He had an elevator pitch on why you should vote for him. He had that in the economy until COVID hit. Now it's harder to find that — especially now that the focus has stuck on him."

He continued, "Biden is barely campaigning, so he's not making many mistakes. Trump was also helped by the fact that Hillary had 20 years of built in negatives."

The Trump campaign spent most heavily on TV ads claiming Biden will be a tool of the far-left, that he does not have the mental competency to be president and that he's the wrong person to deal with China.

Pausing here to address those points.
1) Honestly, you could attempt to defend that one. Biden's now the only Democrat, however, so there's just as much evidence he wants centrist policies as "librul elite commie socialism". The target is even further up a small hill when Trump intentionally pushed, well, socialism. How's it going, farmers, oil and steel industries?
2) There are far more options to show Trump is intentionally/unintentionally ill-informed, slurring or forgetting words, unable to walk, unable to raise a glass of water 18 inches, unable to remember facts and names, unable to change his viewpoint over fifty years, or focus on a topic other than himself for more than 140 character than you'll find for Biden. And the Lincoln Project will find all of them. Probably with the theme of the Benny Hill Show behind them.
3) There is nothing about the current situation with China that portrays Trump as effective. I hope to post more on that later, I just need to, um, call an old friend.

Trump's attacks are worthless if he's more vulnerable than Biden. It's like a werewolf bringing silver weapons to fight a vampire.

And it's going to get worse if Trump tries to show Biden is corrupt by helping his family, because look who's in the motherfucking White House.

Usually, the fear with running a boring but effective candidate is lack of enthusiasm. But, gosh, kind of a lot's changed. One, Bernie and Biden are now basically teaming up. Two, Trump ran the country like a Trump business for three and a half years (next week) and big surprise, it's acting like one. Meanwhile, Biden has more years of effective public service than Trump has mistresses, including fighting off multiple outbreaks which are now orders of magnitude lower than this one, and of course, turning the economy around -- yes, Obama was in charge, yes, Biden will point out he was there when it happened.

Or, he could simply go to each debate and read verbatim the Contract with the American Voter and, after each section, look at the camera and shake his head.

My friends who know me second best are sometimes shocked when I advocate a top-quality vanilla ice cream, such as Breyer's All Natural. "But Breccia!" they say, "you're a chocolate fiend! Why would you ever push for vanilla?" And my response is always the same. "Vanilla is a good flavor. That's why it's in so many desserts, including chocolate desserts. There is a difference between vanilla and plain."

"It is difficult to demonize Joe Biden," said former Rep. Carlos Curbelo, R-Fla. "He is certainly not short on flaws, but throughout his career he has never been considered a villain or a shady character. The president almost needs that kind of foil in order to succeed."

Curbelo said Biden's "affable and conciliatory" nature makes it tough for Trump to land punches.

"It's difficult to attack vanilla," he added.

Biden is vanilla. It goes well with almost every topping -- including hot fudge. Trump, at best, is salted caramel -- overhyped sugar, increasingly flavored by the tears of his rabid fanbase into their single scoop at night.

[DocSavageFan]

We were discussing trump and the republican’s continued bungling of the quarantine situation, involving trump’s complete unwillingness to address the situation until far too late, his penchant for blaming others for his own lack of action or competence, and of course the ever-increasing death toll we have to thank trump for.

You came in spouting off about rioters who in no way were involved with Covid or Trump.

That was the discussion. I know you’ve run out of ways to defend Trump, but it’s best you go back to being a conspicuous silence, rather than a thread derailed.

You evidently didn't read Post #52005. Heresy!

I could have started a thread, but the mods prefer to lump everything that's even remotely Trump related into this thread. Just look at all the threads locked in recent history. Unfortunately, for reasons I don't understand, we can't discuss topics in a more specific manner as they occur in the news...since Trump is typically related to the topic in some way.

[Breccia]

Yet another GOP lawmaker is skipping the Trump ego trip to Jacksonville.

