(08-24-2020, 12:43 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Side note, I was mindlessly scrolling through facebook and saw what looked like a pro-Biden ad and the comments section was completely full of people saying what a senile idiot he is and how he has absolutely no chance of winning in 2020. Seems a little odd it would be so unanimous, is that some sort of fakery that looks like a pro-Biden ad that flopped hard or are Trump supporters really bombarding comments sections with such vigor? Don't they have jobs, damn it?

(08-24-2020, 12:43 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Side note, I was mindlessly scrolling through facebook and saw what looked like a pro-Biden ad and the comments section was completely full of people saying what a senile idiot he is and how he has absolutely no chance of winning in 2020. Seems a little odd it would be so unanimous, is that some sort of fakery that looks like a pro-Biden ad that flopped hard or are Trump supporters really bombarding comments sections with such vigor? Don't they have jobs, damn it?

(08-24-2020, 03:26 PM)Truck_1_0_1_ Wrote: It's cyclical. Though for Trump's tweets, there's a guy who is usually top reply, with a very witty response to the Trump tweet, every tweet. It's funny and the same can't be said for the Biden tweets.

(08-24-2020, 09:34 AM)GMDino Wrote: Here is Trump's "agenda"



My source: https://twitter.com/NicoleSganga/status/1297704384286150656

Original Source: https://www.donaldjtrump.com/media/trump-campaign-announces-president-trumps-2nd-term-agenda-fighting-for-you

These “sea cows” don’t moo, but thankfully the West Indian manatee has been brought back from the brink of extinction under @realDonaldTrump’s administration following decades worth of conservation efforts #WildlifeWin pic.twitter.com/IdgrBZm5HO

— US Department of the Interior (@Interior) August 19, 2020

Quote:[url=https://thehill.com/people/donald-trump]President Trump on Friday said he would support seeing a female president in the United States, but quickly added that it should not be Democratic vice presidential nominee Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.).


Trump mocked Harris over her poor performance in the Democratic presidential primary during a campaign rally in New Hampshire.


"And this would be your president, possibly? I don't think so. I don't think so," Trump told a raucous crowd. "You know, I want to see the first woman president also, but I don’t want to see a woman president get into that position the way she’d do it, and she’s not competent."

"They're all saying 'we want Ivanka,'" Trump added, motioning to the crowd and eliciting loud cheers. "I don't blame them."

Trump: You know I want to see the first woman president also but I don’t want to see a woman president get into that position the way she’d do it and she’s not competent. pic.twitter.com/7CpFsE2wuo

— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) August 28, 2020

Harris is the first woman of color nominated to a major party's presidential ticket. She attacked Trump a day earlier over his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, saying he failed at his basic duty of keeping Americans safe.

• Harris delivers virtual call to action to protesters at new march on...
• Jacob Blake's father says he has not heard from Trump
  

Trump has frequently attacked the senator since she was named to the Democratic ticket earlier this month. He has regularly derided her as "nasty," complaining about her tough questioning of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh during Senate Judiciary Committee hearings and citing her criticisms of Joe Biden during the 2019 Democratic debates.


He also entertained a false and racist conspiracy theory about her eligibility for the vice presidency after it was first raised in a Newsweek op-ed.


Trump's dismissal of Harris as a potential future president follows the Republican National Convention, where multiple speakers sought to soften Trump's image and make inroads with female voters, who polls show favor Biden.

Quote:A groundswell of support for a Marion County, Tennessee, principal who ended up in hot water over a social media post about the Democratic presidential ticket will culminate in a support parade on Sunday in his hometown of Whitwell.


David Smith's job as principal at Whitwell Elementary School is in limbo after a complaint was filed earlier this month with the state Department of Education over a social media post Smith made saying Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and running mate Sen. Kamala Harris were "The New Pad Party," labeling Biden with "pee pads," referring to his age, and Harris with "knee pads," a sexual reference.


The post was taken down within minutes but not before some who read it voiced outrage.