It's not going to be a safe environment

Speaking of Chicago:

We’re doing an all-hands-on-deck strategy, we’re really focussing on the root causes of the violence, but fundamentally we have too many illegal guns on our street and that is a direct result of a failure of federal leadership.

Which is why we need change in November and we need the kind of leadership that Joe Biden is going to bring to our country.

Mayor Lightfoot pointing out the obvious there. Trump has made recent threats against the city due to what he claims is third-world level of crime, but has taken no action to actually do anything because
1) he's even more of a coward than his rabid fanbase
2) he knows the real problem and just wants an easy scapegoat, and
3) he has bigger problems right now, wouldn't you agree?

Illinois is heavily blue. Trump's attention would best be focused nearly literally anywhere else.

[Edge-]

Speaking of Jacksonville - https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/202...ntion-n1233805

The poor event planners will probably be putting together backup plans for an outside convention if they are not allowed to hold theirs indoors.

Long story short, the convention still seems like total chaos and apparently Trump's determination to hold one for the sake of his ego is probably going to lead to people getting pointlessly infected and potentially killed.

[DarkTZeratul]

Trump, at best, is salted caramel -- overhyped sugar, increasingly flavored by the tears of his rabid fanbase into their single scoop at night.

Hey, I will not sit here while you slander salted caramel in that manner.

[Breccia]

So at least --

Speaking of Jacksonville

Dammit! Edge-ninjad!

I'll applaud that move if and when it happens. I mean, look, putting a bunch of people together in any environment is risky. Tulsa, for example, ended up being mostly outdoors -- we all saw the empty seats.

That said, having been even the smallest part of a couple conventions at my much smaller venue, I'm ready to opine that there are going to be a ton of challenges. Outdoors settings are already hard to work with when people can just stroll in/out/through. The RNC can't do that here. This really doesn't feel like something they can put secondary attention to.

Maybe they should take a hint from Houston/Texas' RNC and just move to online. I'm fairly sure Trump, a TV game show host who takes medical advice from other TV game show hosts, knows some people that can handle the telecommunication. Plus, Carlson's on vacation, I'm sure he'd love to be a direct part of this, I mean, more so.

- - - Updated - - -

Trump's CDC head, the Trump employee that works for Trump, says

The time is now. We really need to embrace masking.

If we could get everybody to wear a mask right now I think in four, six, eight weeks we could bring this epidemic under control.

I am heartened to see more and more people now. I'm glad to see the president wear a mask this weekend — the vice president. Clearly in their situation you can easily justify they don't need to because of all the testing around them and they know they're not infected. But we need them to set the example.

Wanna see the video? This is Trump's White House headed by Trump. Why don't y'all listening to Trump's words by proxy, help Trump, and wear the damn mask? Trump asked you to!

[Edge-]

https://findsomethingnew.org/

Ivanka has a new initiative for out of work Americans. Just "Find Something New"! The site has some nice links to existing resources, but absent any federal dollars to actually help people "Find Something New", especially people in areas where jobs aren't readily available, I'm not sure how useful this will be.

Don't worry, though, everyone is absolutely taking the moment to remind Ivanka that she's an unqualified idiot who only "found something new" due to nepotism, where she holds an unelected position and is largely viewed as a non-serious laughing stock by actual world leaders -

[Breccia]

"Find Something New"

"Your daddy will help you with millions in undisclosed free loans to help, and even push foreign governments for your trademarks! What are you waiting for?"

In other news: this is an OP ED but it happens to be an OP I agree with.

America Drank Away Its Children’s Future

Yeah, you know where this is going. I don't need to quote the whole thing, paywall or not.

Many states not only rushed to reopen, they reopened stupidly. Instead of being treated as a cheap, effective way to fight contagion, face masks became a front in the culture war. Activities that posed an obvious risk of feeding the pandemic went unchecked: Large gatherings were permitted, bars reopened.

And the cost of those parties and open bars extends beyond the thousands of Americans who will be killed or suffer permanent health damage as a result of Covid-19’s resurgence. The botched reopening has also endangered something that, unlike drinking in groups, can’t be suspended without doing long-run damage: in-person education.