Smith met with director of schools Mark Griffith on Aug. 16, issued a letter of apology and Griffith initially agreed to Smith's request for a demotion from principal to an assistant principal position.


However, a complaint was filed with the state the next day that caused school board members to take the matter into closed session with the board's attorney. Griffith said that means he can't discuss the matter in much detail. On Thursday, Griffith said there had been no further action in the school board probe on Smith's post.
Griffith said the system's central office is continuing to get calls and emails fro
m both supporters and critics as Smith's situation "is still being vetted by state and local" officials. For the time being, Smith is working as assistant principal at the school, Griffith said Thursday.


In his Aug. 16 letter, Smith said, "I want to start by sincerely apologizing for any trouble, embarrassment or personal strife that my actions have caused you or the members of the board. My Facebook post was not intended to hurt anyone's feelings or demean any person. It was a meme that I interpreted differently than its intent and by the time I Googled the true meaning of the meme, it was too late."


Smith took the post down "within minutes and apologized on the thread for having posted it," he said in the letter. "It was not what I had thought and not what I believe. I even contacted the few people who I personally knew who commented on the meme and apologized to them individually. I definitely am not a racist, sexist or bully. I love people from all walks of life and embrace love among groups."


The post generated immediate criticism and calls for Smith's firing while others said Smith had a right to his own opinions and free speech. Many critics posting comments on the Times Free Press social media page weren't from Marion County but thought the post was out of line.


"He's an educator! You can't say this kind of stuff and not lose your career," Cleveland, Tennessee, resident Charla Combs Filter wrote in her post.


"You have to keep your political views and religious views to yourself," she wrote. "My sister is a principal and she will be the first to tell youdo not post stuff like this on your page, he should've known better. He's been doing this job a long time."
"I'm not so sure I'd feel comfortable with him being in charge of my children, after that comment," she said, adding, "I hope he doesn't lose his job, cause [sic] I'm sure he will never do [it] again."


Since those developments, many members of the Whitwell and Marion County school community have jumped to Smith's defense, saying they believe the school leader wasn't aware of what the posts meant. Many contend the fact that he removed the post as soon as he learned its offensive reference shows he meant no harm to anyone, supporters contend, and Smith's record of service to his community and school shows his true character.


A private Facebook group called "Citizens in support of David Smith" had more than 1,600 members and hundreds of comments on Thursday. Group members praised the veteran principal and called for the community to rally around him by posting stories and photos on the site and participating in a parade to show him their support Sunday evening.


The plan is for Smith's supporters to line the street in Whitwell as he rides through starting at 5 p.m. CDT Sunday. Masks and social distancing are recommended to avoid the spread of COVID-19. It also happens to be Smith's birthday, supporters note.
"He was my principal in middle school and has been both of my kids' principal at the Elementary school for 7 years now," parent and former Whitwell student Brooke Goforth said in an email to the Times Free Press.
Goforth is one of the administrators of the support page for Smith.


"I can't tell you how many times he has helped me with them being sick and sitting with them while they waited on me, eating lunch with them, helping them when they got hurt," Goforth said. She said Smith helped with concerns over some threats made by another student that led to help for that student.


"His compassion for his students past and present is unprecedented," Goforth said. "He comes to sporting events to support them. He mows the school's grass himself without pay and does projects himself to better the school."


Virginia Henry, another former student, current school parent and longtime acquaintance of Smith, said the principal's misinterpreting of the meme that drew so much fire drew undeserved reaction.


"I personally attended church with Mr. Smith for years. I have been his student, my children attend his school, and I babysat his children in his own home," Henry said in her email to the Times Free Press. "I have never seen anything that was inappropriate out of Mr. Smith."


Henry said Smith's misinterpretation grew from political sentiments regarding the act of kneeling in protest.


"As a Christian, Mr. Smith is somewhat conservative and naturally would share views with the Conservative party," Henry said. "The Liberal party/Democrats have made a practice of kneeling as a protest against our national anthem and anything that they do not agree with. Mr. Smith and many others made the same mistake of thinking that the knee pads reference was a joke about all of the kneeling the liberals have done over the past four years."