Some activities hold up fairly well when moved online. I suspect that there will be a lot fewer people flying cross-country to stare at PowerPoints than there were pre-Covid, even once we finally beat this virus.

Education isn’t one of those activities. We now have overwhelming confirmation of something we already suspected: For many, perhaps most students there is no substitute for actually being in a classroom.

But rooms full of students are potential Petri dishes, even if the young are less likely to die from Covid-19 than the old. Other countries have managed to reopen schools relatively safely — but they did so with much lower infection rates than currently prevail in America, and with adequate testing, which we still don’t have in many hot spots.

So we’re now facing a terrible, unnecessary dilemma. If we reopen in-person education, we risk feeding an out-of-control pandemic. If we don’t, we impair the development of millions of American students, inflicting long-term damage on their lives and careers.

For the record, it's not that I don't get the other side to the argument. I understand that businesses were in trouble. But I also understand that your photo album is important to you, but I'll still stop you from running into your burning house to get it.

[Edge-]

https://www.businessinsider.com/russ...sources-2020-7

Russia routinely exploited a US policy of increased information sharing to target Chechen dissidents, according to three law-enforcement and intelligence officials in Europe.

The practice emerged after the Trump administration backed a policy of sharing more secret information with Russia, in hope of strengthening relations.

Sources told Insider Russia routinely sought information on its targets of choice — dissidents who fled the rule of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. The US appears to have received little in return.

It is an open secret that Russia pursues Chechen dissidents and kills them, and sometimes seeks Western help in doing so.

I mean, just leaving this here. It jives with everything we know so far.

[Zan15]

So you think unemployment is going down huh?

Well besides the know problem with the BLS data that should add 2-4% to the unemployment number there is a whole other bucket of "unemployed" not even being tracked and they now make up 44% of the total unemployed.

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/07/09/un...rket-collapse/

Unemployment Claims Hit New Record: 32.9 Million State & Federal. Week 16 of U.S. Labor Market Collapse





On top of all that you still have multiple states that have not even processed federal claims yet.

[kaelleria]

So you think unemployment is going down huh?

Well besides the know problem with the BLS data that should add 2-4% to the unemployment number there is a whole other bucket of "unemployed" not even being tracked and they now make up 44% of the total unemployed.

https://wolfstreet.com/2020/07/09/un...rket-collapse/

Unemployment Claims Hit New Record: 32.9 Million State & Federal. Week 16 of U.S. Labor Market Collapse





On top of all that you still have multiple states that have not even processed federal claims yet.

What's even more fun is the unemployment benefits starting to dry up in many states. Expect to see a ton of evictions, foreclosures, etc...

Even in places that have reopened, a lot of jobs just aren't coming back.

[Zan15]

What's even more fun is the unemployment benefits starting to dry up in many states. Expect to see a ton of evictions, foreclosures, etc...

Even in places that have reopened, a lot of jobs just aren't coming back.

Dry up where? huh?

[Felya]

You evidently didn't read Post #52005. Heresy!

I could have started a thread, but the mods prefer to lump everything that's even remotely Trump related into this thread. Just look at all the threads locked in recent history. Unfortunately, for reasons I don't understand, we can't discuss topics in a more specific manner as they occur in the news...since Trump is typically related to the topic in some way.

Since there are riots under Trump, why would they stop if he is elected again?

[Omega10]

or more to the point started by the cops. like that guy who casually started breaking windows at the auto store, or how palettes of bricks magically appear on street cornors, or the vids of cops smashing their own cars IN FRONT OF PROTESTORS.

It's an effective and time established technique of discrediting protestors.

[kaid]

Speaking of Jacksonville - https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/202...ntion-n1233805

The poor event planners will probably be putting together backup plans for an outside convention if they are not allowed to hold theirs indoors.

Long story short, the convention still seems like total chaos and apparently Trump's determination to hold one for the sake of his ego is probably going to lead to people getting pointlessly infected and potentially killed.

August in florida outside. I am sure that will be a su per enjoyable convention.

[Zan15]

So since we are on the topic of unemployment guess what last payment next week is coming up.

Yup the 600 dollar extra unemployment.


But don't worry the administration has a solution.
Giving $250,000 max to each farmer instead!

I mean 600 dollars is stopping people from working because they make more not working, I wonder in republican and trump's eyes $250k does to farmers?
Not to mention the huge loophole in "family" farms that have been split between a half dozen kids for subsidies reasons, would qualify for over $1 million.

Oh and btw the 250k also has a second "loophole"....Spouses are automatically eligible for crop subsidies, so married couples can collect twice as much as the individual payment limit.
Shit, they better hurry and marry a cousin or something fast.

https://news.yahoo.com/check-trump-f...083031696.html
https://www.agriculture.com/news/bus...-more-possible


Direct farm aid has climbed each year of Trump’s presidency, from $11.5 billion in 2017 to more than $32 billion this year — an all-time high, with potentially far more funding still to come in 2020, amounting to about two-thirds of the cost of the entire Department of Housing and Urban Development and more than the Agriculture Department’s $24 billion discretionary budget, according to a POLITICO analysis. But lawmakers have taken a largely hands-off approach, letting the department decide who gets the money and how much.

USDA is currently distributing $16 billion in farm rescue payments, on top of standard farm bill subsidies, plus another round of trade bailout checks earlier this year. But bipartisan lawmakers are now calling for adding as much as $50 billion to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue’s arsenal in the next stimulus package to help producers stung by supply chain disruptions.

Obama topped out at 13 billion. You know that evil socialist president!

[Edge-]

https://apnews.com/38b6562b7aaa73ea66fb72b06472e05d

Following massive public backlash and on the same day that legal challenges to the order began, the Trump administration and ICE are rescinding the rule that would have kicked out international students from the US if their colleges moved to hosting classes online.

This is a good change, but it shouldn't have massive public backlash and legal challenges for it to be made.

[Breccia]

ICE reverses rule that would kick out F-1 visa students due to schools going online.

The full weight of lawsuits very likely broke their resolve. ICE literally announced it in the courtroom, staring down the double-barrel of Harvard and MIT with the machine-gun of 57 other schools behind them, and 17 states behind them, and a shitload of tech dollars (like Microsoft) behind them.

Fuck that order anyhow. If Trump needed evidence that nobody likes him, he's seeing it unfold in court.

Unrelated: What does Trump's GPA have in common with Trump's GDP?

He had to throw other people's money at both just to get them to almost 3

EDIT: DAMN YOU Edge- !!!!

EDIT EDIT:

This is a good change, but it shouldn't have massive public backlash and legal challenges for it to be made.

See also: "I can't breathe".

[DocSavageFan]

Again, my point exactly. Your entire "argument" is just "insinuating" things that you don't say out loud. It isn't nearly as clever as you think it is. You go on rants about dangerous mobs, rioting, and threats to "our culture". You shadowbox with nebulous organizations like "Antifa". You refer to "Creepy Joe" without actually defining the gross conspiracy theories that go with it.

If Rioters are not associated with BLM, or democrats, then great. We agree. That makes them irrelevant to a political discussion, and we can safely ignore them entirely, because they don't have a political cause.

So to be clear here, since you hate being tied to anything, are you saying that BLM and rioters are completely separate things? That one is a social and political movement to address a specific issue, and the other is petty criminal activity? Are you definitively stating that Democrats are not supporting rioting? Because if you are saying that, that is fantastic.

But of course you won't say that. Because you never "Say" anything. You just pop in to imply stuff.

Consider this...the reason you can't find any quotes where I equated BLM with Rioters or BLM with Democrats is because...wait for it...I never said any such thing.

Please know that your "reality" in this particular matter has no basis in fact and is based purely on what you erroneously imagined to be true. I personally struggle with this kind of low resolution thinking as it's typically based on simplistic, highly polarized stereotypes. Surely you're better than this.

Perhaps Haidt had it right when he said that “Liberals need to be shaken,” and they “simply misunderstand conservatives far more than the other way around.”