Henry said "in her heart" she knows Smith meant no offense toward women.


"I have known him for over 25 years and never seen anything of this nature from him. The whole community is grieving over this. Such a fine man doesn't deserve to have his life torn apart over a naive mistake," Henry said. "He has apologized and is horrified by how the meme was misunderstood. The kids at Whitwell Elementary do not deserve to suffer from this mistake."
Henry said Smith is selfless in his dedication to his community.


"He devotes his personal time and money to the kids at our school to be sure that each of them have the greatest chance of success," Henry said.


Whitwell student grandmother Peggy Hudson said Smith showed his love for children in his community when he made a special effort on a mother's behalf.


"This sweet baby girl lost her mom to cancer in July of 2018," Hudson said in a post on the support page, alongside a photo of her granddaughter.


"Her mothers wish was to see her little girl start to pre-K. Sadly she knew she probably would not live long enough to see that. But she did, thanks to David Smith," Hudson said in the post. "He had a mock 1st day of pre-K so her mother could witness it. He followed this baby around school all day and took pictures so her mother could see the things she did. And this is the kind of man David Smith is!!"

Quote:1) The most important mechanism of economic policy—not the only tool, but the most important—is adjusting the burden of taxation on society’s richest citizens. Lower this level, as Republicans did in 2017, and prosperity will follow. The economy has had a temporary setback, but thanks to the tax cut of 2017, recovery is ready to follow strongly. No further policy change is required, except possibly lower taxes still.
2) The coronavirus is a much-overhyped problem. It’s not that dangerous and will soon burn itself out. States should reopen their economies as rapidly as possible, and accept the ensuing casualties as a cost worth paying—and certainly a better trade-off than saving every last life by shutting down state economies. Masking is useless and theatrical, if not outright counterproductive.

3) Climate change is a much-overhyped problem. It’s probably not happening. If it is happening, it’s not worth worrying about. If it’s worth worrying about, it’s certainly not worth paying trillions of dollars to amend. To the extent it is real, it will be dealt with in the fullness of time by the technologies of tomorrow. Regulations to protect the environment unnecessarily impede economic growth.
4) China has become an economic and geopolitical adversary of the United States. Military spending should be invested with an eye to defeating China on the seas, in space, and in the cyberrealm. U.S. economic policy should recognize that relations with China are zero-sum: When China wins, the U.S. loses, and vice versa.
5) The trade and alliance structures built after World War II are outdated. America still needs partners, of course, especially Israel and maybe Russia. But the days of NATO and the World Trade Organization are over. The European Union should be treated as a rival, the United Kingdom and Japan should be treated as subordinates, and Canada, Australia, and Mexico should be treated as dependencies. If America acts decisively, allies will have to follow whether they like it or not—as they will have to follow U.S. policy on Iran.

6) Health care is a purchase like any other. Individuals should make their own best deals in the insurance market with minimal government supervision. Those who pay more should get more. Those who cannot pay must rely on Medicaid, accept charity, or go without.
7) Voting is a privilege. States should have wide latitude to regulate that privilege in such a way as to minimize voting fraud, which is rife among Black Americans and new immigrant communities. The federal role in voting oversight should be limited to preventing Democrats from abusing the U.S. Postal Service to enable fraud by their voters.
8) Anti-Black racism has ceased to be an important problem in American life. At this point, the people most likely to be targets of adverse discrimination are whites, Christians, and Asian university applicants. Federal civil-rights-enforcement resources should concentrate on protecting them.

9) The courts should move gradually and carefully toward eliminating the mistake made in 1965, when women’s sexual privacy was elevated into a constitutional right.
10) The post-Watergate ethics reforms overreached. We should welcome the trend toward unrestricted and secret campaign donations. Overly strict conflict-of-interest rules will only bar wealthy and successful businesspeople from public service. Without endorsing every particular action by the president and his family, the Trump administration has met all reasonable ethical standards.
11) Trump’s border wall is the right policy to slow illegal immigration; the task of enforcing immigration rules should not fall on business operators. Some deal on illegal immigration must be found. The most important Republican priority in any such deal is to delay as long as possible full citizenship, voting rights, and health-care benefits for people who entered the country illegally.

12) The country is gripped by a surge of crime and lawlessness as a result of the Black Lives Matter movement and its criticism of police. Police misconduct, such as that in the George Floyd case, should be punished. But the priority now should be to stop crime by empowering police.
13) Civility and respect are cherished ideals. But in the face of the overwhelming and unfair onslaught against President Donald Trump by the media and the “deep state,” his occasional excesses on Twitter and at his rallies should be understood as pardonable reactions to much more severe misconduct by others.

So there’s the platform. Why not publish it?

There are two answers to that question, one simple, one more complicated.
The simple answer is that President Trump’s impulsive management style has cast his convention into chaos. The location, the speaking program, the arrangements—all were decided at the last minute. Managing the rollout of a platform as well was just one task too many.

The more complicated answer is that the platform I’ve just described, like so much of the Trump-Republican program, commands support among only a minority of the American people. The platform works (to the extent it does work) by exciting enthusiastic support among Trump supporters; but when stated too explicitly, it invites a backlash among the American majority. This is a platform for a party that talks to itself, not to the rest of the country. And for those purposes, the platform will succeed most to the extent that it is communicated only implicitly, to those receptive to its message.

(08-30-2020, 11:32 AM)GMDino Wrote: Trump and the GOP can't get anything of substance to stick to Biden/Harris (other than the usual personal attacks) so they are resorting to lying.

(08-30-2020, 07:44 AM)grampahol Wrote: If you want to read the real GOP platform read David Frum's article in The Atlantic. He nailed it down tighter than Lincoln's coffin.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/08/new-gop-platform-authoritarianism/615640/

Ehhh...Here it is in case you don't like following random links.

(08-30-2020, 01:00 PM)Dill Wrote: That's what "energizes the base."

There's a clip here of @AdyBarkan, who has ALS and speaks via voice assistance, asking Biden about "re-directing" public safety funding. The clip alters the quote. It splices "for police" into it, using Barkan's artificial voice. https://t.co/WKkbRzlrXF https://t.co/mUysm9YDeQ pic.twitter.com/uofqi9428E

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) August 30, 2020

(08-31-2020, 07:41 AM)Dill Wrote:
Trump's still in trouble in first post-convention polling
https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/30/politics/trump-biden-post-convention-polling/index.html

President Donald Trump wanted a large bounce coming out of the Republican National Convention, and early evidence is that he did not receive one. Trump may have gotten a small bump out of his convention, but he still clearly trails former Vice President Joe Biden.
If later polling data confirms this early evidence, a Trump victory hinges on him becoming the first incumbent in over 70 years to come from behind after trailing following the major party conventions.
The new ABC News/Ipsos poll is especially harsh for Trump. Although it did not poll the horse race, it did poll the candidates' favorability ratings.
Trump's favorable rating stood at 32% in an Ipsos' poll last week. Today, after the Republican National Convention, it stands at 31%.
Biden's favorable rating, meanwhile, was at 45% last week. It's now at 46%.

(08-30-2020, 07:36 PM)GMDino Wrote: Scalise then doubled down and was still lying.

But this is the original answer to the first “yes”:

"I’ve proposed that kind of reform. And by the way, the idea, though - that’s not the same as getting rid of or defunding all the police.” https://t.co/MpucgdxFYH

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) August 30, 2020

(08-31-2020, 08:32 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: RCP hasn't updated their EC map in a while. I will be interested to see some of the state-by-state polling post-convention and with everything going on. National polls from the convention should be coming out this week, and that will be interesting to see the effects on polling.

What the conservatives are harping on right now, though, is the betting odds: https://www.realclearpolitics.com/elections/betting_odds/2020_president/

They put the race at a near neck-and-neck scenario, which isn't at all surprising to be honest. The polling aggregate folks I look at all have it as Biden with a slight edge. This is, and will remain, close.